FOREIGN AFFAIRS

AN AMERICAN QUARTERLY REVIEW

HAMILTON FISH ARMSTRONG
EDITOR

PHILIP W. QUIGG
MANAGING EDITOR

58 EAST SIXTY-EIGHTH STREET
NEW YORK 21, N. Y.

CABLE ADDRESS: FOR AFFAIRS, NEW YORK

December 18, 1959

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
6 Divinity Avenue
Cambridge 38, Massachusetts

Dear Henry:

I apologize; this has all the earmarks of a second draft, not a first, and for this I am grateful. It reads quite smoothly and, although as usual I have some fairly substantial criticisms to make, I think it is good. I have made a number of comments on the manuscripts and will add here those of a more general sort.

The weakest section, in my judgment, is right at the start of Chapter I. Apart from some difficulties I had with your argument itself (for example, see p. 4), my objection is editorial in nature. Deterrence has been so much written about, so much debated, that to launch another extended discussion of it, I think you need to do a better job of attracting the reader's interest. This means, in effect, that you can't begin at the beginning, but need to begin with some fresh conception of the problem or some explanation of why recent developments require that we take another look at the subject of deterrence. As it is, you may lose two large classes of readers early in the game: those who believe in the stalemate and those who never believed in the notion of massive retaliation and are proud of it.

My next observation I offer more hesitantly, partly because to take full account of it would now involve an immense amount of work. But I am sorry that you chose to organize your chapters as you did. The effort to exclude political and psychological considerations from Chapter I gives it a slightly unreal quality characteristic of so many RAND papers. One of your principal contributions as a commentator on strategic questions has been your awareness of the interrelation between politics and technology and the skillful way you have seen the problem whole. As it stands, Chapter I has a slightly abstract quality which is unnatural to you. Also, I find what seem to me distortions which do not get corrected until Chapter II. For example, circa p. 28, you equate the dangers and uncertainties

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger

2.

December 18, 1959

to which both sides are exposed in such a way that the impression
is left that we are in much less danger than in fact you believe
we are.

In a somewhat similar vein, the table (I-V-3) seems too neat
and precise. I am in any case prejudiced against tables, but in
this instance I do not think it contributes to the clarity that
could be achieved by summarizing the whole thing in a sentence.

One point that seems to me important to your argument I did
not find: the opportunity for blackmail coincident with a first
strike in a situation of mutual vulnerability. I refer to the pos-
sibility that the aggressor, after knocking out a high proportion
of the defenders retaliatory force, can announce that the penalty
for retaliation will be the destruction of all the defender's major
surviving cities. This would not be possible if the defender re-
taliated instantaneously, but if there was any delay in responding,
as appears quite likely, this seems to me a real and harrowing pos-
sibility, whereby the aggressor would survive a nuclear war un-
scathed.

Chapter II seems to bog down a bit toward the end, giving the
impression of becoming repetitive. This is particularly true of
Section V, which could, I think, be cut to a few paragraphs instead
of 10 pages.

This critique has been done in more than usual haste and I
hope it is of some use to you. Sorry I won't be here through Jan-
uary and part of February, but if I can be of help after that,
please let me know.

ms.enc.

FOREIGN

AFFAIRS

March 10, 1960.

Mr. Henry A. Kissinger
Center for International Affairs
6 Divinity Avenue
Cambridge, Mass.

Dear Henry:

I have decorated your margins with my usual nasty comments, though a couple of sections have remained fairly free of them. Have made my way through only one chapter as yet, but thought you might want to have it back without delay.

I confess that when your writing is especially bad I do get irked, because I know you can do better and because I get so bogged down in trying to understand what you want to say that I cannot see the woods for the trees. That is, if you asked me what I thought of this chapter or how substantively it could be improved by additions, omissions or reorganization, I could not tell you, because I have not been able to stand off and look at it whole. Much of the time I've just had to plod from sentence to sentence, feeling like an editorial hack and marveling that a person as articulate and intelligent as you are can use words so carelessly, and that a person who thinks as clearly and rigorously as you do can shroud his sentences in so much fog.

I say these things not merely to be my usual objectionable self or to work off my own peek, but because someone has to remind you that to make use of your great powers you have got to express yourself lucidly through the written word, and no one can do this for you. I would not beat on you if I felt you were unable to write clearly, but I know you can; it is just a lot of work. And though I am glad to help, there is a limit to what another can do for you. I feel I could be of much more help if the manuscript came to me in a form in which I could - in addition to clearing up some rough spots - be more constructively critical and not wholly absorbed in parsing sentences.

...2/

(2)

This letter will perhaps seem to you particularly un-
gracious after your recent kindness to me in an emergency,
but I do not think our relationship should be based on a
balance of favors granted. If you have any doubt of my
fondness and regard for you (and recently you seemed to),
then of course this letter will be quite intolerable, but -
as my old headmaster was fond of quoting from the Bible:
"He beat on them with many rods for the love he bore them."

So, if you are willing, I will struggle along with the
other chapters you have sent me, writing my little barbs in
the margin, raising your blood-pressure, and always hoping
that I will come upon a section written with that clarity
of thought and discipline of mind of which I know you are
capable.

P.S.

Tom Schelling writes that a commitment to _Daedalus_
precludes his writing for us on essentially the same topic,
so the way is clear for your piece. I look forward to
seeing it.

FOREIGN

AFFAIRS

March 21, 1960.

Mr. Henry A. Kissinger
Center for International Affairs
6 Divinity Avenue
Cambridge 38, Mass.

Dear Henry:

Herewith another chapter - that on negotiations. I haven't much to add to what I have written in the margins, but I am a little distressed to find so much that is negative and so little that is positive. I had thought that perhaps the next chapter would deal with more positive aspects of the problem but I find that it concerns NATO and Europe. Is this actually the sequence you plan? Incidentally I'm about halfway through the next chapter and I find it a much more nearly finished product than those that have gone before.

I think this chapter on negotiations needs a lot of work and a lot of cutting. All the best to you.

FOREIGN

AFFAIRS

April 8, 1960.

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
Center for International Studies
Harvard University
6 Divinity Avenue
Cambridge 38, Mass.

Dear Henry:

I began this chapter with a good deal of enthusiasm, but I confess I ran out of steam. It wasn't just that the writing was bad or that there were errors in copying which made reading difficult, but rather that, in my judgement, you belabored a couple of good ideas nearly to death. The repetition gets to be nearly unbearable. I say this not to needle you because I know this is a first draft, but because I would impress on you the need for really drastic cutting and refinement of your argument.

You will find that I read section I and two-thirds of section II with considerable care, but after that I confess I skimmed. Hence my nasty comments are fairly scattered toward the end.

As you will see from my marginalia (and in two places I even had to take to the typewriter), I have some harsh criticisms of this chapter on more substantial grounds than length. Yet I do not have the slightest doubt that you have hold of something important here that would make a good article, and the very fact that it is not in the field of military strategy attracts me to it. But your central idea in section I will have to be more carefully developed before I could pass judgment as to whether it was more desirable than the arms-control chapter.

We can talk about this further after you have looked over my comments.

All the best,

FOREIGN

AFFAIRS

April 29, 1960.

Dear Henry:

I've now finished reading and annotating the chapter on political evolution. Each section of it is enormously improved over the previous draft, but it is true, as you pointed out, that it is not as close to being a finished piece as the arms control chapter. Section III particularly seems to me to need a good deal more work.

All in all, I think we'd best proceed with the arms control chapter. Even though the decision has been difficult, it's pleasant to suffer an embarrassment of riches.

It was awfully good to see you yesterday and I'm glad that your first venture into the Wohlstetter group proved to be the best meeting we have had.

MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
LINCOLN LABORATORY

LEXINGTON 73, MASSACHUSETTS

VOLUNTEER 2-3370

August 12, 1960

Dr. Henry Kissinger
104 Fletcher Road
Belmont, Massachusetts

Dear Henry:

Your secretary said that you wanted to revise the arms control
chapter this week end, and that written comments would be useful. On
some matters, it would be desirable to have some added discussion at some
time but for the present, I shall set forth the following remarks for
whatever they might be worth to you.

By way of a general comment, the chapter as a whole seems to be a
splendid summary statement of the business. On some details, there might
be better ways of implementing certain things; for example, I think there
may be a way of handling the phasing problem then the one set forth in
your specimen scheme. But these do not detract significantly from the
general excellence of the paper.

My most serious criticism would be the most difficult for you to
deal with, although it is only a verbal matter and not a substantive
one. This concerns your use of the phrase "surprise attack". You use
this phrase with the same looseness and variety of meaning that is common
in much of the recent literature pertaining to arms control. There is
in the first instance the classical sense of a surprise attack per se,
such as the one at Pearl Harbor. However, so-called arms control "measures
to safeguard against surprise attack" can and should be subdivided into
a number of different possibilities: measures to reduce the temptation
to deliberate attack (a) through reduction of capability, (b) through
reducing the likelihood of achieving surprise (by short-term warning systems);
measures to reduce the incentive to pre-emption; measures to reduce the
likelihood of misinformation leading to false pre-emption. The difficulty
with this situation is that many people have differing understanding of
which of these, or which combination of these, is meant by the phrase "measures
to safeguard against surprise attack". I think it would be helpful to
your readers and to the subject in the large if you could generally avoid
the phrase "surprise attack", except in the classical sense of the attack
per se, and replacing it in each other instance with a more precise phrase.
I strongly suggest that you talk to Tom Schelling about this point, if necessary,
by calling him at home over the week end. This would be useful both as a

LP

# The Role of Inspection in Arms Control

## D. G. Brennan

August 8, 1960

In the absence of any overt and explicitly agreed arms control inspection, we are nevertheless in possession of some information about the military establishments, strategic views and doctrines, and possible or likely intentions of our prospective opponents. In the present environment, the extent of our information of this type leaves much to be desired. Broadly speaking, we may state that the role of inspection in arms control is to improve the quality and quantity of information of this type. We may thus view inspection as an information-gathering process, the output information from which is used as a basis for adjusting our own military establishment, doctrine, and intentions. This is, however, merely a general statement of principle; a sufficient elaboration of this principle constitutes a largely unsolved problem. Some discussion of this point may help clarify the nature of the problem. In order to simplify the language of the following discussion, it will be assumed that the only parties of interest are the United States and the Soviet Union.

Our present information on Soviet military plans and on the Soviet military establishment stems from articles in Soviet military journals and the Soviet public press, and from espionage activities of various kinds. There are two aspects of this information that are important: first, the extent of this information is not negligible, and it constitutes an important guide to our own armament policy; second, the information is terribly incomplete, often misleading, and sometimes, downright false. To illustrate the last point first, it is widely known that our own B-36 bomber program was based in part on an exaggerated estimate of Soviet bomber production. In fact, however, the Soviets largely bypassed the technological generation represented by the propeller-driven B-36, and were concentrating their efforts on the development of missiles and more advanced types of long-range bombers while we were engaged in a crash B-36 program. This same incident also illustrates the im-

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importance of the fact that some of our information is sometimes not so misleading or inaccurate. If we had absolutely no information whatever on the state of the Soviet military establishment, and were only aware of her hostile intentions and possibly aggressive designs, we might feel obliged to be maintaining and improving our military establishment at the maximum level the economy would withstand.

We might feel terribly insecure even if our armament program were limited solely by economic saturation. The presently relatively relaxed state of our missile and air defense programs (among others) presumably reflects information, possibly gathered in part by the U-2 flights, about the actual state of Soviet military preparations in such weapons--or, rather, our leaders' beliefs about the actual extent--and reflects the fact that the Soviets are not engaged in all-out development of such facilities. One might identify the central problem facing the United States decision-makers as that of adjusting our own armament policy in the light of the quality and quantity of available information.

Exactly the same problem would be present in an arms control environment. The role of inspection in arms control is, primarily, to provide the information on which the requisite decisions must be based. The inspection apparatus may well be designed to discourage or deter evasions as well as detect them; decisions may well be taken in advance of the information itself, simply on the basis of an agreement to provide the requisite inspection apparatus; the personnel of the inspectorate may well have constructive functions to perform that are not directly related to their monitoring function. None of these considerations alters the fact that decisions must still be made on the basis of incomplete and possibly misleading information, though, hopefully, much better information than is presently available.

These considerations point to the fact that there are relations between the extent and reliability of inspection on the one hand, and our armament policy on the other. These relations need not always be in the direction of less arms in

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exchange for more information; it might happen that more or better information
would disclose some areas in which increased effort was needed. And inspection
might be used simply to monitor the state of readiness of existing forces. Apart
from these possibilities, however, there is, broadly speaking, a possible trade-off
between degree of inspection and required armament (and/or deployment or development
of armament). The central problem associated with arms control inspection is the
evaluation of this trade-off.

This problem may be broken down in three parts. First, there is the problem
of determining the purely technical efficacy of an inspection system--what information
the system definitely will get, what information the system definitely will not
get, and what information it may or may not get with some degree of likelihood,
all for a given degree of effort. Second, there is the problem of assessing the
likelihood of various possible Soviet courses of action in those areas in which the
inspection system would provide equivocal information or no information. Third,
there is the problem of determining what policies and postures (including possible
arms limitations) would be appropriate in the light of the answers to the first
two problems. These three problems are not, of course, completely independent;
there is appreciable interaction among all of them. However, it is useful to
employ this breakdown for preliminary discussion. And it should be emphasized
that these problems are not different in kind whether the "inspection" consists
purely of unilateral intelligence activities or consists of the inspection associated
with very comprehensive arms control programs, employing thousands of inspectors.

In the present situation of no explicitly agreed inspection, the first two
of these problems are evaluated (in the very highest degree of secrecy) in the
executive branch of the government, largely on the basis of information furnished
by the Central Intelligence Agency and related sources. Such policy as emerges
from the evaluation of the third problem is largely public, and is released through

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Congressional hearings and other channels. These remarks point to the fact that we do cope with the "trade-off" process at the present time, though the efficacy and adequacy of the process are matters of much debate. In other words, we do have some understanding of these problems in the present environment.

When applied to any specific arms control measure or program, or for that matter any armament policy differing appreciably from our present policy, we do not have even this very imperfect understanding of the problems involved. In the particular case of a nuclear test ban, we are beginning to have fairly good understanding of the first problem (the purely technical efficacy of the inspection systems), although the technical information involved is still in something of a slight state of flux. Even for the simple case of a weapon test ban, however, evaluation of the second and third problems, which involves the full range of military and foreign policy, is a matter of the most vigorous debate. And most of this debate is based on inadequate understanding of the second and third problems, in the sense that most of the participants of the debate have not yet identified more than a small fraction of the (very complex) issues involved. For example, the opposition of opponents in this debate is quite often based on differing underlying assumptions about the probable nature of, and relative desirability of, different kinds of warfare, although these underlying assumptions are hardly ever brought into the argument explicitly.

Some work has been done on the technical efficacy of inspection systems to monitor the production of fissionable material. Beyond this and the nuclear-testing case, however, virtually no information is available on any of the three problems as associated with any arms control measures involving explicit constraints on the development, production or deployment of military forces or weapons. A specific example may be instructive. In the case of a seismic monitoring network to inspect a weapon test ban, it is known that a certain number of seismic stations in the

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Soviet Union, distributed in a certain way, employing certain kinds of instrumentation, and permitting a certain number of on-site inspections per year, will yield a specified probability of detection of an underground weapon test of specified yield and specified environmental conditions. This information constitutes a reference mark in evaluating the technical efficacy of the inspection network. No similar reference mark, or even vaguely analogous reference mark, is in any way known for inspection systems to monitor the production and deployment of ballistic missiles and military aircraft. We simply do not presently have any clear idea of the information that would or would not be obtained, or might be obtained, by any configuration of inspectors and observation techniques. In the absence of this information, it is rather difficult to assess the possible (much less the likely) courses of Soviet action in areas in which the inspection system would yield uncertain information, because we do not know what those areas are; given such massive ignorance, the determination of sensible policies is of course quite impossible. In short, we simply do not have a detailed understanding of the possible role of inspection in connection with arms control measures intended to stabilize force levels of conventional strategic delivery systems. The same difficulty obtains for measures to constrain the development or deployment of space weapon systems, for zonal force deployment restrictions, and for most other arms control measures that have been proposed.

Although our understanding of "inspection" by unilateral espionage in our present environment is not all that might be desired, it so far exceeds the understanding we have of the detailed role of explicit inspection in an arms control environment that the difference is worth some comment. The first major difference appears to reside in the fact that we do have some understanding of the technical efficacy of present information-gathering processes, i.e., both the capabilities and the limitations of these presently operative processes are known. (Much of

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this information is only known to policy-makers and advisors, but this is sufficient.)
Similar information on most types of inspection systems has not yet been developed.
The second major distinction appears to reside in the fact that there are many people
who are more or less well-versed in the information appropriate to the present environ-
ment and skilled in the utilization of this information. Apart from the fact that
the relevant information for arms control inspection largely does not exist, there
is no similar body of "professionals" familiar with this information and skilled
in its evaluation. Both of these difficulties appear susceptible of remedy; studies
of sufficient scope would yield the requisite information, and would simultaneously
develop a body of people familiar with the information. And it seems likely that
"understanding" in this context is nearly equivalent to "familiarity".

Although the foregoing discussion has emphasized the role of inspection as
an information-gathering process, the same problems can be viewed in other ways.
Some of these alternative ways are useful in providing illumination on the problems
involved. For example, since arms control depends on cooperative or reciprocated
action concerning armament, inspection for arms control may be regarded as the process
of confirming (or denying) that the cooperation implied in the agreement--even
in the case of implicit "agreements"--is being observed. This is, however, merely
another way of approaching the same problems discussed above.

January 11, 1960

PERSONAL

Mr. John W. Gardner, President
The Carnegie Corporation
589 Fifth Avenue
New York 17, New York

Dear John:

I would like to tell you again how sorry I am about my
unintentional rudeness on Friday. Part of it was caused by a
secretarial mix-up. A meeting was scheduled in the Governor's
office for 11:00. I was afraid there might be some delay, and
I asked my secretary to call your office to see if 12:45 would be
equally convenient for you. She was told that it would be. I
am not sure whether she simply informed you that I was coming late
or whether she misunderstood me. At any rate, as things turned
out, the meeting did not start until noon and, since I was in dis-
agreement with everyone present and since the meeting had been
called in part to give me an opportunity to explain my views,
there was no way for me to duck out. I did leave well before the
end of the meeting and while everyone was still in full cry, so
that I probably succeeded in ruffling feelings in both places.
I do hope you know that your friendship has meant so much to me
over the years that I would not intentionally treat you in an
off-hand manner.

In thinking over our conversation I have also had a
slight concern about the propriety of my raising the various
possibilities of assistance with you so frequently. Part of the
problem has been that Jim Perkins had made the suggestion last
year in such an off-hand manner that I really was never quite
clear on what it was that he was proposing. Even more importantly,
I have had a tendency to consider the possibility of support from
you as a kind of escape-hatch from the pressures under which I
find myself. I have therefore had a tendency to check with you
before considering any drastic moves. Clearly, however, the
responsibility for making these moves is up to me. In assessing
my role in this, I hope you will keep in mind that, while I have
perhaps too frequently raised the issue, I have never actually
taken advantage of the opportunities which you have given me.
I am sure this is not a problem, but I am rather sensitive on
things of this kind.

Mr. John W. Gardner

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One comment about the "dying gods." What puzzles me here is not so much the factual situation but the relationship between analysis and action and between function and purpose. A historian or a philosopher can say that a society, to be vital, requires a myth and that the vitality of the myth resides in its being believed, not in its being true. Perhaps a better way to state this would be to say that the myth becomes true by being believed, or that gods cannot live without an act of faith. Having said this, however, one is no nearer to a solution for an age that cannot believe or for a society which has lost one faith and is groping for another. It is not enough, it seems to me, to say that one must believe in something or that one ought to have a faith. After all, what good would it have done a dinosaur to know which forms of life would succeed him? He had no choice except to be a dinosaur.

What this suggests to me is that the process of growth in a society may well stop once it has elaborated all the possibilities inherent in the basic structure of its values. Henceforth, its concern will turn to methodology or to orthodoxy or to the institutionalization of its dogma by means of a priesthood. If it takes the road of cynicism, it may no longer have the capacity for faith because it has become almost perfectly adaptable. If it takes the road of orthodoxy, it may exhaust the possibilities of adaptation inherent in its values. It will then refuse to change, not because it is incapable of conceiving a different kind of system, but because to adopt a different kind of system would be to give up the very reason for its existence. I can conceive it quite possible that a society may know very well what it may need in order to survive and yet it may be incapable of carrying this out because that course of action may seem entirely repugnant to it.

We must talk about this problem further. This is the kind of thing on which I too will be working as soon as my book is finished.

Let me know when you come up here. I would love to see you for lunch or dinner or at any other time that you could give us.

With best regards.

CARNEGIE CORPORATION OF NEW YORK

589 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 17, N.Y.

JOHN W. GARDNER
President

February 26, 1960

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger
Harvard University
Center for International Affairs
6 Divinity Avenue
Cambridge 38, Massachusetts

Dear Henry:

I am returning the manuscript of your chapter on negotiations. This seems to me to be Kissinger at the top of his form. It is penetrating, it never oversimplifies, and yet it is beautifully lucid. If the rest of the book comes up to this standard it should be quite an event.

Here are some specific comments:

I-6 Fourth line from bottom. "An international system..." This sentence is far from clear on first reading.

I-7 Second and third lines from bottom. "Awkward repetition of "will prove"

I-8 Line 13. "The frustration of this impasse" is awkward and unclear.

II-1 Beginning on the middle of the page ("A sterile debate...") and sporadically throughout the rest of the chapter you deal very shrewdly with the foolish business of trying to divine Soviet intentions. You might bring out more explicitly what I read between the lines (or can almost hear you saying across the lunch table)--that this runs through so much else in our foreign policy and is a manifestation of our ear-to-the-ground, watch-the-polls, market research approach to weighty decisions. Determine the environment in which the decision is to be made, we tell ourselves, forgetting that the decision will shape the environment as much as vice versa.

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger

-2-

February 26, 1960

II-3 Lines 1-2. "were unexceptionable"? I'd prefer "were highly plausible." You give the impression here of treating the authors of the containment policy with a senatorial courtesy which you do not lavish on their successors. It's a matter of a word and phrase here and there. Actually no one who reads the following pages carefully will believe that you really meant "unexceptionable."

II-11 Third line from bottom. "Carried to its extreme..." The discussion on the following pages is extremely good and lucid. The _Wall Street Journal_ argument is a little like that new "nerve gas" that acts on the neural centers to produce complete paralysis. I'll add this item to my collection. Similar paralyzers of thought and judgment: (1) When business is bad you mustn't speculate on the possibility of a recession because it may bring on a recession; (2) You mustn't criticize any innovator in art--however fantastic--because some of the most honored names today were once criticized.

II-14 Line 6ff. "The view..." The word _tensions_ has so many connotations that you might prefer "a threatening atmosphere." As you use the word tension in the next paragraph the context allows no misunderstanding, but here it's confusing.

II-21 Last three lines. Wonderful point.

IV-6 Whole discussion on this page is _excellent_.

V-16 Line 6. I read the wrong meaning into "satellite orbit" and was baffled.

VI-11 Line 7. "Only the purposeful..." Is this strictly true. I think you mean that "Only in the purposeful is flexibility a virtue"

JWG:hca

JOHN W. GARDNER
President

May 18, 1960

Dear Henry:

The chapter on political evolution is even better than the earlier chapter you showed me. It's so well done that I can offer little comment or criticism. Except for a few typos it could go to press as it is. But just to prove that I did my homework, here are some trivial comments.

Page I--4 I'm not sure you are quite fair to Rostow in suggesting that his book is simply a sophisticated version of the views you described in the preceding pages. Unless I'm reading something into Rostow which isn't there, he has a greater sense of the complexity of things than your paragraphs would suggest.

Page I--5 (Paragraph beginning at the bottom of page) Your point is an interesting one, and your argument is effective, but it seems to me to be more skillful than convincing.

Page I--6 (Five lines from bottom) At a number of points in the chapter you used the single word _history_ when what you seem to mean is _historical determinism_ or an _interpretation of history_ or _historical inevitability_. I am afraid many readers will fail to understand this.

Page I--7 Your discussion of the validity of our evolutionary assumptions--beginning here and continuing for several pages--is remarkably good. A high point of the chapter.

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger

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May 18, 1960

Page I--12 This page was missing in my copy.

Page II--1 This whole section on "the process of evolution reconsidered" seemed to me extremely instructive and clarifying.

Page II--2 (Second paragraph) The point made in your opening sentence is penetrating and helpful, but perhaps the phrase "historians of evolution" means something different for you than it does for me. Do you mean historians who are fond of evolutionary interpretations? (The rest of the paragraph is superb.)

Page II--4 The discussion which begins in the middle of this page and continues for two more pages is immensely useful but I think you see the movement toward rigidity as more inexorable than (I hope) it actually is. I wonder, in the case of a pluralistic society such as our own, subject to more or less continuous change, whether it is really possible to speak in terms of a single framework which inevitably rigidifies. Would it be wholly unrealistic to say that parts of our society (our culture, our social traditions, our intellectual world) are dying, while other parts are being born. To the extent that we are successful in helping the moribund parts to die gracefully, and in bringing the newer parts through the perils of infancy, we may avoid or at least postpone the inevitable rigidification. You touch this possibility very lightly on page II--6 (first sentence).

Page V--1 The discussion of the role of the new countries in international relations is perceptive and convincing. There is one aspect of the situation you might touch on a bit more explicitly. Their actions are explainable, as you say, partly in terms of their own insecurity and self-absorption; but also partly explainable in terms of the "role possibilities" which exist in a tensely bipolar world. You will find notable similarities between Argentina's behavior in the bipolar world of 1943 and Egypt's in the bipolar world of 1953. Such bipolarity creates a role for neutrals and determines to a

Dr. Henry A. Kissinger

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May 18, 1960

considerable degree how that role will be played.
Whoever happens to fill the role will find himself
playing much the same part, using the same arguments,
resorting to the same ambiguities, seizing the same
opportunities.

* * * * *

So much for the specific comments. I have not at-
tempted to indicate all the points at which I applaud your
sureness of insight. I look forward to the book with great
enthusiasm.

JWG:hca

The paper is shot through with impressive insights; on many occasions, I stopped to reflect on some phrase or sentence. It is well written.

Suggested improvements:

You have done less on the question of the relation between democracy and industrial development than I had hoped, given our conversation, to find. Specifically, you have not attempted to deal with the issue except in black and white. The alternatives ought not to be Germany and England, but France and England, or the U.S. and England. In the development of these democracies, what role, specifically, did industrialism play? Also -- and most important -- what is the relation between the ideas that a society accepts and the economic and political forms that it creates? Marxism says nothing about "planning," but this is now presented as a peculiarly Soviet device. Its achievements are fairly obvious; what are its limitations? How much of what we see in Russia today expresses an implementation of Marxist theories, and how much expresses the peculiar historical traditions of that society? When was Russia "free" in the Western sense? Do we have, in history, evidence of a state drastically altering its character, in the way that certain optimists about Russia pretend? I feel that there are dimensions to this topic that you have scarcely considered.

I am equally anxious that you do more with the question of "the uses of education." The notion that to educate is to make men free is certainly unproved by evidence that we have. In the context of the twentieth century, what purposes may an educational system have other than freedom? With increasing automation, and an ever-developing technology, the utilitarian aspects of education can certainly occupy an individual's time totally. Why do we imagine that technological competence leads to a concern with political problems or with freedom or with any other sort of resistance to authority. The study of Hegel or Kant in the 19th century agitated Russians, and led to disaffection. The study of physics or chemistry in the 20th century need not produce the same results at all. Also, it is important always to realize how total is the state's control of education today. If it wishes to render history in a certain idiom, there is no possibility of another view con-