U.S. STRATEGY IN A NEW WORLD

BY HENRY KISSINGER

IT is the nature of revolu-
tions to destroy the bal-
ance between concepts
and reality. What is so ex-
traordinary about the politi-
cal upheavals of the past
year is the growing obsoles-
cence of not only traditional
concepts of security but also
of the machinery for devis-
ing new ones.

During the Cold War the
threats to the security of the
West were seemingly unam-
biguous and largely mili-
tary. There was a broad con-
sensus about the need to con-
tain the Soviet Union.

Now, for the foreseeable fu-
ture, ethnic conflicts and do-
mestic tensions make it
highly unlikely that the
Soviet Union could deploy
large ground forces outside
its borders without ample
warning. More likely, it will
need to earmark its best
troops to control domestic
unrest.

On the other hand, the
Kremlin's control over its
strategic nuclear arsenal is
probably the firmest element
of its power structure. Even
after a START agreement,
the Soviets will possess
about 10,000 warheads.

A DIRECT attack on the
United States is deterred by
the size and variety of
America's nuclear arsenal. A
START agreement will con-
tribute an additional element
of stability.

But these same factors
make other countries within
reach of Soviet nuclear
weapons more vulnerable, at
least psychologically. To-
ward most of them the
Soviet Union possesses a nu-
clear monopoly; toward all of
them a potentially crushing
nuclear superiority.

How does one assess the
Kremlin's political readiness
to resort to its military
potential in these circum-
stances?

How can America's nu-
clear deterrent be made
credible for distant coun-
tries, however closely allied
with America they are?

Will the period of internal
Soviet weakness and assured
mutual nuclear destruction
invite Soviet nuclear black-
mail or a period of concilia-
tion? How permanent is the
Soviet crisis?

Is the old axiom still valid
that Russia is never as
powerful as it appears, but
neither is it ever as weak?

None of these issues is ad-
dressed in the tug of war be-
tween the U.S. Defense De-
partment and Congress over
the so-called peace dividend.

The current defense budget
is based on a five-year pro-
gram that reflects a threat
assessment essentially over-
taken by events. There is a
crying need for a new strate-
gic doctrine defining likely
dangers and how to deal
with them as well as na-
tional objectives and how to
attain them.

Unfortunately, the elabora-
tion of strategic doctrine has
never been an American
forte.

Until the last two decades,
America's resources were
overwhelming in relation to
foreseeable threats. As a re-
sult, its defense budget has
historically reflected adjudic-
ation among the conflicting
claims of the military ser-
vices.

During periods of budge-
tary plenty, increases were
translated into claims for an
even further expansion of
weapons systems. By the
same token, periods of re-
trenchment concentrated on
personnel because personnel
is expensive and the cuts can
be reversed more easily.

In short, the thrust of
American defense planning
has not been so much to
come up with a strategy as
to protect weapons systems.

The trend of the American
military establishment is in
the direction of more and
more complex weapons sys-
tems and ever fewer ready
forces.

During periods of budge-
tary plenty, technological so-
phistication and abundance
tend to obscure this state of
affairs. But as soon as reduc-
tion of the defense budget be-
comes a major political
issue, the military capacity
of the United States begins to
deteriorate rapidly.

Using a budget based on
outdated threat assessments
as a point of departure for al-
locating symmetrical cuts
among the services is surely
a prescription for progres-
sive obsolescence. That trend
is accelerated when congres-
sional budget cutters aim at
individual weapons systems
with even less attention to
long-range contingencies.

WITTHIN the Atlantic Al-
liance, compartmentaliza-
tion is also running increas-
ingly counter to political
reality.

Military issues are dis-
cussed within NATO; politi-
cal issues find their focal
point in the European Com-
munity, and will do so in-
creasingly as Europe builds
its political unity.

As that process gathers
momentum, American mili-
tary forces may turn into
passive auxiliaries for the
political decisions of others.

The United States has tried
to counteract this tendency
by proposing a new political
role for NATO. But the pro-
posal runs up against the
historic suspicion of some
Europeans that the United
States is manipulating
NATO to undermine Euro-
pean unification.

For in NATO, the United
States deals with the Euro-
pean countries individually;
the European Community as
an institution is not repre-
sented.

At the same time, the
United States is for all
practical purposes excluded
from the political delibera-
tions of the Community.

The standard procedure is
for the Council of Ministers
to convey its conclusions to
the United States through a
chairman who changes
every six months. But that
foreign minister is in effect
an instructed messenger
with no negotiating flexibil-
ity. The best he can do is to
inform his colleagues of the
American views.

But since their decision
usually emerges from
months of painful delibera-
tions and difficult compro-
mises, they are understand-
ably reluctant to change
their position.

Thus, security issues are
relegated to a forum inimil-
cal to European identity,
while political issues are
handled in a forum that ex-
cludes the United States
from meaningful participa-
tion.

This incongruity makes it
increasingly difficult for Eu-
rope and America to define
their roles and strategies on
crucial issues.

For example, there is gen-
eral agreement that U.S.
troops should remain in Eu-
rope. Two arguments are
most frequently advanced:
that NATO is America's sole
institutional link to Europe,
and that NATO is a means
for tying Germany inextri-
cably into the West.

But institutions thrive only
when they are based on a
common purpose; they can-
not create it. NATO can re-
main America's link to Eu-
rope and Germany's link to
the West only if it responds
to a widely shared common
purpose and a generally un-
derstood strategy.

This raises two issues: the
level of U.S. forces and the
hoary issue of nuclear weap-
ons.

New York Post

Tuesday, May 29, 1990

(Continued)

THE level of U.S. forces is partly a military issue, but largely a psychological one; they must be large enough to leave no doubt that a conventional attack on Europe would involve the United States. Going much below 100,000 would raise grave questions in that regard.

The nuclear issue is almost entirely psychological.

The American public must become convinced that the defense of Europe against a nuclear threat which spares America is in the national interest.

And Europe must accept the fact that a nuclear guarantee, to be credible, requires some American nuclear deployment on the Continent to safeguard U.S. troops, and some arrangement within NATO that makes nuclear defense an Allied matter.

Too many in Germany justify their growing opposition to the stationing of any nuclear weapons on their soil with the goal of banishing nuclear risk from German territory. In the United States a significant group favors stationing all strategic weapons in this country or at sea in order to retain unilateral control of the decision to engage in nuclear war.

The political dilemma for the Atlantic Community is that so long as Europeans seek nuclear protection without nuclear risk, Americans will question having to shoulder risks in defense of Allied countries that those countries are avoiding. The end of that road is growing dissociation.

All this suggests that the nuclear issue must be faced explicitly and without delay. There must be a definition of political and strategic purposes.

Otherwise, the alliance will teeter between the denuclearization of Central Europe and a strategy that makes the alliance itself a major political issue.

The same dilemmas exist with respect to arms control.

When negotiations on conventional arms control began, the political dividing line ran through the center of Germany, and Soviet ground forces were assumed to be vastly superior. In such circumstances, the goal of equal force levels was a major contribution toward stability.

Since then, the communist regimes in Eastern Europe have collapsed; most of the successor governments have asked the Soviet Union to withdraw its forces.

For an interim period symmetrical reduction of forces will help speed the Soviet withdrawal without obliging the United States to make greater reductions than budgetary pressures demand. But with every increment of withdrawal the principle of symmetrical forces will become more firmly established.

Arms control, however, runs the risk of legitimizing more forces in Eastern Europe than the host countries want. Or else it could generate pressures on the United States to withdraw all its forces from Central Europe.

Neither outcome reflects the political revolution of the past year. The symmetrical approach in fact will pro-

gressively be in conflict with political realities.

A creative solution would require not only good ideas but an equally wide domestic and Allied consensus.

A useful model could be the Advisory Council on Social Security established by President Ford. Composed of leaders of Congress and the administration, it hammered out an approach that overcame domestic discord and guided the legislative process.

IN the end, the defense budget is arbitrary and vulnerable unless it is related to a strategic doctrine defining priorities. The conclusions of a bipartisan commission would provide not only a guide but a safety net for the administration to protect it against arbitrary attacks.

A way must be found whereby the European Community is institutionally represented in the NATO Council when political issues are discussed and the United States has access to the deliberations of the European Community before they harden into formal decisions.

It is essential that a coherent view of East-West rela-

tions, strategy and arms-control negotiations emerges from the processes suggested here.

There should be a pause in conventional arms-control negotiations after the first stage to permit the elaboration of the appropriate mix between political and security elements.

In particular, there should be a careful examination of the concept of constituting the erstwhile satellite states as a neutral belt on each side of which an arms-control regimen would be established.

A time of upheaval poses so many challenges that it is not always easy to come up with the right answers. But it would be a pity to be ruled by procedures which do not permit us even to ask the right questions.