Replied: HAK:jfp:S\2c\10

CENTRAL FILES
MAR 4 1970

RECEIVED

Washington, D. C.
United States Senator
Honorable Jacob K. Lavitte

Henry V. Kleingor

Warm regards,

term, written up,
trip, and am glad to see them, even in strict
been interested in your impressions from the
entry in the Congressional Record. I have
Many thanks for the copy of your February 10

Dear Jack!

MAR 3 1970

KLEINGOR, HENRY V.

Mandarins 1

POLITICIANS AND MANDARINS

Henry KISSINGER: I do not think that somebody in my position should appear as a public advocate of a particular point of view or indeed should appear within the bureaucracy as an advocate of his own point of view. My primary responsibility, as I see it, is to make sure that every responsible point of view -- and "responsible" is defined in a very generous manner -- gets a fair hearing; to separate whatever recommendations I might make from the presentation of options that the President confronts. I want to say now that it is in providing this spectrum of considerations and to give a hearing to every point of view of significance that I would want the success if my efforts to be judged.

Policy-making in our society confronts the difficulty that revolutionary changes have to be encompassed and dealt with by an increasingly rigid administrative structure. Great, and increasing, energy has to be devoted to keeping the existing machine going, and in the nature of things there isn't enough time to inquire into the purpose of these activities. The temptation is great to define success by whether one fulfills certain programs, however accidentally these programs may have been arrived at. The question is whether it is possible in the modern bureaucratic state to develop a sense of long-range purpose and to inquire into the meaning of activity. This is one of the big challenges. The great danger of war seems to me not to lie in the deliberate actions of wicked men but in the inability of harassed men to manage events that have run away with them.

The second, and related problem seems to be how to deal with the element of conjecture in foreign policy, which I will

* Kissinger had not taken up this appointment as President Nixon's Adviser for National Security Affairs.

Mandarins 2

define as follows: when the scope for action is greater, then the knowledge on which to base such action is at a minimum. When the knowledge is greatest, the scope for creative action has often disappeared. In 1936 it would have been physically possible when Germany re-occupied the Rhineland to stop Hitler. It would have been morally extremely difficult, because no one could know in 1936 whether Hitler was a misunderstood nationalist, or bent on world domination. In 1941 it had become morally easy but physically very difficult. I am not saying that early action is always correct and that inaction is always incorrect. I am trying to say that whether one acts or doesn't act depends on some moral or philosophical judgment as well as on judgments of fact.

These are some of the concerns which have led me to accept the offer of the President-Elect. He has insisted that he wanted to hear every point of view, that he wanted to make sure that the best talent in the country, whether or not it agreed with pronouncements he made in the past, would receive a hearing. I can tell you, speaking for myself as well as for the President-Elect, that every effort will be made to give the best talent in the country an opportunity to present their views. Many of you have worked with me for many years and you know what I have stood for and you know, I hope, that I will continue to stand for this no matter what my position is. I would hope that I can use this opportunity to tell you that the doors of my office are open to your ideas and to invite you to share them with me. I will try to enlist some of you from America as well as from abroad, but I also hope that you would volunteer your ideas because after all it is not impossible that I will be caught up in the process that I have described and may not always get to make the requests.

29 January, 1972.

575 University Avenue,
Los Altos, California 94022

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
The White House
Washington, D. C. 20500

Dear Sir:

I heard an excerpt of your remarks of 26
January (I believe) to the National Press Club
on the CBS evening news of 27 January. I thought
that your description of our international
environment and the frame of mind with which
we should seek to perform in it were both
magnificently stated.

If it is possible, I would like very much
to obtain a copy of your remarks as source
material for a thesis which I am preparing on
a related subject.

KISSINGER, HENRY 'A.

The White House
Washington

WHA008 (11)DEA206 KC285

K NDA215 NL MIN PDF CS SPRINGFIELD MASS 28

HENRY A KISSINGER

THE WHITE HOUSE WASH DC

YOUR TODAYS SPEECH FOLLOWING SENATORS CHURCH INTRODUCTION

WILL MAKE HISTORY. I ALWAYS TRUSTED YOU AND YOUR ABILITY NOW

I AM CERTAIN THAT YOU ARE A WINNER

ANTHONY H MILKOWSKI.

1972 JAN 28 PM 11 35

FEB 1 1972

CENTRAL FILES

FORM 0805 PRINTED BY THE STANDARD REGISTER COMPANY U.S.A.

ANTHONY H. MILKOWSKI.

I AM CERTAIN THAT YOU ARE A WINNER
WILL MAKE HISTORY. I ALWAYS TRUSTED YOU AND YOUR ABILITY NOW
YOUR TODAY'S SPEECH FOLLOWING SENATORS CHURCH INTRODUCTION

THE WHITE HOUSE WASH DC

HENRY A KIRRINGER
K NOVAS22 NE MIN BDF CS2 SPRINGFIELD MAR2 S8
WHA008 (11)DEAS06 KCS82

Henry Kissinger

Partly because so much has been achieved here in America, we have tended to suppose that every problem must have a solution, and that good intentions always guarantee good results. Utopia was seen by us not as a dream but as our logical destination. Our generation is the first to have found that the road is endless, and that in traveling it we will find not Utopia, but only ourselves. In a world in which there has never been more talk, and less dialogue, nothing is more important than to raise our debates from motives to issues. As we regain our trust in each other, the important can again replace the urgent in our concern.

So beyond all the hoopla and drama of Presidential trips, beyond the

analyses of communiqués and speeches, we are on the quest for a peace which is deeper than the absence of war among nations.

KISSINGER, HENRY A.

MEMORANDUM

THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON

23699

ACTION

November 25, 1970

MEMORANDUM FOR HENRY A. KISSINGER

FROM: Peter W. Rodman PMR
SUBJECT: Inclusion of Your Essay in a Book of Readings

Prof. Romano Romani of the Department of Political Science at Indiana State University wants to include a condensed version of your paper on "Domestic Structure and Foreign Policy" in a book of readings in international politics which he is compiling. He wants your consent.

At Tab A is a xerox copy of the article with the deletions he proposes to make. His letter and the consent forms are at Tab B.

The deletions amount to about half of the essay. They include discussion of:

- the influence exerted by technical staffs and advisers (pp 505-10)

- the problems of bureaucratic stagnation and orthodoxy in a revolutionary period (pp 511, 512)

- the influence of lawyers and businessmen on American policymaking (pp 515-18)

- the Communist belief in the predominance of "objective factors," and its impact on negotiating style (pp 519-20, 520-21)

- the new nations' uncertain sense of identity (pp 523-24)

- the prospects for world order (the whole concluding section, pp 525-29)

What remains is the bulk of your discussion of the "impact of the administrative structure," and the most general points of your

RAYMOND ARON

order had been adapted to technological civilization. Our con-
clusion is that this order has been transformed, but not overturned.
Pessimists prophesy the collective suicide of mankind failing a kind
of historic mutation such as would be denoted by the renunciation
of military sovereignty by states. Optimists believe in peace through
fear, in the end of the domination of peoples by peoples, since domi-
nation does not pay.

We have no grounds to decide in favor of one or the other.
Mankind has always lived dangerously. The dangers are no longer
the same, but they have not disappeared. One mankind, united
under one sole rational administration in order to exploit natural
resources, would correspond to one possible end of the human
adventure. The adventure is still far from this final state, conform-
ing not to the logic of history but to a partial logic that fascinates
because it at once attracts and repels. Would man achieve fulfill-
ment or perdition if he were to arrive at the Promised Land of the
world-state of technology?

This material is excerpted from a major article commissioned from M. Aron by the editors of *Encyclopaedia Britannica*. In view of the importance of the conference on the Conditions of World Order, and of M. Aron's contribution to it, *Britannica* has waived its usual precedents in order to grant special permission for this publication.

502

HENRY A. KISSINGER

I. The Role of Domestic Structure

IN THE traditional conception, international relations are conducted
by political units treated almost as personalities. The domestic
structure is taken as given; foreign policy begins where domestic
policy ends.

But this approach is appropriate only to stable periods because
then the various components of the international system generally
have similar conceptions of the "rules of the game." If the domestic
structures are based on commensurable notions of what is just, a
consensus about permissible aims and methods of foreign policy de-
velops. If domestic structures are reasonably stable, temptations to
use an adventurous foreign policy to achieve domestic cohesion are
at a minimum. In these conditions, leaders will generally apply the
same criteria and hold similar views about what constitutes a "rea-
sonable" demand. This does not guarantee agreement, but it pro-
vides the condition for a meaningful dialogue, that is, it sets the
stage for traditional diplomacy.

When the domestic structures are based on fundamentally differ-
ent conceptions of what is just, the conduct of international affairs
grows more complex. Then it becomes difficult even to define the
nature of disagreement because what seems most obvious to one
side appears most problematic to the other. A policy dilemma arises
because the pros and cons of a given course seem evenly balanced.
The definition of what constitutes a problem and what criteria are
relevant in "solving" it reflects to a considerable extent the domestic
notions of what is just, the pressures produced by the decision-
making process, and the experience which forms the leaders in their
rise to eminence. When domestic structures—and the concept of
legitimacy on which they are based—differ widely, statesmen can

503

HENRY A. KISSINGER

still meet, but their ability to persuade has been reduced for they no
longer speak the same language.

This can occur even when no universal claims are made. Incom-
patible domestic structures can passively generate a gulf, simply
because of the difficulty of achieving a consensus about the nature
of "reasonable" aims and methods. But when one or more states
claim universal applicability for their particular structure, schisms
grow deep indeed. In that event, the domestic structure becomes
not only an obstacle to understanding but one of the principal
issues in international affairs. Its requirements condition the con-
ception of alternatives; survival seems involved in every dispute.
The symbolic aspect of foreign policy begins to overshadow the
substantive component. It becomes difficult to consider a dispute
"on its merits" because the disagreement seems finally to turn not on
a specific issue but on a set of values as expressed in domestic
arrangements. The consequences of such a state of affairs were
explained by Edmund Burke during the French Revolution:

I never thought we could make peace with the system; because it was
not for the sake of an object we pursued in rivalry with each other, but
with the system itself that we were at war. As I understood the matter,
we were at war not with its conduct but with its existence; convinced
that its existence and its hostility were the same.¹

Of course, the domestic structure is not irrelevant in any histori-
cal period. At a minimum, it determines the amount of the total
social effort which can be devoted to foreign policy. The wars of the
kings who governed by divine right were limited because feudal
rulers, bound by customary law, could not levy income taxes or
conscript their subjects. The French Revolution, which based its
policy on a doctrine of popular will, mobilized resources on a truly
national scale for the first time. This was one of the principal reasons
for the startling successes of French arms against a hostile Europe
which possessed greater over-all power. The ideological regimes
of the twentieth century have utilized a still larger share of the
national effort. This has enabled them to hold their own against an
environment possessing far superior resources.

Aside from the allocation of resources, the domestic structure
crucially affects the way the actions of other states are interpreted.
To some extent, of course, every society finds itself in an environ-
ment not of its own making and has some of the main lines of its
foreign policy imposed on it. Indeed, the pressure of the environ-
ment can grow so strong that it permits only one interpretation of

504

its significance; Prussia in the eighteenth century and Israel in the
contemporary period may have found themselves in this position.

But for the majority of states the margin of decision has been
greater. The actual choice has been determined to a considerable
degree by their interpretation of the environment and by their
leaders' conception of alternatives. Napoleon rejected peace offers
beyond the dreams of the kings who had ruled France by "divine
right" because he was convinced that *any* settlement which demon-
strated the limitations of his power was tantamount to his downfall.
That Russia seeks to surround itself with a belt of friendly states
in Eastern Europe is a product of geography and history. That it
is attempting to do so by imposing a domestic structure based on a
particular ideology is a result of conceptions supplied by its do-
mestic structure.

The domestic structure is decisive finally in the elaboration of
positive goals. The most difficult, indeed tragic, aspect of foreign
policy is how to deal with the problem of conjecture. When the
scope for action is greatest, knowledge on which to base such
action is small or ambiguous. When knowledge becomes available,
the ability to affect events is usually at a minimum. In 1936, no
one could know whether Hitler was a misunderstood nationalist
or a maniac. By the time certainty was achieved, it had to be paid
for with millions of lives.

The conjectural element of foreign policy—the need to gear
actions to an assessment that cannot be proved true when it is
made—is never more crucial than in a revolutionary period. Then,
the old order is obviously disintegrating while the shape of its re-
placement is highly uncertain. Everything depends, therefore, on
some conception of the future. But varying domestic structures can
easily produce different assessments of the significance of existing
trends and, more importantly, clashing criteria for resolving these
differences. This is the dilemma of our time.

Problems are novel; their scale is vast; their nature is often
abstract and always psychological. In the past, international rela-
tions were confined to a limited geographic area. The various
continents pursued their relations essentially in isolation from each
other. Until the eighteenth century, other continents impinged on
Europe only sporadically and for relatively brief periods. And
when Europe extended its sway over much of the world, foreign
policy became limited to the Western Powers with the single
exception of Japan. The international system of the nineteenth

505