BUSINESS EXECUTIVES MOVE
FOR VIETNAM PEACE
800 West Picc Boulevard
Los Angeles, California 90015

November 25, 1968

President-elect Richard M. Nixon
Hotel Pierre
5th Avenue and 61st Street
New York, New York 10021

Dear Mr. Nixon:

Dr. Franklin Murphy will be surprised to learn it, but this letter stems from his comments during a lunch meeting several days ago. We were discussing past, present and future American foreign policy and what role (if any) businessmen should play in the determination of our international policy.

At one point Dr. Murphy mentioned the possibility that a President-elect might be pleased to know there were businessmen interested in such matters. Also, that we owe support and encouragement to new leaders. These and other thoughts expressed by Dr. Murphy remained in my mind and now impel me to write this letter.

Dr. Murphy is right. The new President, confronting the challenges you face, should be encouraged and supported. How, I began to wonder, could I be of tangible help?

It might be useful to say that, like yourself, I grew up in Southern California and had the good fortune to progress from extreme poverty to relative affluence. Now I am fortunate enough to own substantial commercial properties which I have developed over the years. I also head an operating company which is quite successful although not large. I mention all this only to indicate how much our country has given me and the good reasons I have to value our way of life.

Because I came to regard the Vietnam War as a costly, tragic mistake, I have willingly spent the last eighteen months helping to organize and promote the activity represented by this letterhead. I want to be candid in telling you also that my strong feelings about the war led me to form Businessmen for McCarthy and serve as national chairman of that group. Perhaps you had occasion to see its advertising in the Wall Street Journal and elsewhere. After the Democratic Convention, I resisted enormous pressures and refused to participate in the Humphrey campaign.

pressures and refused to participate in the Humphrey campaign. and elsewhere. After the Democratic Convention, I resisted anomalous perhaps you had occasion to see its advertising in the Wall Street Journal Businessmen for McCarthy and serve as national chairman of that group. in telling you also that my strong feelings about the war led me to form promote the activity represented by this letterhead. I want to be candid I have willingly spent the last eighteen months helping to organize and because I came to regard the Vietnam War as a costly, tragic mistake,

the good reasons I have to value our way of life. mention all this only to indicate how much our country has given me and an operating company which is quite successful although not large. I commercial properties which I have developed over the years. I also had relative influence. Now I am fortunate enough to own substantial com- California and had the good fortune to progress from extreme poverty to it might be useful to say that, like yourself, I grew up in Southern

could I be of tangible help? You face, should be encouraged and supported. How, I began to wonder, Dr. Murphy is right. The new President, confronting the challenges in my mind and now impel me to write this letter.

leaders. These and other thoughts expressed by Dr. Murphy remained such matters. Also, that we owe support and encouragement to new elect might be pleased to know there were businessmen interested in At one point Dr. Murphy mentioned the possibility that a President-

international policy. role (if any) businessmen should play in the determination of our discussing past, present and future American foreign policy and what from his comments during a lunch meeting several days ago. We were Dr. Franklin Murphy will be surprised to learn it, but this letter stems

Dear Mr. Nixon:

New York, New York 10031
5th Avenue and 61st Street
Hotel Pierre
President-elect Richard W. Nixon

November 22, 1968

Los Angeles, California 90012
800 West 52nd Street
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
BUSINESS EXECUTIVES ONLY

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Vol. 47

JANUARY 1969

No. 2

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

By Henry A. Kissinger

THE peace negotiations in Paris have been marked by the classic Vietnamese syndrome: optimism alternating with bewilderment; euphoria giving way to frustration. The halt to the bombing produced another wave of high hope. Yet it was followed almost immediately by the dispute with Saigon over its participation in the talks. The merits of this issue aside, we must realize that a civil war which has torn a society for twenty years and which has involved the great powers is unlikely to be settled in a single dramatic stroke. Even if there were mutual trust—a commodity not in excessive supply—the complexity of the issues and the difficulty of grasping their interrelationship would make for complicated negotiations. Throughout the war, criteria by which to measure progress have been hard to come by; this problem has continued during the negotiations. The dilemma is that almost any statement about Viet Nam is likely to be true; unfortunately, truth does not guarantee relevance.

The sequence of events that led to negotiations probably started with General Westmoreland's visit to Washington in November 1967. On that occasion, General Westmoreland told a Joint Session of Congress that the war was being won militarily. He outlined "indicators" of progress and stated that a limited withdrawal of American combat forces might be undertaken beginning late in 1968. On January 17, 1968, President Johnson, in his State of the Union address, emphasized that the pacification program—the extension of the control of Saigon into the countryside—was progressing satisfactorily. Sixty-seven percent of the population of South Viet Nam lived in relatively secure areas; the figure was expected to rise. A week later, the Tet offensive overthrew the assumptions of American strategy.

What had gone wrong? The basic problem has been conceptual:

212

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

the tendency to apply traditional maxims of both strategy and "nation-building" to a situation which they did not fit.

American military strategy followed the classic doctrine that victory depended on a combination of control of territory and attrition of the opponent. Therefore, the majority of the American forces was deployed along the frontiers of South Viet Nam to prevent enemy infiltration and in the Central Highlands where most of the North Vietnamese main-force units—those units organized along traditional military lines—were concentrated. The theory was that defeat of the main forces would cause the guerrillas to wither on the vine. Victory would depend on inflicting casualties substantially greater than those we suffered until Hanoi's losses became "unacceptable."

This strategy suffered from two disabilities: (a) the nature of guerrilla warfare; (b) the asymmetry in the definition of what constituted unacceptable losses. A guerrilla war differs from traditional military operation because its key prize is not control of territory but control of the population. This depends, in part, on psychological criteria, especially a sense of security. No positive program can succeed unless the population feels safe from terror or reprisal. Guerrillas rarely seek to hold real estate; their tactic is to use terror and intimidation to discourage coöoperation with constituted authority.

The distribution of the population in Viet Nam makes this problem particularly acute. Over 90 percent of the population live in the coastal plain and the Mekong Delta; the Central Highlands and the frontiers, on the other hand, are essentially unpopulated. Eighty percent of American forces came to be concentrated in areas containing less than 4 percent of the population; the locale of military operations was geographically removed from that of the guerrilla conflict. As North Vietnamese theoretical writings never tired of pointing out, the United States could not hold territory and protect the population simultaneously. By opting for military victory through attrition, the American strategy produced what came to be the characteristic feature of the Vietnamese war: military successes that could not be translated into permanent political advantage. (Even the goal of stopping infiltration was very hard to implement in the trackless, nearly impenetrable jungles along the Cambodian and Laotian frontiers.)

As a result, the American conception of security came to have

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

213

little in common with the experience of the Vietnamese villagers. American maps classified areas by three categories of control, neatly shown in various colors: Government, contested and Viet Cong. The formal criteria were complicated, and depended to an unusual extent on reports by officers whose short terms of duty (barely 12 months) made it next to impossible for them to grasp the intangibles and nuances which constitute the real elements of control in the Vietnamese countryside. In essence, the first category included all villages which contained some governmental authority; "contested" referred to areas slated to be entered by governmental cadres. The American notion of security was a reflection of Western administrative theory; control was assumed to be in the hands of one of the contestants more or less exclusively.

But the actual situation in Viet Nam was quite different; a realistic security map would have shown few areas of exclusive jurisdiction; the pervasive experience of the Vietnamese villager was the ubiquitousness of both sides. Saigon controlled much of the country in the daytime, in the sense that government troops could move anywhere if they went in sufficient force; the Viet Cong dominated a large part of the same population at night. For the villagers, the presence of Government during the day had to be weighed against its absence after dark, when Saigon's cadres almost invariably withdrew into the district or provincial capitals. If armed teams of administrators considered the villages unsafe at night, the villagers could hardly be expected to resist the guerrillas. Thus, the typical pattern in Viet Nam has been dual control, with the villagers complying with whatever force was dominant during a particular part of the day.

The political impact of this dual control was far from symmetrical, however. To be effective, the Government had to demonstrate a very great capacity to provide protection; probably well over 90 percent. The guerrillas' aim was largely negative: to prevent the consolidation of governmental authority. They did not need to destroy all governmental programs; indeed in some areas, they made no effort to interfere with them. They did have to demonstrate a capability to punish individuals who threw in their lot with Saigon. An occasional assassination or raid served to shake confidence for months afterwards.

The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong had another advantage which they used skillfully. American "victories" were empty

214

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

unless they laid the basis for an eventual withdrawal. The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong, fighting in their own country, needed merely to keep in being forces sufficiently strong to dominate the population after the United States tired of the war. We fought a military war; our opponents fought a political one. We sought physical attrition; our opponents aimed for our psychological exhaustion. In the process, we lost sight of one of the cardinal maxims of guerrilla war: the guerrilla wins if he does not lose. The conventional army loses if it does not win. The North Vietnamese used their main forces the way a bullfighter uses his cape —to keep us lunging in areas of marginal political importance.

The strategy of attrition failed to reduce the guerrillas and was in difficulty even with respect to the North Vietnamese main forces. Since Hanoi made no attempt to hold any territory, and since the terrain of the Central Highlands cloaked North Vietnamese movements, it proved difficult to make the opposing forces fight except at places which they chose. Indeed, a considerable majority of engagements came to be initiated by the other side; this enabled Hanoi to regulate its casualties (and ours) at least within certain limits. The so-called "kill-ratios" of United States to North Vietnamese casualties became highly unreliable indicators. Even when the figures were accurate they were irrelevant, because the level of what was "unacceptable" to Americans fighting thousands of miles from home turned out to be much lower than that of Hanoi fighting on Vietnamese soil.

All this caused our military operations to have little relationship to our declared political objectives. Progress in establishing a political base was excruciatingly slow; our diplomacy and our strategy were conducted in isolation from each other. President Johnson had announced repeatedly that we would be ready to negotiate, unconditionally, at any moment, anywhere. This, in effect, left the timing of negotiations to the other side. But short of a complete collapse of the opponent, our military deployment was not well designed to support negotiations. For purposes of negotiating, we would have been better off with 100 percent control over 60 percent of the country than with 60 percent control of 100 percent of the country.

The effort to strengthen Saigon's political control faced other problems. To be effective, the so-called pacification program had to meet two conditions: (a) it had to provide security for the population; (b) it had to establish a political and institutional

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

215

link between the villages and Saigon. Neither condition was ever met: impatience to show "progress" in the strategy of attrition caused us to give low priority to protection of the population; in any event, there was no concept as to how to bring about a political framework relating Saigon to the countryside. As a result, economic programs had to carry an excessive load. In Viet Nam—as in most developing countries—the overwhelming problem is not to buttress but to develop a political framework. Economic progress that undermines the existing patterns of obligation—which are generally personal or feudal—serves to accentuate the need for political institutions. One ironic aspect of the war in Viet Nam is that, while we profess an idealistic philosophy, our failures have been due to an excessive reliance on material factors. The communists, by contrast, holding to a materialistic interpretation, owe many of their successes to their ability to supply an answer to the question of the nature and foundation of political authority.

The Tet offensive brought to a head the compounded weaknesses—or, as the North Vietnamese say, the internal contradictions—of the American position. To be sure, from a strictly military point of view, Tet was an American victory. Viet Cong casualties were very high; in many provinces, the Viet Cong infrastructure of guerrillas and shadow administrators surfaced and could be severely mauled by American forces. But in a guerrilla war, purely military considerations are not decisive: psychological and political factors loom at least as large.

On that level the Tet offensive was a political defeat in the countryside for Saigon and the United States. Two claims had been pressed on the villages. The United States and Saigon had promised that they would be able to protect an ever larger number of villages. The Viet Cong had never made such a claim; they merely asserted that they were the real power and presence in the villages and they threatened retribution upon those who collaborated with Saigon or the United States.

As happened so often in the past, the Viet Cong made their claim stick. Some twenty provincial capitals were occupied. Though the Viet Cong held none (except Hué) for more than a few days, they were there long enough to execute hundreds of Vietnamese on the basis of previously prepared lists. The words "secure area" never had the same significance for Vietnamese civilians as for Americans, but, if the term had any meaning, it

216

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

applied to the provincial and district capitals. This was precisely where the Tet offensive took its most severe toll. The Viet Cong had made a point which far transcended military considerations in importance: there are no secure areas for Vietnamese civilians. This has compounded the already great tendency of the Vietnamese population to await developments and not to commit itself irrevocably to the Saigon Government. The withdrawal of government troops from the countryside to protect the cities and the consequent increase in Viet Cong activity in the villages even in the daytime have served to strengthen this trend. One result of the Tet offensive was to delay—perhaps indefinitely—the consolidation of governmental authority, which in turn is the only meaningful definition of “victory” in guerrilla warfare.

For all these reasons, the Tet offensive marked the watershed of the American effort. Henceforth, no matter how effective our actions, the prevalent strategy could no longer achieve its objectives within a period or with force levels politically acceptable to the American people. This realization caused Washington, for the first time, to put a ceiling on the number of troops for Viet Nam. Denied the very large additional forces requested, the military command in Viet Nam felt obliged to begin a gradual change from its peripheral strategy to one concentrating on the protection of the populated areas. This made inevitable an eventual commitment to a political solution and marked the beginning of the quest for a negotiated settlement. Thus the stage was set for President Johnson's speech of March 31, which ushered in the current negotiations.

## II. THE ENVIRONMENT OF NEGOTIATIONS

Of course, the popular picture that negotiations began in May is only partially correct. The United States and Hanoi have rarely been out of touch since the American commitment in Viet Nam started to escalate. Not all these contacts have been face to face. Some have been by means of public pronouncements. Between 1965 and 1968, the various parties publicly stated their positions in a variety of forums: Hanoi announced Four Points, the NLF put forth Five Points, Saigon advanced Seven Points and the United States—perhaps due to its larger bureaucracy—promulgated Fourteen.

These public pronouncements produced a fairly wide area of apparent agreement on some general principles: that the Geneva

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

217

Accords could form the basis of a settlement, that American forces would be withdrawn ultimately, that the reunification of Viet Nam should come about through direct negotiation between the Vietnamese, that (after a settlement) Viet Nam would not contain foreign bases. The United States has indicated that three of Hanoi's Four Points are acceptable.¹

There is disagreement about the status of Hanoi's forces in the South; indeed, Hanoi has yet to admit that it has forces in the South—though it has prepared a “fall-back position” to the effect that North Vietnamese forces in the South cannot be considered “external.” The role of the NLF is equally in dispute. Saigon rejects a separate political role for the NLF; the NLF considers Saigon a puppet régime. There is no agreement about the meaning of those propositions which sound alike or on how they are to be enforced.

In addition to negotiations by public pronouncements, there have been secret contacts which have been described in many books and articles.² It has been alleged that these contacts have failed because of a lack of imagination or a failure of coordination within our Government. (There have also been charges of deliberate sabotage.) A fair assessment of these criticisms will not be possible for many years. But it is clear that many critics vastly oversimplify the problem. Good will may not always have been present; but even were it to motivate all sides, rapid, dramatic results would be unlikely. For all parties face enormous difficulties. Indeed, the tendency of each side to overestimate the freedom of manœuvre of the other has almost certainly increased distrust. It has caused Hanoi to appear perversely obstinate to Washington and Washington to seem devious to Hanoi.

Both the Hanoi Government and the United States are limited in their freedom of action by the state of mind of the population of South Viet Nam which will ultimately determine the outcome of the conflict. The Vietnamese people have lived under foreign rule for approximately half of their history. They have maintained a remarkable cultural and social cohesion by being finely attuned to the realities of power. To survive, the Vietnamese have had

¹ These are: withdrawal of U.S. forces, the provision of the Geneva agreements calling for neutrality for North and South Viet Nam, and reunification on the basis of popular wishes. The United States has rejected the third point which implies that the internal arrangements for South Viet Nam should be settled on the basis of the NLF program—though the United States has agreed to consider the NLF program among others.

² See, for example, Kraslow and Loory, "The Secret Search for Peace in Vietnam." New York: Random House, 1968.

218

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

to learn to calculate—almost instinctively—the real balance of forces. If negotiations give the impression of being a camouflaged surrender, there will be nothing left to negotiate. Support for the side which seems to be losing will collapse. Thus, all the parties are aware—Hanoi explicitly, for it does not view war and negotiation as separate processes; we in a more complicated bureaucratic manner—that *the way* negotiations are carried out is almost as important as *what* is negotiated. The choreography of how one enters negotiations, what is settled first and in what manner is inseparable from the substance of the issues.

Wariness is thus imposed on the negotiators; a series of deadlocks is difficult to avoid. There are no "easy" issues, for each issue is symbolic and therefore in a way prejudges the final settlement. On its merits, the debate about the site of the conference—extending over a period of four weeks in April and May—was trivial. Judged intellectually, the four weeks were "wasted." But they did serve a useful function: they enabled the United States to let Saigon get used to the idea that there *would* be negotiations and to maintain that it retained control over events. It would not be surprising if Hanoi had a similar problem with the NLF.

The same problem was illustrated by the way the decision to stop the bombing was presented. Within twenty-four hours after announcement of the halt, both Hanoi and Saigon made statements of extraordinary bellicosity, which, taken literally, would have doomed the substantive talks about to begin. But their real purpose was to reassure each side's supporters in the South. Saigon especially has had a difficult problem. It has been pictured by many as perversely stubborn because of its haggling over the status of the NLF. However, to Saigon, the status of the NLF cannot be a procedural matter. For South Viet Nam it has been very nearly the central issue of the war. Washington must bear at least part of the responsibility for underestimating the depth and seriousness of this concern.

The situation confronted by Washington and Hanoi internationally is scarcely less complex. Much of the bitter debate in the United States about the war has been conducted in terms of 1961 and 1962. Unquestionably, the failure at that time to analyze adequately the geopolitical importance of Viet Nam contributed to the current dilemma. But the commitment of 500,000 Americans has settled the issue of the importance of Viet Nam. For what is in-

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

219

volved now is confidence in American promises. However fash-
ionable it is to ridicule the terms "credibility" or "prestige," they
are not empty phrases; other nations can gear their actions to
ours only if they can count on our steadiness. The collapse of the
American effort in Viet Nam would not mollify many critics;
most of them would simply add the charge of unreliability to the
accusation of bad judgment. Those whose safety or national
goals depend on American commitments could only be dismayed.
In many parts of the world—the Middle East, Europe, Latin
America, even Japan—stability depends on confidence in Ameri-
can promises. Unilateral withdrawal, or a settlement which un-
intentionally amounts to the same thing, could therefore lead to
the erosion of restraints and to an even more dangerous inter-
national situation. No American policymaker can simply dismiss
these dangers.

Hanoi's position is at least as complicated. Its concerns are not
global; they are xenophobically Vietnamese (which includes, of
course, hegemonial ambitions in Laos and Cambodia). But Ha-
noi is extraordinarily dependent on the international environment.
It could not continue the war without foreign material assistance.
It counts almost as heavily on the pressures of world public opin-
ion. Any event that detracts from global preoccupations with the
war in Viet Nam thus diminishes Hanoi's bargaining position.
From this point of view, the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia
was a major setback for Hanoi.

Hanoi's margin of survival is so narrow that precise calculation
has become a way of life; caution is almost an obsession. Its bar-
gaining position depends on a fine assessment of international
factors—especially of the jungle of intra-communist relations. In
order to retain its autonomy, Hanoi must manœuvre skillfully
between Peking, Moscow and the NLF. Hanoi has no desire to
become completely dependent on one of the communist giants.
But, since they disagree violently, they reinforce Hanoi's already
strong tendency toward obscurantist formulations. In short, Ha-
noi's freedom of manœuvre is severely limited.

The same is true of the Soviet Union, whose large-scale aid to
Hanoi makes it a semi-participant in the war. Moscow must be
torn by contradictory inclinations. A complete victory for Hanoi
would tend to benefit Peking in the struggle for influence among
the communist parties of the world; it would support the Chinese
argument that intransigence toward the United States is, if not

220

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

without risk, at least relatively manageable. But a defeat of Hanoi would demonstrate Soviet inability to protect "fraternal" communist countries against the United States. It would also weaken a potential barrier to Chinese influence in Southeast Asia and enable Peking to turn its full fury on Moscow. For a long time, Moscow has seemed paralyzed by conflicting considerations and bureaucratic inertia.

Events in Czechoslovakia have reduced Moscow's usefulness even further. We would compound the heavy costs of our pallid reaction to events in Czechoslovakia if our allies could blame it on a quid pro quo for Soviet assistance in extricating us from Southeast Asia. Washington therefore requires great delicacy in dealing with Moscow on the Viet Nam issue. It cannot be in the American interest to add fuel to the already widespread charge that the superpowers are sacrificing their allies to maintain spheres of influence.

This state of affairs would be enough to explain prolonged negotiations progressing through a series of apparent stalemates. In addition, a vast gulf in cultural and bureaucratic style between Hanoi and Washington complicates matters further. It would be difficult to imagine two societies less meant to understand each other than the Vietnamese and the American. History and culture combine to produce almost morbid suspiciousness on the part of the Vietnamese. Because survival has depended on a subtle skill in manipulating physically stronger foreigners, the Vietnamese style of communication is indirect and, by American standards, devious—qualities which avoid a total commitment and an overt test of strength. The fear of being made to look foolish seems to transcend most other considerations. Even if the United States accepted Hanoi's maximum program, the result might well be months of haggling while Hanoi looked for our "angle" and made sure that no other concessions were likely to be forthcoming.

These tendencies are magnified by communist ideology, which defines the United States as inherently hostile, and by Hanoi's experience in previous negotiations with the United States. It may well feel that the Geneva Conferences of 1954 and 1962 (over Laos) deprived it of part of its achievements on the battlefield.

All this produces the particular negotiating style of Hanoi: the careful planning, the subtle, indirect methods, the preference for

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

221

opaque communications which keep open as many options as
possible toward both foe and friend (the latter may seem equally
important to Hanoi). North Viet Nam's diplomacy operates in
cycles of reconnaissance and withdrawal to give an opportunity
to assess the opponent's reaction. This is then followed by an-
other diplomatic sortie to consolidate the achievements of the
previous phase or to try another route. In this sense, many con-
tacts with Hanoi which seemed "abortive" to us, probably served
(from Hanoi's point of view) the function of defining the terrain.
The methods of Hanoi's diplomacy are not very different from
Viet Cong military strategy and sometimes appear just as im-
penetrable to us.

If this analysis is correct, few North Vietnamese moves are ac-
cidental; even the most obtuse communication is likely to serve
a purpose. On the other hand, it is not a style which easily lends
itself to the sort of analysis at which we excel: the pragmatic,
legal dissection of individual cases. Where Hanoi makes a fetish
of planning, Washington is allergic to it. We prefer to deal with
cases as they arise, "on their merits." Pronouncements that the
United States is ready to negotiate do not guarantee that a nego-
tiating position exists or that the U.S. Government has articu-
lated its objectives.

Until a conference comes to be scheduled, two groups in the
American bureaucracy usually combine to thwart the elabora-
tion of a negotiating position: those who oppose negotiations and
those who favor them. The opponents generally equate negotia-
tions with surrender; if they agree to discuss settlement terms at
all, it is to define the conditions of the enemy's capitulation.
Aware of this tendency and of the reluctance of the top echelon to
expend capital on settling disputes which involve no immediate
practical consequences, the advocates of negotiations coöperate
in avoiding the issue. Moreover, delay serves their own purposes
in that it enables them to reserve freedom of action for the con-
ference room.

Pragmatism and bureaucracy thus combine to produce a diplo-
matic style marked by rigidity in advance of formal negotiations
and excessive reliance on tactical considerations once negotia-
tions start. In the preliminary phases, we generally lack a nego-
tiating program; during the conference, bargaining considerations
tend to shape internal discussions. In the process, we deprive
ourselves of criteria by which to judge progress. The over-

222

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

concern with tactics suppresses a feeling for nuance and for
intangibles.

The incompatibility of the American and North Vietnamese
styles of diplomacy produced, for a long time, a massive break-
down of communication—especially in the preliminary phases of
negotiation. While Hanoi was feeling its way toward negotia-
tions, it bent all its ingenuity to avoid clear-cut, formal commit-
ments. Ambiguity permitted Hanoi to probe without giving away
much in return; Hanoi has no peers in slicing the salami very
thin. It wanted the context of events rather than a formal docu-
ment to define its obligations, lest its relations with Peking or
the NLF be compromised.

Washington was unequipped for this mode of communication.
To a government which equates commitments with legally en-
forceable obligations, Hanoi's subtle changes of tense were lit-
erally incomprehensible. In a press conference in February 1968,
President Johnson said, "As near as I am able to detect, Hanoi
has not changed its course of conduct since the very first response
it made. Sometimes they will change 'will' to 'would' or 'shall'
to 'should,' or something of the kind. But the answer is all the
same." A different kind of analysis might have inquired why
Hanoi would open up a channel for a meaningless communi-
cation, especially in the light of a record of careful planning
which made it extremely unlikely that a change of tense would
be inadvertent.

Whatever the might-have-beens, Hanoi appeared to Washing-
ton as devious, deceitful and tricky. To Hanoi, Washington must
have seemed, if not obtuse, then cannily purposeful. In any event,
the deadlock produced by the difference in negotiating style con-
cerned specific clauses less than the philosophical issue of the na-
ture of an international "commitment" or the meaning of "trick-
ery." This problem lay at the heart of the impasse over the
bombing halt.

### III. LESSONS OF THE BOMBING HALT

The bombing halt occupied the first six months of the Paris
talks. The formal positions were relatively straightforward. The
American view was contained in the so-called San Antonio for-
mula which was put forth by President Johnson in September
1967: "The United States is willing to stop all aerial and naval
bombardment of North Viet Nam when this will lead promptly

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS 223

to productive discussions. We, of course, assume that while dis-
cussions proceed, North Viet Nam would not take advantage of
the bombing cessation or limitation." In its main outlines, the
American position remained unchanged throughout the negotia-
tions.

Hanoi's reaction was equally simple and stark. It scored the
obvious debating point that it could guarantee useful but not
"productive" talks since that depended also on the United States.³
But in the main, Hanoi adamantly insisted that the bombing halt
had to be "unconditional." It rejected all American proposals
for reciprocity as put forward, for example, by Secretary Rusk:
respect for the DMZ, no attack on South Vietnamese cities, re-
duction in the level of military operations.

Though this deadlock had many causes, surely a central problem was the difficulty each side had in articulating its real concern. Washington feared "trickery;" it believed that once stopped, the bombing would be politically difficult, if not impossible, to start again even in the face of considerable provocation. Too, it needed some assurance as to how the negotiations would proceed after a bombing halt. Washington was aware that a bombing halt which did not lead rapidly to substantive talks could not be sustained domestically.

The legalistic phrasing of these concerns obscured their real
merit. If bombing were resumed under conditions of great public
indignation, it would be much harder to exercise restraint in the
choice of targets and much more difficult to stop again in order
to test Hanoi's intentions. The frequently heard advice to
"take risks for peace" is valid only if one is aware that the
consequences of an imprudent risk are likely to be escalation
rather than peace.

Hanoi, in turn, had a special reason for insisting on an unconditional end of the bombing. A government as subtle as Hanoi must have known that there are no "unconditional" acts in the relation of sovereign states, if only because sovereignty implies the right to reassess changing conditions unilaterally. But Hanoi has always placed great reliance on the pressures of world opinion; the "illegality" of U.S. bombing was therefore a potent political weapon. Reciprocity would jeopardize this claim; it would suggest that bombing might be justified in some circumstances. Hanoi did not want a formula under which the United States

³ Article by Wilfred Burchett, *The New York Times*, October 21, 1967.

224

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

could resume bombing "legally" by charging violations of an
understanding. Finally, Hanoi was eager to give the impression
to its supporters in the South that it had induced us to stop "un-
conditionally" as a symbol of imminent victory. For the same
reason, it was important to us that both sides in South Viet Nam
believe there had been reciprocity.

As a result, six months were devoted to defining a quid pro quo
which could be represented as unconditional. The issue of the
bombing halt thus raised the question of the nature of an inter-
national commitment. What is the sanction for violation of an
understanding? The United States, for a long time, conducted
itself as if its principal safeguard was a formal, binding commit-
ment by Hanoi to certain restraints. In fact, since no court exists
to which the United States could take Hanoi, the American sanc-
tion was what the United States could do unilaterally should
Hanoi "take advantage" of the bombing pause. Hanoi's fear of
the consequences is a more certain protection against trickery
than a formal commitment. Communicating what we meant by
taking advantage turned out to be more important than eliciting
a formal North Vietnamese response.

The final settlement of the problem seems to have been arrived
at by this procedure. In his address announcing the bombing
halt, President Johnson stressed that Hanoi is clear about our
definition of "take advantage." Hanoi has not formally acknowl-
edged these terms; it has, in fact, insisted that the bombing halt
was unconditional. But Hanoi can have little doubt that the
bombing halt would not survive if it disregarded the points pub-
lically stated by Secretary Rusk and President Johnson.

If the negotiations about the bombing halt demonstrate that
tacit bargaining may play a crucial role in an ultimate settlement,
they also show the extraordinary danger of neglecting the politi-
cal framework. Washington had insisted throughout the negotia-
tions that Saigon participate in the substantive talks which were
to follow a bombing halt. President Johnson, in his speech an-
nouncing the bombing halt, implied that Saigon's participation
satisfied the requirement of the San Antonio formula for "pro-
ductive talks." How we came to insist on a condition which was
basically neither in our interest nor Saigon's cannot be deter-
mined until the records are available—if then. It should have
been clear that the participation of Saigon was bound to raise
the issues of the status of the NLF and the internal structure of

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

225

Viet Nam—issues which, as will be seen below, it is in everybody's interest to defer to as late a stage of the negotiations as possible.

Having made Saigon's participation a test case, we advanced the "your side, our side" formula. Under it, Saigon and the NLF are to participate in the conference. Each side can claim that it is composed of two delegations; its opponent is free to insist that it really deals with only one delegation. Thus the United States does not "recognize" the NLF and insists that Hanoi is its negotiating partner; Hanoi can take a similar view and maintain its refusal to deal formally with Saigon. It is difficult to disentangle from public sources whether Saigon ever agreed to this formula and whether it understood that our formula amounted to giving the NLF equal status.⁴

On the face of it, Saigon's reluctance to accept equal status with the NLF is comprehensible for it tends to affect all other issues, from ceasefire to internal structure. The merits of the dispute aside, the public rift between Saigon and Washington compromised what had been achieved. To split Washington and Saigon had been a constant objective of Hanoi; if the Paris talks turn into an instrument to accomplish this, Hanoi will be tempted to use them for political warfare rather than for serious discussions.

Clearly, there is a point beyond which Saigon cannot be given a veto over negotiations. But equally, it is not preposterous for Saigon to insist on a major voice in decisions affecting its own country. And it cannot strengthen our position in Paris to *begin* the substantive discussions with a public row over the status of a government whose constitutionality we have insistently pressed on the world for the past two years. The impasse has demonstrated that to deal with issues on an ad hoc basis is too risky;

⁴ Clashes with our allies in which both sides claim to have been deceived occur so frequently as to suggest structural causes (see Skybolt, the Non-Proliferation Treaty, now the bombing halt). What seems to be happening is the same bureaucratic deadlock internationally which was noted above within our Government. When an issue is fairly abstract—before there is a prospect for an agreement—our diplomats tend to present our view in a bland, relaxed fashion to the ally whose interests are involved but who is not present at the negotiations. The ally responds equally vaguely for three reasons: (a) he may be misled into believing that no decision is imminent and therefore sees no purpose in making an issue; (b) he is afraid that if he forces the issue the decision will go against him; (c) he hopes the problem will go away because agreement will prove impossible. When agreement seems imminent, American diplomats suddenly go into high gear to gain the acquiescence of the ally. He in turn feels tricked by the very intensity and suddenness of the pressure while we are outraged to learn of objections heretofore not made explicit. This almost guarantees that the ensuing controversy will take place under the most difficult conditions.

(16]

226

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

before we go much further in negotiations, we need an agreed
concept of ultimate goals and how to achieve them.

IV. CEASEFIRE AND COALITION GOVERNMENT

Substantive negotiations confront the United States with a
major conceptual problem: whether to proceed step by step, dis-
cussing each item "on its merits," or whether to begin by attempt-
ing to get agreement about some ultimate goals.

The difference is not trivial. If the negotiations proceed step
by step through a formal agenda, the danger is great that the
bombing halt will turn out to be an admission ticket to another
deadlock. The issues are so interrelated that a partial settlement
foreshadows the ultimate outcome and therefore contains all of
its complexities. Mutual distrust and the absence of clarity as to
final goals combine to produce an extraordinary incentive to sub-
mit all proposals to the most searching scrutiny and to erect
hedges for failure or bad faith.

This is well illustrated by two schemes which public debate
has identified as suitable topics for the next stage of negotiations:
ceasefire and coalition government.

It has become axiomatic that a bombing halt would lead—
almost automatically—to a ceasefire. However, negotiating a
ceasefire may well be tantamount to establishing the precon-
ditions of a political settlement. If there existed a front line
with unchallenged control behind it, as in Korea, the solution
would be traditional and relatively simple: the two sides could
stop shooting at each other and the ceasefire line could follow the
front line. But there are no front lines in Viet Nam; control is not
territorial, it depends on who has forces in a given area and on
the time of day. If a ceasefire permits the Government to move
without challenge, day or night, it will amount to a Saigon vic-
tory. If Saigon is prevented from entering certain areas, it means
in effect partition which, as in Laos, tends toward permanency.
Unlike Laos, however, the pattern would be a crazy quilt, with
enclaves of conflicting loyalties all over the country.

This would involve the following additional problems: (1) It
would lead to an intense scramble to establish predominant con-
trol before the ceasefire went into effect. (2) It would make next
to impossible the verification of any withdrawal of North Viet-
namese forces that might be negotiated; the local authorities in
areas of preponderant communist control would doubtless certify

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

227

that no external forces were present and impede any effort at
international inspection. (3) It would raise the problem of the
applicability of a ceasefire to guerrilla activity in the non-commu-
nist part of the country; in other words, how to deal with the
asymmetry between the actions of regular and of guerrilla forces.
Regular forces operate on a scale which makes possible a rela-
tively precise definition of what is permitted and what is pro-
scribed; guerrilla forces, by contrast, can be effective through
isolated acts of terror difficult to distinguish from normal criminal
activity.

There would be many other problems: who collects taxes and
how, who enforces the ceasefire and by what means. In other
words, a tacit de facto ceasefire may prove more attainable than a
negotiated one. By the same token, a formal ceasefire is likely to
predetermine the ultimate settlement and tend toward partition.
Ceasefire is thus not so much a step toward a final settlement as
a form of it.

This is even more true of another staple of the Viet Nam de-
bate: the notion of a coalition government. Of course, there are
two meanings of the term: as a means of legitimizing partition,
indeed as a disguise for continuing the civil war; or as a "true"
coalition government attempting to govern the whole country. In
the first case, a coalition government would be a façade with
non-communist and communist ministries in effect governing
their own parts of the country. This is what happened in Laos,
where each party in the "coalition government" wound up with
its own armed forces and its own territorial administration. The
central government did not exercise any truly national functions.
Each side carried on its own business—including civil war. But
in Laos, each side controlled contiguous territory, not a series of
enclaves as in South Viet Nam. Too, of all the ways to bring
about partition, negotiations about a coalition government are
the most dangerous because the mere participation of the United
States in talking about it could change the political landscape of
South Viet Nam.

Coalition government is perhaps the most emotionally charged
issue in Viet Nam, where it tends to be identified with the second
meaning: a joint Saigon-NLF administration of the entire coun-
try. There can be no American objection, of course, to direct nego-
tiations between Saigon and the NLF. The issue is whether the
United States should be party to an attempt to *impose* a coali-

228

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

tion government. We must be clear that our involvement in such an effort may well destroy the existing political structure of South Viet Nam and thus lead to a communist takeover.

Some urge negotiations on a coalition government for precisely this reason: as a face-saving formula for arranging the communist political victory which they consider inevitable. But those who believe that the political evolution of South Viet Nam should not be foreclosed by an American decision must realize that the subject of a coalition government is the most thankless and tricky area for negotiation by outsiders.

The notion that a coalition government represents a "compro-
mise" which will permit a new political evolution hardly does jus-
tice to Vietnamese conditions. Even the non-communist groups
have demonstrated the difficulty Vietnamese have in compromis-
ing differences. It is beyond imagination that parties that have
been murdering and betraying each other for 25 years could work
together as a team giving joint instructions to the entire country.
The image of a line of command extending from Saigon into the
countryside is hardly true of the non-communist government in
Saigon. It would be absurd in the case of a coalition government.
Such a government would possess no authority other than that of
each minister over the forces he controlled either through per-
sonal or party loyalty.

To take just one example of the difficulties: Communist min-
isters would be foolhardy in the extreme if they entered Saigon
without bringing along sufficient military force for their pro-
tection. But the introduction of communist military forces into
the chief bastion of governmental strength would change the
balance of political forces in South Viet Nam. The danger of a
coalition government is that it would decouple the non-com-
munist elements from effective control over their armed forces
and police, leaving them unable to defend themselves adequately.

In short, negotiations seeking to impose a coalition from the
outside are likely to change markedly and irreversibly the po-
litical process in South Viet Nam—as Vietnamese who believe
that a coalition government cannot work quickly choose sides.
We would, in effect, be settling the war on an issue least amenable
to outside influence, with respect to which we have the least grasp
of conditions and the long-term implications of which are most
problematical.

This is not to say that the United States should resist an out-

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

229

come freely negotiated among the Vietnamese. It does suggest that any negotiation on this point by the United States is likely to lead either to an impasse or to the collapse of Saigon.

### V. WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

Paradoxical as it may seem, the best way to make progress where distrust is so deep and the issues so interrelated may be to seek agreement on ultimate goals first and to work back to the details to implement them.

This requires an analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of both sides. Hanoi's strength is that it is fighting among its own people in familiar territory, while the United States is fighting far away. As long as Hanoi can preserve some political assets in the South, it retains the prospect of an ultimately favorable political outcome. Not surprisingly, Hanoi has shown a superior grasp of the local situation and a greater capacity to design military operations for political ends. Hanoi relies on world opinion and American domestic pressures; it believes that the unpopularity of the war in Viet Nam will ultimately force an American withdrawal.

Hanoi's weaknesses are that superior planning can substitute for material resources only up to a point. Beyond it, differences of scale are bound to become significant and a continuation of the war will require a degree of foreign assistance which may threaten North Viet Nam's autonomy. This Hanoi has jealously safeguarded until now. A prolonged, even if ultimately victorious war might leave Viet Nam so exhausted as to jeopardize the purpose of decades of struggle.

Moreover, a country as sensitive to international currents as North Viet Nam cannot be reassured by recent developments. The Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia removed Viet Nam as the principal concern of world opinion, at least for a while. Some countries heretofore critical of the United States remembered their own peril and their need for American protection; this served to reduce the intensity of public pressures on America. Hanoi's support of Moscow demonstrated the degree of Hanoi's dependence on the U.S.S.R.; it also may have been intended to forestall Soviet pressures on Hanoi to be more flexible by putting Moscow in Hanoi's debt. Whatever the reason, the vision of a Titoist Viet Nam suddenly seemed less plausible—all the more so as Moscow's justification for the invasion of

230

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

Czechoslovakia can provide a theoretical basis for an eventual Chinese move against North Viet Nam. Finally, the Soviet doctrine according to which Moscow has a right to intervene to protect socialist domestic structures made a Sino-Soviet war at least conceivable. For Moscow's accusations against Peking have been, if anything, even sharper than those against Prague. But in case of a Sino-Soviet conflict, Hanoi would be left high and dry. International crises threatening to overshadow Viet Nam in successive years—the Middle East in 1967; Central Europe in 1968—thus may have convinced Hanoi that time is not necessarily on its side.

American assets and liabilities are the reverse of these. No matter how irrelevant some of our political conceptions or how insensitive our strategy, we are so powerful that Hanoi is simply unable to defeat us militarily. By its own efforts, Hanoi cannot force the withdrawal of American forces from South Viet Nam. Indeed, a substantial improvement in the American military position seems to have taken place. As a result, we have achieved our minimum objective: Hanoi is unable to gain a military victory. Since it cannot force our withdrawal, it must negotiate about it. Unfortunately, our military strength has no political corollary; we have been unable so far to create a political structure that could survive military opposition from Hanoi after we withdraw.

The structure of the negotiation is thus quite different from Korea. There are no front lines with secure areas behind them. In Viet Nam, negotiations do not ratify a military status quo but create a new political reality. There are no unambiguous tests of relative political and military strength. The political situation for both sides is precarious—within Viet Nam for the United States, internationally for Hanoi. Thus it is probable that neither side can risk a negotiation so prolonged as that of Panmunjom a decade and a half ago. In such a situation, a favorable outcome depends on a clear definition of objectives. The limits of the American commitment can be expressed in two propositions: first, the United States cannot accept a military defeat, or a change in the political structure of South Viet Nam brought about by external military force; second, once North Vietnamese forces and pressures are removed, the United States has no obligation to maintain a government in Saigon by force.

American objectives should therefore be (1) to bring about

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

231

a staged withdrawal of external forces, North Vietnamese and American, (2) thereby to create a maximum incentive for the contending forces in South Viet Nam to work out a political agreement. The structure and content of such an agreement must be left to the South Vietnamese. It could take place formally on the national level. Or, it could occur locally on the provincial level where even now tacit accommodations are not unusual in many areas such as the Mekong Delta.

The details of a phased, mutual withdrawal are not decisive for our present purposes and, in any case, would have to be left to negotiations. It is possible, however, to list some principles: the withdrawal should be over a sufficiently long period so that a genuine indigenous political process has a chance to become established; the contending sides in South Viet Nam should commit themselves not to pursue their objectives by force while the withdrawal of external forces is going on; in so far as possible, the definition of what constitutes a suitable political process or structure should be left to the South Vietnamese, with the schedule for mutual withdrawal creating the time frame for an agreement.

The United States, then, should concentrate on the subject of the mutual withdrawal of external forces and avoid negotiating about the internal structure of South Viet Nam for as long as possible. The primary responsibility for negotiating the internal structure of South Viet Nam should be left for direct negotiations among the South Vietnamese. If we involve ourselves deeply in the issue of South Viet Nam's internal arrangements, we shall find ourselves in a morass of complexities subject to two major disadvantages. First, we will be the party in the negotiation least attuned to the subtleties of Vietnamese politics. Second, we are likely to wind up applying the greater part of our pressure against Saigon as the seeming obstacle to an accommodation. The result may be the complete demoralization of Saigon, profound domestic tensions within the United States and a prolonged stalemate or a resumption of the war.

Whatever the approach, the negotiating procedure becomes vital; indeed, it may well determine the outcome and the speed with which it is achieved.

Tying the bombing halt to Saigon's participation in the substantive discussions was probably unwise—all the more so as Hanoi seems to have been prepared to continue bilateral talks.

232

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

The participation of Saigon and the NLF raised issues about status that would have been better deferred; it made a discussion of the internal structure of South Viet Nam hard to avoid. Nevertheless, the principles sketched above, while now more difficult to implement, can still guide the negotiations. The tension between Washington and Saigon can even prove salutary if it forces both sides to learn that if they are to negotiate effectively they must confront the fundamental issues explicitly.

As these lines are being written, the formula for resolving the issue of Saigon's participation in the conference is not yet clear. But the general approach should be the same whatever the eventual compromise.

The best procedure would be to establish three forums. If the South Vietnamese finally appear in Paris—as is probable—the four-sided conference should be looked upon primarily as a plenary session to legitimize the work of two negotiating committees which need not be formally established and could even meet secretly: (a) between Hanoi and the United States, and (b) between Saigon and the NLF. Hanoi and Washington would discuss mutual troop withdrawal and related subjects such as guarantees for the neutrality of Laos and Cambodia. (The formula could be the implementation of the Geneva Accords which have been accepted in principle by both sides.) Saigon and the NLF would discuss the internal structure of South Viet Nam. The third forum would be an international conference to work out guarantees and safeguards for the agreements arrived at in the other committees, including international peacekeeping machinery.

If Saigon continues to refuse the "our side, your side" formula, the same procedure could be followed. The subcommittees would become principal forums and the four-sided plenary session could be eliminated. The international "guaranteeing conference" would not be affected.

To be sure, Saigon, for understandable reasons, has consistently refused to deal with the NLF as an international entity. But if Saigon understands its own interests, it will come to realize that the procedure outlined here involves a minimum and necessary concession. The three-tiered approach gives Saigon the greatest possible control over the issues that affect its own fate; direct negotiations between the United States and the NLF would be obviated. A sovereign government is free to talk to any group

THE VIET NAM NEGOTIATIONS

233

that represents an important domestic power base without there-
by conferring sovereignty on it; it happens all the time in union
negotiations or even in police work.

But why should Hanoi accept such an approach? The answer
is that partly it has no choice; it cannot bring about a withdrawal
of American forces by its own efforts, particularly if the United
States adopts a less impatient strategy—one better geared to
the protection of the population and sustainable with substan-
tially reduced casualties. Hanoi may also believe that the NLF,
being better organized and more determined, can win a political
contest. (Of course, the prerequisite of a settlement is that both
sides think they have a chance to win or at least to avoid losing.)
Above all, Hanoi may not wish to give the United States a
permanent voice in internal South Vietnamese affairs, as it will
if the two-sided approach is followed. It may be reinforced in this
attitude by the belief that a prolonged negotiation about coali-
tion government may end no more satisfactorily from Hanoi's
point of view than did the Geneva negotiations over Viet Nam
in 1954 and Laos in 1962. As for the United States, if it brings
about a removal of external forces and pressures, and if it gains
a reasonable time for political consolidation, it will have done
the maximum possible for an ally—short of permanent occupa-
tion.

To be sure, Hanoi cannot be asked to leave the NLF to the
mercy of Saigon. While a coalition government is undesirable, a
mixed commission to develop and supervise a political process
to reintegrate the country—including free elections—could be
useful. And there must be an international presence to enforce
good faith. Similarly, we cannot be expected to rely on Hanoi's
word that the removal of its forces and pressures from South
Viet Nam is permanent. An international force would be required
to supervise access routes. It should be reinforced by an electronic
barrier to check movements.

A negotiating procedure and a definition of objectives cannot
guarantee a settlement, of course. If Hanoi proves intransigent
and the war goes on, we should seek to achieve as many of our
objectives as possible unilaterally. We should adopt a strategy
which reduces casualties and concentrates on protecting the popu-
lation. We should continue to strengthen the Vietnamese army
to permit a gradual withdrawal of some American forces, and we
should encourage Saigon to broaden its base so that it is stronger

234

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

for the political contest with the communists which sooner or
later it must undertake.

No war in a century has aroused the passions of the conflict in
Viet Nam. By turning Viet Nam into a symbol of deeper re-
sentments, many groups have defeated the objective they pro-
fess to seek. However we got into Viet Nam, whatever the judg-
ment of our actions, ending the war honorably is essential for
the peace of the world. Any other solution may unloose forces
that would complicate prospects of international order. A new
Administration must be given the benefit of the doubt and a
chance to move toward a peace which grants the people of Viet
Nam what they have so long struggled to achieve: an opportunity
to work out their own destiny in their own way.

Page 2

These details are mentioned, Mr. Nixon, to help communicate several points. First, I am far less concerned with party labels or ideological hang-ups than with seeking ways to solve pressing problems which I believe threaten to undermine the vitality of our country. Second, that I have developed an excellent relationship with thousands of business executives around the country in the course of the two activities described. Incidentally, Business Executives Move for Vietnam Peace has always been and still remains non-partisan. Our members believe that Vietnam reflects a foreign policy which should be re-examined in the same objective, analytical spirit which is employed by businessmen who constantly reassess their activities to avoid obsolete concepts, methods or products. I know that our 2400 members are representative of many thousands who share our views but who were reluctant to "put their names on the line" insofar as Vietnam is concerned.

Your statements concerning an "open administration" have impressed me deeply as well as your expressed willingness to engage in dialogue with divergent responsible elements of our society. It therefore occurs to me that the most meaningful support I can offer in this critical formative period of your preparation for leadership is my willingness to communicate clearly and frankly the perspectives and attitudes of the businessmen I represent.

In such a dialogue we may discover that apparent differences are more imagined than real. Perhaps the views I would communicate might even prove helpful to you in dealing with the awesome problems facing our nation and you as its new leader.

Let me add only one thing to a letter already too long. There is nothing I want or need from you personally, Mr. Nixon. But there is much I can hope for in terms of what you might do for our country at a critical time in its history. If the point of view I represent could somehow help you achieve fuller perspective as you prepare to face the challenges ahead, then the opportunity to communicate directly with you would have proved the best way for me to offer the support of which Dr. Murphy so wisely spoke.

If all this prompts you to feel that an hour of your time might be a worthwhile investment, I shall be in Washington, D.C. December 2, 3, and 4 and in New York City December 5 through December 12 and would gladly make myself available at your convenience. While I am travelling I can always be reached through my secretary, Miss Katherine Dobbs, in Los Angeles at (213) 748-0231.

HW/d

cc: Dr. Franklin D. Murphy

cc: Dr. Franklin D. Murphry
HW\q

Harold Willens

Sincerely yours,

Miss Katherine Doppa, in Los Angeles at (513) 748-0531.
convenience. While I am travelling I can always be reached through my secretary,
December 3 through December 15 and would gladly make myself available at your
ment, I shall be in Washington, D.C. December 2, 3, and 4 and in New York City
It all this prompts you to feel that an hour of your time might be a worthwhile invest-
wise spoke.

would have proved the best way for me to offer the support of which Dr. Murphry so
to face the challenges ahead, then the opportunity to communicate directly with you
view I represent could somehow help you achieve fuller perspective as you prepare
what you might do for our country at a critical time in its history. If the point of
need from you personally, Mr. Nixon. But there is much I can hope for in terms of
Let me add only one thing to a letter already too long. There is nothing I want or
dealing with the awesome problems facing our nation and you as its new leader.
Perhaps the views I would communicate might even prove helpful to you in
real. In such a dialogue we may discover that apparent differences are more imagined than
businessmen I represent.

willingness to communicate clearly and frankly the perspectives and attitudes of the
I can offer in this critical formative period of your preparation for leadership is my
elements of our society. It therefore occurs to me that the most meaningful support
well as your expressed willingness to engage in dialogue with divergent responsible
Your statements concerning an "open administration" have impressed me deeply as
concerned.

but who were reluctant to "but their names on the line" insofar as Vietnam is
that our 5400 members are representative of many thousands who share our views
assess their activities to avoid obsolete concepts, methods or products. I know
analytical split which is employed by businessmen who constantly re-
Vietnam reflects a foreign policy which should be re-examined in the same op-
that always been and still remains non-partisan. Out members believe that
activities described. Incidentally, Business Executives Wave for Vietnam Peace
with thousands of business executives around the country in the course of the two
vitality of our country. Second, that I have developed an excellent relationship
seeking ways to solve pressing problems which I believe threaten to undermine the
First, I am far less concerned with party labels or ideological hang-ups than with
These details are mentioned, Mr. Nixon, to help communicate several points.

JAN 21 1969

МОСКОВСКОЕ РАДИО

СССР Москва Радио

January 16, 1968.

Professor Henry A. Kissinger,
6 Divinity Ave.,
Harvard University,
Cambridge, Mass.,
USA

Dear Professor Kissinger,

As you are probably aware, your contribution to "Agenda for the Nation" has aroused no little interest among people concerned with international affairs in this country. Yuri Arbatov, who heads the United States Institute of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, has written about it in "Izvestia". (January 10, 1969), and I have heard favourable comment upon it from other quarters as well.

I wonder if you could somehow get a copy of the book to me, as I believe I could arrange to translate it for one of our publishing houses. This would make it available to a considerable section of our reading public interested in the United States and world affairs generally.

НЯК:
Can I send him
reprint
yes / no -

KISSINGER, HENRY A.

Articles Books
Written by

HENRY A. KISSINGER

CENTRAL ISSUES OF
AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY

The twentieth century has known little repose. Since the turn of the century, international crises have been increasing in both frequency and severity. The contemporary unrest, although less apocalyptic than the two world wars which spawned it, is even more profoundly revolutionary in nature.

The essence of a revolution is that it appears to contemporaries as a series of more or less unrelated upheavals. The temptation is great to treat each issue as an immediate and isolated problem which once surmounted will permit the fundamental stability of the international order to reassert itself. But the crises which form the headlines of the day are symptoms of deep-seated structural problems. The international system which produced stability for a century collapsed under the impact of two world wars. The age of the superpowers, which temporarily replaced it, is nearing its end. The current international environment is in turmoil because its essential elements are all in flux simultaneously. This paper will concentrate on structural and conceptual problems; earlier papers in this volume have dealt with specific policy issues.

The Structural Problem

For the first time, foreign policy has become global. In the past, the various continents conducted their foreign policy essentially in isolation. Throughout much of history, the foreign policy of Europe was scarcely affected by events in Asia. When, in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the European powers were extending their influence throughout the world, the effective decisions continued to be made in only a few great European capitals. Today, statesmen face the unprecedented problem of formulat-

Extra Copies filed in Box #1

585

Kissinger, Henry A.

586 Agenda for the Nation

ing policy for well over a hundred countries. Every nation, no matter how insignificant, participates in international affairs. Ideas are transmitted almost instantaneously. What used to be considered domestic events can now have world-wide consequences.

The revolutionary character of our age can be summed up in three general statements: (a) the number of participants in the international order has increased and their nature has altered; (b) their technical ability to affect each other has vastly grown; (c) the scope of their purposes has expanded.

Whenever the participants of the international system change, a period of profound dislocation is inevitable. They can change because new states enter the political system, or because there is a change in values as to what constitutes legitimate rule, or finally, because of the reduction in influence of some traditional units. In our period, all of these factors have combined. Since the end of the Second World War, several score of new states have come into being. In the nineteenth century the emergence of even a few new nations produced decades of adjustment, and after the First World War, the successor states of the Austro-Hungarian Empire were never assimilated. Our age has yet to find a structure which matches the responsibilities of the new nations to their aspirations.

As the number of participants has increased, technology has multiplied the resources available for the conduct of foreign policy. A scientific revolution has, for all practical purposes, removed technical limits from the exercise of power in foreign policy. It has magnified insecurities because it has made survival seem to depend on the accidents of a technological breakthrough.

This trend has been compounded by the nature of contemporary domestic structures. As long as the states' ability to mobilize resources was limited, the severity of their conflicts had definite bounds. In the eighteenth century, custom restricted the demands rulers by "divine right" could make upon their subjects; a philosophy of minimum government performed the same role through much of the nineteenth century. Our period has seen the culmination of a process started by the French Revolution: the basing of governmental legitimacy on popular support. Even totalitarian regimes are aberrations of a democratic legitimacy; they depend on popular consensus even when they manufacture it through propaganda and pressure. In such a situation, the consensus is decisive; limitations of tradition are essentially irrelevant. It is an ironic result of the democratization

Central Issues of American Foreign Policy

587

tion of politics that it has enabled states to marshal ever more resources
for their competition.

Ideological conflict compounds these instabilities. In the great periods
of cabinet diplomacy, diplomats spoke the same language, not only in the
sense that French was the lingua franca, but more importantly because
they tended to understand intangibles in the same manner. A similar out-
look about aims and methods eases the tasks of diplomacy—it may even be
a precondition for it. In the absence of such a consensus, diplomats can
still meet, but they lose the ability to persuade. More time is spent on defin-
ing contending positions than in resolving them. What seems most reason-
able to one side will appear most problematical to the other.

When there is ideological conflict, political loyalties no longer coincide
with political boundaries. Conflicts among states merge with divisions
within nations; the dividing line between domestic and foreign policy
begins to disappear. At least some states feel threatened not only by the
foreign policy of other countries but also, and perhaps especially, by domes-
tic transformations. A liberalized communist regime in Prague—which
had in no way challenged Soviet preeminence in foreign policy—caused the
Kremlin to believe that its vital interests were threatened and to respond
by occupying the country without even the pretext of legality.

The tensions produced by ideological conflict are exacerbated by the
reduction in influence of the states that were considered great powers
before the First World War. The world has become militarily bipolar.
Only two powers—the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist
Republics—possess the full panoply of military might. Over the next
decade, no other country or group of countries will be capable of challeng-
ing their physical preeminence. Indeed, the gap in military strength be-
tween the two giant nuclear countries and the rest of the world is likely to
increase rather than diminish over that period.

Military bipolarity is a source of rigidity in foreign policy. The guardians
of the equilibrium of the nineteenth century were prepared to respond to
change with counteradjustment; the policy makers of the superpowers in
the second half of the twentieth century have much less confidence in the
ability of the equilibrium to right itself after disturbance. Whatever
"balance" there is between the superpowers is regarded as both precarious
and inflexible. A bipolar world loses the perspective for nuance; a gain
for one side appears as an absolute loss for the other. Every issue seems to
involve a question of survival. The smaller countries are torn between a
desire for protection and a wish to escape big power dominance. Each of

588 Agenda for the Nation

the superpowers is beset by the desire to maintain its preeminence among
its allies, to increase its influence among the uncommitted, and to enhance
its security vis-à-vis its opponent. The fact that some of these objectives
may well prove incompatible adds to the strain on the international
system.

But the age of the superpowers is now drawing to an end. Military\>bipolarity has not only failed to prevent, it has actually encouraged, polit-
ical multipolarity. Weaker allies have good reason to believe that their
defense is in the overwhelming interest of their senior partner. Hence,
they see no need to purchase its support by acquiescence in its policies. The
new nations feel protected by the rivalry of the superpowers, and their
nationalism leads to ever bolder assertions of self-will. Traditional uses of
power have become less feasible, and new forms of pressure have emerged
as a result of transnational loyalties and weak domestic structures.

This political multipolarity does not necessarily guarantee stability. Rigidity is diminished, but so is manageability. Nationalism may succeed in curbing the preeminence of the superpowers; it remains to be seen whether it can supply an integrating concept more successfully in this century than in the last. Few countries have the interest and only the superpowers have the resources to become informed about global issues. As a result, diplomacy is often geared to domestic politics and more concerned with striking a pose than contributing to international order. Equilibrium is difficult to achieve among states widely divergent in values, goals, expectations, and previous experience.

The greatest need of the contemporary international system is an agreed
concept of order. In its absence, the awesome available power is unre-
strained by any consensus as to legitimacy; ideology and nationalism, in
their different ways, deepen international schisms. Many of the elements of
stability which characterized the international system in the nineteenth
century cannot be re-created in the modern age. The stable technology,
the multiplicity of major powers, the limited domestic claims, and the
frontiers which permitted adjustments are gone forever. A new concept of
international order is essential; without it stability will prove elusive.

This problem is particularly serious for the United States. Whatever our
intentions or policies, the fact that the United States disposes of the great-
est single aggregate of material power in the world is inescapable. A new
international order is inconceivable without a significant American con-
tribution. But the nature of this contribution has altered. For the two
decades after 1945, our international activities were based on the assump-

Central Issues of American Foreign Policy 589

tion that technology plus managerial skills gave us the ability to reshape
the international system and to bring about domestic transformations in
“emerging countries.” This direct “operational” concept of international
order has proved too simple. Political multipolarity makes it impossible
to impose an American design. Our deepest challenge will be to evoke the
creativity of a pluralistic world, to base order on political multipolarity
even though overwhelming military strength will remain with the two
superpowers.

*The Limits of Bipolarity: The Nature of Power in the Modern Period*

Throughout history, military power was considered the final recourse. Statesmen treated the acquisition of additional power as an obvious and paramount objective. As recently as twenty-five years ago, it would have been inconceivable that a country could possess too much strength for effective political use; every increment of power was—at least theoretically —politically effective. The minimum aim was to assure the impermeability of the territory. Until the Second World War, a state's strength could be measured by its ability to protect its population from attack.

The nuclear age has destroyed this traditional measure. Increasing
strength no longer necessarily confers the ability to protect the population.
No foreseeable force level—not even full-scale ballistic missile defenses—
can prevent levels of damage eclipsing those of the two world wars. In
these conditions, the major problem is to discipline power so that it bears
a rational relationship to the objectives likely to be in dispute. The paradox
of contemporary military strength is that a gargantuan increase in power
has eroded its relationship to policy. The major nuclear powers are capable
of devastating each other. But they have great difficulty translating this
capability into policy except to prevent direct challenges to their own sur-
vival—and this condition is interpreted with increasing strictness. The
capacity to destroy is difficult to translate into a plausible threat even
against countries with no capacity for retaliation. The margin of superior-
ity of the superpowers over the other states is widening; yet other nations
have an unprecedented scope for autonomous action. In relations with
many domestically weak countries, a radio transmitter can be a more
effective form of pressure than a squadron of B-52s. In other words, power
no longer translates automatically into influence. This does not mean

590 Agenda for the Nation

that impotence increases influence, only that power does not automatically confer it.

This state of affairs has profound consequences for traditional notions of balance of power. In the past, stability has always presupposed the existence of an equilibrium of power which prevented one state from imposing its will on the others.

The traditional criteria for the balance of power were territorial. A state could gain overwhelming superiority only by conquest; hence, as long as territorial expansion was foreclosed, or severely limited, the equilibrium was likely to be preserved. In the contemporary period, this is no longer true. Some conquests add little to effective military strength; major increases in power are possible entirely through developments within the territory of a sovereign state. China gained more in real military power through the acquisition of nuclear weapons than if it had conquered all of Southeast Asia. If the Soviet Union had occupied Western Europe but had remained without nuclear weapons, it would be less powerful than it is now with its existing nuclear arsenal within its present borders. In other words, the really fundamental changes in the balance of power have all occurred within the territorial limits of sovereign states. Clearly, there is an urgent need to analyze just what is understood by power—as well as by balance of power—in the nuclear age.

This would be difficult enough were technology stable. It becomes enormously complicated when a scientific revolution produces an upheaval in weapons technology at five-year intervals. Slogans like "superiority," "parity," "assured destruction," compete unencumbered by clear definitions of their operational military significance, much less a consensus on their political implications. The gap between experts and decision makers is widening. The decision maker rarely has as many hours to study a problem as the expert has years. The result is that the decision maker runs the risk of unprecedented dependence on his technical staff. He is informed by "briefings," a procedure which stresses theatrical qualities and leaves its target with the uneasy feeling that he has been "taken," even—or perhaps especially—when he does not know exactly how. Decisions may reflect an attempt to ward off conflicting pressures rather than a clear conception of long-range purposes.

In short, as power has grown more awesome, it has also turned abstract, intangible, elusive. Deterrence has become the dominant military policy. But deterrence depends above all on psychological criteria. It seeks to keep

Central Issues of American Foreign Policy 591

an opponent from a given course by posing unacceptable risks. For purposes of deterrence, the opponent's calculations are decisive. A bluff taken seriously is more useful than a serious threat interpreted as a bluff. For political purposes, the meaningful measurement of military strength is the assessment of it by the other side. Psychological criteria vie in importance with strategic doctrine.

The abstract nature of modern power affects domestic disputes profoundly. Deterrence is tested negatively by things which do not happen. But it is never possible to demonstrate why something has not occurred. Is it because we are pursuing the best possible policy or only a marginally effective one? Bitter debate even among those who believe in the necessity of defense policy is inevitable and bound to be inconclusive. Moreover, the longer peace is maintained—or the more successful deterrence is—the more it furnishes arguments for those who are opposed to the very premises of defense policy. Perhaps there was no need for preparedness in the first place because the opponent never meant to attack. In the modern state, national security is likely to be a highly divisive domestic issue.

The enormity of modern power has destroyed its cumulative impact to a considerable extent. Throughout history the use of force set a precedent; it demonstrated a capacity to use power for national ends. In the twentieth century any use of force sets up inhibitions against resorting to it again. Whatever the outcome of the war in Vietnam, it is clear that it has greatly diminished American willingness to become involved in this form of warfare elsewhere. Its utility as a precedent has therefore been importantly undermined.

The difficulty of forming a conception of power is paralleled by the problem of how to use it diplomatically. In the past, measures to increase readiness signaled the mounting seriousness with which an issue was viewed.¹ But such measures have become less obvious and more dangerous when weapons are always at a high state of readiness—solid-fuel missiles require less than ten minutes to be fired—and are hidden either under the ground or under the oceans. With respect to nuclear weapons, signaling increased readiness has to take place in a narrow range between the danger of failure and the risk of a preemptive strike.

Even when only conventional weapons are involved, the question of what constitutes a politically meaningful threat is increasingly com-

1. Sometimes these measures got out of control; the mobilization schedules were one of the principal reasons for the outbreak of the First World War.

592 *Agenda for the Nation*

plicated. After the capture of the Pueblo, the United States called up thirteen thousand reservists and moved an aircraft carrier into the waters off the shores of Korea. Did the fact that we had to call up reserves when challenged by a fifth-rate military power convey that we meant to act or that we were overextended? Did the move of the aircraft carrier indicate a decision to retaliate or was it intended primarily to strike a pose?

The problem is illustrated dramatically by the war in Vietnam. A massive breakdown of communication occurred not only within the policy-making machinery in the United States but also between the United States and Hanoi. Over the past five years, the U.S. government has found it difficult, if not impossible, to define what it understood by victory. President Johnson extended an open-ended offer for unconditional negotiations. Yet our troops were deployed as if this offer had not been made. The deployment was based on purely military considerations; it did not take into account the possibility that our troops might have to support a negotiation—the timing of which we had, in effect, left to the opponent. Strategy divorced from foreign policy proved sterile.

These perplexities have spurred new interest in arms-control negotiations, especially those dealing with strategic missiles. These negotiations can be important for the peace and security of the world. But to be effective, they require an intellectual resolution of the issues which have bedeviled the formulation of military policy. Unless we are able to give an operational meaning to terms such as "superiority" or "stability," negotiations will lack criteria by which to judge progress.

Thus, whatever the course—a continuation of the arms race or arms control—a new look at American national security policy is essential. Over ten years have passed since the last comprehensive, bipartisan, high-level reevaluation of all aspects of national security: the Gaither Committee. A new administration should move quickly to bring about such a review. It should deal with some of the following problems: (a) a definition of the national interest and national security over the next decade; (b) the nature of military power in that period; (c) the relationship of military power to political influence; (d) implications and feasibility (both military and political) of various postures—superiority, parity, and so on; (e) the implications (both political and military) of new developments such as MIRV (multiple individually targeted reentry vehicles) and ballistic missile defenses; (f) the prospects for arms control including specific measures to moderate the arms race.

593

## Political Multipolarity: The Changed Nature of Alliances

No area of policy illustrates more dramatically the tensions between political multipolarity and military bipolarity than the field of alliance policy. For a decade and a half after the Second World War, the United States identified security with alliances. A global network of relationships grew up based on the proposition that deterrence of aggression required the largest possible grouping of powers.

This system of alliances was always in difficulty outside the Atlantic area because it tried to apply principles drawn from the multipolar world of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries when several major powers of roughly equal strength existed. Then, indeed, it was impossible for one country to achieve dominance if several others combined to prevent it. But this was not the case in the era of the superpowers of the forties and fifties. Outside Europe, our allies added to our strength only marginally; they were in no position to reinforce each other's capabilities.

Alliances, to be effective, must meet four conditions: (1) a common objective—usually defense against a common danger; (2) a degree of joint policy at least sufficient to define the casus belli; (3) some technical means of cooperation in case common action is decided upon; (4) a penalty for noncooperation—that is, the possibility of being refused assistance must exist—otherwise protection will be taken for granted and the mutuality of obligation will break down.

In the system of alliances developed by the United States after the Second World War, these conditions have never been met outside the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). In the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) and the Central Treaty Organization (CENTO), to which we belong in all but name, there has been no consensus as to the danger. Pakistan's motive for obtaining U.S. arms was not security against a communist attack but protection against India. The Arab members of CENTO armed not against the USSR but against Israel. Lacking a conception of common interests, the members of these alliances have never been able to develop common policies with respect to issues of war and peace. Had they been able to do so, such policies might well have been stillborn anyway, because the technical means of cooperation have been lacking. Most allies have neither the resources nor the will to render mutual support. A state which finds it difficult to maintain

594 *Agenda for the Nation*

order or coherence of policy at home does not increase its strength by combining with states suffering similar disabilities.

In these circumstances, SEATO and CENTO have grown moribund as instruments of collective action. Because the United States has often seemed more eager to engage in the defense of its SEATO and CENTO allies than they themselves, they have become convinced that noncooperation will have no cost. In fact, they have been able to give the impression that it would be worse for us than for them if they fell to communism. SEATO and CENTO have become, in effect, unilateral American guarantees. At best, they provide a legal basis for bilateral U.S. aid.

The case is different with NATO. Here we are united with countries of similar traditions and domestic structures. At the start, there was a common conception of the threat. The technical means for cooperation existed. Mechanisms for developing common policies came into being—especially in the military field. Thus in its first decade and a half, NATO was a dynamic and creative institution.

Today, however, NATO is in disarray as well. Actions by the United States—above all, frequent unilateral changes of policy—are partially responsible. But the most important cause is the transformation of the international environment, specifically the decline in the preeminence of the superpowers and the emergence of political multipolarity. Where the alliances outside of Europe have never been vital because they failed to take into account the military bipolarity of the fifties, NATO is in difficulties because it has yet to adjust to the political multipolarity of the late sixties.

When NATO was founded in 1949, Europeans had a dual fear: the danger of an imminent Soviet attack and the prospect of eventual U.S. withdrawal. In the late 1960s, however, the fear of Soviet invasion has declined. Even the attack on Czechoslovakia is likely to restore anxiety about Soviet military aggression only temporarily. At the same time, two decades of American military presence in Europe coupled with American predominance in NATO planning have sharply reduced the fear that America might wash its hands of European concerns.

When NATO was formed, moreover, the principal threat to world peace seemed to lie in a Soviet attack on Europe. In recent years, the view has grown that equally grave risks are likely to arise in trouble spots outside Europe. To most Europeans, these do not appear as immediate threats to their independence or security. The irony here is striking. In the fifties, Europeans were asking for American assistance in Asia and the Middle

Central Issues of American Foreign Policy 595

East with the argument that they were defending the greater interests of freedom. The United States replied that these very interests required American aloofness. Today, the roles are precisely reversed. It is Europe that evades our entreaties to play a global role; that is to say, Europeans do not consider their interests at stake in America's extra-European involvement.

These are symptoms of deeper, structural problems, however. One problem, paradoxically, is the growth of European economic strength and political self-confidence. At the end of the Second World War, Europe was dependent on the United States for economic assistance, political stability, and military protection. As long as Europe needed the shelter of a superpower, American predominance was inevitable. In relations with the United States, European statesmen acted as lobbyists rather than as diplomats. Their influence depended less on the weight of their countries than on the impact of their personalities. A form of consultation evolved whereby Europeans sought to influence American actions by giving us a reputation to uphold or—to put it more crudely—by oscillating between flattery and almost plaintive appeals for reassurance. The United States, secure in its predominance, in turn concentrated on soothing occasional European outbreaks of insecurity rather than on analyzing their causes.

Tutelage is a comfortable relationship for the senior partner, but it is demoralizing in the long run. It breeds illusions of omniscience on one side and attitudes of impotent irresponsibility on the other. In any event, the United States could not expect to perpetuate the accident of Europe's postwar exhaustion into a permanent pattern of international relations. Europe's economic recovery inevitably led to a return to more traditional political pressures.

These changes in Europe were bound to lead to a difficult transitional period. They could have resulted in a new partnership between the United States and an economically resurgent and politically united Europe, as had been envisaged by many of the early advocates of Atlantic unity. However, the European situation has not resolved itself in that way. Thoughtful Europeans know that Europe must unite in some form if it is to play a major role in the long run. They are aware, too, that Europe does not make even approximately the defense effort of which it is capable. But European unity is stymied, and domestic politics has almost everywhere dominated security policy. The result is a massive frustration which expresses itself in special testiness toward the United States.

These strains have been complicated by the growth of Soviet nuclear

596 *Agenda for the Nation*

power. The changed nature of power in the modern period has affected NATO profoundly. As the risks of nuclear war have become enormous, the credibility of traditional pledges of support has inevitably been reduced. In the past, a country would carry out a commitment because, it could plausibly be argued, the consequences of not doing so were worse than those of coming to the ally's assistance. This is no longer self-evident. In each of the last three annual statements by the Secretary of Defense on the U.S. defense posture, the estimate of dead in a general nuclear war ranged from 40 to 120 million. This figure will, if anything, increase. It will become more and more difficult to demonstrate that anything is worse than the elimination of over half of a society in a matter of days. The more NATO relies on strategic nuclear war as a counter to all forms of attack, the less credible its pledges will be.

The consciousness of nuclear threat by the two superpowers has undermined allied relationships in yet another way. For understandable reasons, the superpowers have sought to make the nuclear environment more predictable, witness the nuclear test ban treaty and the nonproliferation treaty. But the blind spot in our policy has been the failure to understand that, in the absence of full consultation, our allies see in these talks the possible forerunner of a more comprehensive arrangement affecting their vital interests negotiated without them. Strategic arms talks thus emphasize the need of political understanding in acute form. The pattern of negotiating an agreement first and then giving our allies an opportunity—even a full one—to comment is intolerable in the long run. It puts the onus of failure on them, and it prevents them from doing more than quibble about a framework with which they may disagree. Strains have been reinforced by the uncertain American response to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia—especially the reluctance to give up the prospect of a summit meeting. Atlantic relations, for all their seeming normalcy, thus face a profound crisis.

This state of affairs has been especially difficult for those Americans who deserve most credit for forging existing Atlantic relations. Two decades of hegemony have produced the illusion that present Atlantic arrangements are “natural,” that wise policy consists of making the existing framework more tolerable. “Leadership” and “partnership” are invoked, but the content given to these words is usually that which will support the existing pattern. European unity is advocated to enable Europeans to share burdens on a world-wide scale.

Such a view fails to take into account the realities of political multi-

597

polarity. The aim of returning to the "great days of the Marshall Plan" is impossible. Nothing would sunder Atlantic relationships so surely as the attempt to reassert the notions of leadership appropriate to the early days of NATO. In the bipolar world of the forties and fifties, order could be equated with military security; integrated command arrangements sufficed as the principal bond of unity. In the sixties, security, while still important, has not been enough. Every crisis from Berlin to Czechoslovakia has seen the call for "strengthening NATO" confined to military dispositions. Within months a malaise has become obvious again because the overriding need for a common political conception has not been recognized. The challenge of the seventies will be to forge unity with political measures.

It is not "natural" that the major decisions about the defense of an area so potentially powerful as Western Europe should be made three thousand miles away. It is not "normal" that Atlantic policies should be geared to American conceptions. In the forties and fifties, practicing unity—through formal resolutions and periodic reassurances—was profoundly important as a symbol of the end of our isolationism. In the decade ahead, we cannot aim at unity as an end in itself; it must emerge from common conceptions and new structures.

"Burden-sharing" will not supply that impetus. Countries do not assume burdens because it is fair, only because it is necessary. While there are strong arguments for Atlantic partnership and European unity, enabling Europe to play a global role is not one of them. A nation assumes responsibilities not only because it has resources but because it has a certain view of its own destiny. Through the greater part of its history—until the Second World War—the United States possessed the resources but not the philosophy for a global role. Today, the poorest Western European country—Portugal—has the widest commitments outside Europe because its historic image of itself has become bound up with its overseas possessions. This condition is unlikely to be met by any other European country—with the possible exception of Great Britain—no matter what its increase in power. Partially as the result of decolonization, Europeans are unlikely to conduct a significant global policy whatever their resources or their degree of unity. Cooperation between the United States and Europe must concentrate on issues within the Atlantic area rather than global partnership.

Even within the Atlantic area, a more equitable distribution of responsibilities has two prerequisites: there must be some consensus in the analysis of the international situation, at least as it affects Europe; there must be a

598 *Agenda for the Nation*

conviction that the United States cannot or will not carry all the burdens
alone. Neither condition is met today. The traditional notion of American
leadership tends to stifle European incentives for autonomy. Improved
consultation—the remedy usually proposed—can only alleviate, not re-
move, the difficulty.

The problem of consultation is complex, of course. No doubt unilateral
American action has compounded the uneasiness produced by American
predominance and European weakness. The shift in emphasis of American
policy, from the NATO multilateral force to the nonproliferation treaty,
the frequent unilateral changes in strategic doctrine, have all tended to
produce disquiet and to undermine the domestic position of ministers
who had staked their futures on supporting the American viewpoint.

It is far from self-evident, however, that more extensive consultation
within the existing framework can be more than a palliative. One problem
concerns technical competence. In any large bureaucracy—and an inter-
national consultative process has many similarities to domestic administra-
tive procedures—the weight given to advice bears some relation to the
competence it reflects. If one partner possesses all the technical compe-
tence, the process of consultation is likely to remain barren. The minimum
requirement for effective consultation is that each ally have enough knowl-
edge to give meaningful advice.

But there are even more important limits to the process of consultation.
The losing party in a domestic dispute has three choices: (a) it can ac-
cept the setback with the expectation of winning another battle later on—
this is the usual bureaucratic attitude and it is based on the assurance of
another hearing; (b) if advice is consistently ignored, it can resign and
go into opposition; (c) as the opposition party, it can have the pur-
pose either of inducing the existing government to change its course or of
replacing it. If all these avenues are closed, violence or mounting frustra-
tion are the consequences.

Only the first option is open to sovereign states bound together by an
alliance, since they obviously cannot resign or go into opposition without
wrecking the alliance. They cannot affect the process by which their
partners' decision makers are chosen despite the fact that this may be
crucial for their fate. Indeed, as long as the need to maintain the alliance
 overrides all other concerns, disagreement is likely to be stifled. Advice
without responsibility and disagreement without an outlet can turn con-
sultation into a frustrating exercise which compounds rather than alleviates
discord.

Central Issues of American Foreign Policy 599

Consultation is especially difficult when it lacks an integrating overall framework. The consultation about the nonproliferation treaty concerned specific provisions but not the underlying general philosophy which was of the deepest concern to many of our allies, especially the Federal Republic of Germany and Italy. During periods of détente, each ally makes its own approach to Eastern Europe or the USSR without attempting to further a coherent Western enterprise. During periods of crisis, there is pressure for American reassurance but not for a clearly defined common philosophy. In these circumstances, consultation runs the risk of being irrelevant. The issues it “solves” are peripheral; the central issues are inadequately articulated. It deals haphazardly in answers to undefined questions.

Such a relationship is not healthy in the long run. Even with the best will, the present structure encourages American unilateralism and European irresponsibility. This is a serious problem for the United States. If the United States remains the trustee of every noncommunist area, it will exhaust its psychological resources. No country can act wisely simultaneously in every part of the globe at every moment of time. A more pluralistic world—especially in relationships with friends—is profoundly in our long-term interest. Political multipolarity, while difficult to get used to, is the precondition for a new period of creativity. Painful as it may be to admit, we could benefit from a counterweight that would discipline our occasional impetuosity and, by supplying historical perspective, modify our penchant for abstract and “final” solutions.

All of this suggests that there is no alternative to European unity either for the United States or for Europe. In its absence, the malaise can only be alleviated, not ended. Ultimately, this is a problem primarily for the Europeans. In the recent past, the United States has often defeated its purposes by committing itself to one particular form of European unity—that of federalism. It has also complicated British membership in the Common Market by making it a direct objective of American policy.

In the next decade the architectonic approach to Atlantic policy will no longer be possible. The American contribution must be more philosophical; it will have to consist more of understanding and quiet, behind-the-scenes encouragement than of the propagation of formal institutional structures. Involved here is the American conception of how nations cooperate. A tradition of legalism and habits of predominance have produced a tendency to multiply formal arrangements.

But growing European autonomy forces us to learn that nations cooperate less because they have a legal obligation to do so than because they