INSTITUTE FOR DEFENSE ANALYSES

International and Social Studies Division

DEC 1 8 1968

400 Army-Navy Drive, Arlington, Virginia 22202 • Telephone (703) 558-1000

December 16, 1968

Dear Henry:

I am looking forward to seeing you Thursday night. Give me a call as you set out for Chevy Chase and I will make sure that you get the proper directions (my phone number is OLiver 4-6213). Don't worry about the time. I have a Spanish housekeeper and a very tolerant wife.

I am enclosing, for whatever interest it may have, a copy of a speech I gave last week at a conference sponsored by Carleton University and the Canadian Institute of International Affairs. It relates to some of the key issues which you and your colleagues will have to confront. One of the principal points I tried to make while I was in Ottawa was that the Canadians, in their own serious review of policy, had better keep in close touch with us as they review their NATO and general defense policy.

C. L. Cooper
13 December 1968
Carleton University
Ottawa, Canada

[lc]

A Reappraisal of Strategic Issues

Americans, those of us who live in the United States and those of us who live in Canada, have much in common. High on the list is an uninhibited free-swinging frontier spirit. How else can one explain our readiness, in the time frame of less than two days, to address the problem of "The United States and the World"? And how else can one explain my own brash willingness in half an hour to discuss and presumably dispose of a "Reappraisal of Strategic Issues"?

It is a commentary on our society and our era that the amount of time statesmen can devote to reflection and enlightenment seems to be inversely related to the urgency and complexity of the problems they confront. Perhaps think-time has always been a scarce good for national leaders; periods of history which seem to us to have been leisurely and simple, to the statesmen of the time, might have been fraught with pressing and difficult problems. But it may be worth noting that it has only been quite recently that my government, at least, has found it necessary to create a special category of civil servants called "Policy-Planners," and to sponsor a special category of institutions called "Think Tanks." Even thus equipped, one wonders how many of our top policymakers can listen, without a rueful shrug, to the advice of a shrewd 17th Century Spanish Jesuit: "Think beforehand, today for tomorrow, and even for many days hence," Gracian admonished. "For the provident, there are no mischances, and for the careful, no narrow escapes. It is better to sleep on things beforehand than lie awake about them afterwards."

2

But however brisk the pace of events, and however harassed our leaders, there is at least one brief moment for pause and reflection that comes our way as a by-product of our constitutional form of government. For you in Canada it comes more or less irregularly; for us in the United States it comes faithfully every four years. This phase in the life cycle of our government process has been aptly described as "A Time of Reappraisal."

Like the emergence of autumn itself, the season of reappraisal is signaled by many faint but readily discernible changes in the air. Our daily papers and weekly journals devote more space to such subjects as "National Priorities" and "Whither the Nation?" Our pundits in and out of academe increasingly, and sometimes shrilly, call out their advice and offer their wares; prestigious institutions publish provocative Agendas for the Nation; Think Tanks offer analyses of the Process of Decisionmaking; legislators take the occasion to offer guidance and admonishment; Government "position papers" flourish and multiply. There is a heady, invigorating atmosphere of intellectual ferment devoted to three Big Questions: Where Are We? Where Do We Wish to Go? How Can We Best Get There?

Every season of reappraisal seems to have its own unique quality. And this is not surprising. The world moves rapidly. Enough dramatic, sometimes horrendous events take place both within our borders and beyond them in the course of four years to give at least some superficial validity to the feeling that a period of testing and trouble is to be faced - a period very different from that which the more fortunate, sometimes misguided, guardians of our destiny confronted just a few years before.

3

It is naive and even self-serving for each new Administration, on the eve of its tenure, to think of itself as representing "America's Last Chance." But I would submit that, President-Elect Nixon would be fully justified in regarding himself as poised on a watershed of history; the United States faces a truly unique period in terms of the nature and extent of problems, and in terms of the scale and gravity of its challenges. An urgent reappraisal is indicated - and would have been indicated even if President Johnson had succeeded himself - and would have been indicated even if we did not find ourselves at our Quadrennial Pause for Reflection.

Before we, here, and hopefully before the new policy team in Washington embarks on a "Reappraisal of Strategic Issues," it is essential that we put the problem in perspective. Without flailing around in the semantics swamp, I think we can agree that "Strategic Issues" relate to those Great Questions that must be dealt with in the current pursuit of our national goals. What are our national goals? Broadly speaking, I think they are two:

The first is a very elementary one - our survival as a nation.

The second is a broader, more philosophical one - together with other like-minded nations, the development of a world order in which our country and others can flourish.

It is worth spending a moment or two on a closer examination of these goals.

Our first objective implies that nuclear war with the Soviet Union must be eliminated as a conceivable policy option. The hard, rigorous conclusion that inevitably follows from this is that the United States should not knowingly undertake any move which carries with it a high risk of intercontinental nuclear war - rhetoric delivered during election campaigns and ceremonial toasts made at State dinners, notwithstanding.

4

The second broad objective implies that the United States follows a policy of tolerance, patience and abstinence in the affairs of other countries - provided that one nation, in the pursuit of its aspirations and perceived destiny, does not threaten the security and well-being of its neighbors, and thereby threaten the peace. Implicit in this objective must be the recognition, both by the United States and other countries, that we cannot assume the role of international gendarme; we have not demonstrated any conspicuous talent for such a role, and we should not endanger other, possibly more vital, interests by becoming embroiled indiscriminately in other peoples' squabbles. Implicit, too, for selfish as well as altruistic reasons, is the need to assist the underdeveloped world in its economic development - a need that will, as the years pass, become at once more urgent and more difficult to fulfill.

I think it would be hard to quarrel with these objectives, at least as stated in their most skeletal form. Do they need to be "reappraised"? I think not. They were applicable for President Truman, as they were for President Eisenhower. And as relevant in 1968 as they were in 1962. In fact, they are not too far removed from the objectives announced almost two hundred years ago: "to establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity."

It is important that we recognize that these relatively unchanging national objectives must be constantly sought, but in our fluid world they will probably never really be achieved. The most that our leaders can do is to assure that, to the extent they have control of or influence over the course of events, the nation is moving in a direction

5

toward rather than away from survival and the development of world order. The problem facing Mr. Nixon is how best in December 1968, to seek our national objectives in a world very different from that confronting Mr. Johnson in December, 1964. This involves a careful reappraisal of several profound national and international questions - "strategic issues," if you will.

Six major issues confront us as a government and as a society, while we stagger wearily through the last seconds of the 1968th Round and come out weaving and bobbing for Round 1969. Some of these are destiny-shaping in their implications for all of us; some provide special but by no means exclusive challenges for Washington policymakers. Each of them is closely related to our goals of national survival and world order. They are: the wide range of _domestic_ economic and social problems; the approaching Moment of Truth in our _space_ programs; the international _population-food_ equation; _U.S.-Soviet relations_ in a period of nuclear parity; the _US role in Asia_ after Vietnam; and the current and future state of the _Atlantic Alliance_. One is chilled by the thought that there may be yet one more, as yet unpredictable, development - one which, like Vietnam and President Johnson, might result in a marriage of Problem to President which will permit little opportunity for rival claimants to time and attention.

As of today, December 13, 1968, most thoughtful people in the United States, I would guess, regard our national survival as being under greater threat than at any time in the past century, including the periods of the two Great Wars. This uneasiness does not stem from the hazards of living in the shadow of possible thermonuclear extinction, but rather from the all too-apparent erosion of the fabric and quality of our day-to-day life. Black Panthers and the Ku Klux Klan, skid-rows and pot and mink coats for men, air pollution in Los Angeles, traffic jams in Washington, virtual anarchy in

6

New York, and police brutality in Chicago are problems of the Here and Now; the
Doomsday threat of Soviet ICBMs is beyond our comprehension.

No President since Franklin Roosevelt has been confronted with such appalling,
insistent domestic problems on entering office as Mr. Nixon. He will have to (and
I use the verb construction advisedly) make conspicuous progress in solving them if the
future of our children is to have any recognizable resemblance to the hopes and dreams
we have cherished for them. Thus, the next several years is likely to see some major
shifts in national priorities and resources, lest our survival as a democratic nation
be threatened. And because of the interaction of our domestic and international pursuits,
this will have important implications - for good or ill - for the rest of the world.

Estimates of the effort necessary to make consequential strides in coping with our
national environmental, urban, public health and educational problems are grossly
imprecise, and probably even irrelevant, for our present discussion. Suffice to say
finding the resources, and then convincing Congress to allocate them, will require
gargantuan efforts by Mr. Nixon and his principal subordinates. It has been said that
a country as wealthy as the United States can undertake a domestic program of this
scale without sacrificing important defense or international programs. But what
political scientists and economists prescribe for a nation's objectives is not necessarily
what responsible politicians are likely to advocate. Something will have to give. And
the vital and profound decisions, on what is to be chosen and what is to be sacrificed,
constitute in the last analysis, Strategic Decisions - that is, decisions whose magnitude
and complexity are properly the concern of National Security Councils, Institutes for
Strategic Studies and Conferences on the United States and the World.

*

*

*

7

Some time during his tenure, the new President will play host to the first (or second - and I don't care very much) group of men to have trod the moon's surface. But on the morning after, if not well before, he must make a fateful decision as to where we go from there. Once we reach the moon, and especially if we reach it before the Russians - with all this implies in terms of national pride and prestige - widespread popular apathy and even opposition may develop to devoting vast new sums in an effort to go onward and ourward. Advocates of earth-bound programs will be likely to get an increasingly sympathetic hearing. But even if the case for "New York, Yes" and "Venus, No" does not prevail, rival claimants for a vastly expanded program to study the ocean floor may succeed in diverting space funds to this new frontier of science and technology.

The problems subsumed under the gruesome equation of population versus food also bear closely on both our national survival and our quest for world order. In terms of any but the most narrow and trivial definition, they are as much strategic in nature as those arising from the invention of the atom bomb.

A man named Malthus summed up the problem very tidily. He started with two basic propositions: "Food is necessary to the existence of man"; "the passion between the sexes is necessary and will remain nearly in its present state." He noted that population could be held in check only by "war, famine and pestilence." The innate optimism of college freshmen and the scholarly treatises of college professors tended largely to discount Malthus for not having foreseen the great scientific advances of the 19th and 20th Centuries that were to change the course of events. But Malthus may have turned out to be right after all. Paul Ehrlich, in his book "The Population Bomb," warns that, "The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the '70s, "Ehrlich writes,

8.

"the world will undergo famines - millions of people are going to starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now." We are in deep trouble says C. P. Snow, "Many millions of people in the poor countries are going to starve to death before our eyes."

There are those who know infinitely more about this subject than I who would say that Ehrlich and Snow present much too lugubrious a view. But even cheerier prognostications are sobering. For statesmen trying to cope with the world they have inherited, the food-population equation may have macabre strategic implications. Because of our large food surpuses, the difference between eating and starving for millions of people thousands of miles away may depend on decisions made in Washington and Ottawa. But even with new programs, Wagnerian in scope, and even with new advances in agronomy and techniques in food substitutions our ability to affect the balance may be increasingly eroded within the next several years. Some would say that because of this national incapacity, we should strike the problem from our list of strategic issues. But unless we are prepared to live in a permanent state of psychological and political seige, we had better leave it on the Reappraisal Agenda.

If war is now too important to be left to the generals, the food problem is now too urgent to be left to bureaucrats in Ministries of Trade or Departments of Agriculture. We in North America - together with our cousins in Australasia - may, all too soon, find this to be one of the most difficult questions of national policy. Perhaps it is a question best addressed together, perhaps through the machinery of the United Nations, but in any event in close cooperation, and very soon - like today to tomorrow.

This is all the more true since the people of Asia, Africa, and Latin America wish not only to survive; they wish to improve the life they live. We "have" nations are

9

already being subjected to great pressures from the less well-endowed areas of the world to conduct trade and provide assistance for economic development on terms much more favorable than have been accorded thus far. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, held last winter in New Delhi, ended in virtual deadlock; a significant portent of a new word polarization is that the division was between rich and poor, not between Communist and non-Communist countries.

Let us now turn to some issues with which we, as strategic thinkers and specialists in international affairs, feel more comfortable. Of prime importance, of course, is the Super-Power relationship. The United States, for the first time since World War II, confronts the world in a position of nuclear parity rather than superiority, vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, a situation which has ominous implications for our national survival, but one which might also present new opportunities for reducing international tension. Mr. Nixon may well have the choice to make.

The rapid growth of Soviet strategic forces clearly dates from decisions taken after the Cuban missile crisis of 1962. We do not know the extent to which these forces will continue to expand or precisely the forms they might take. Though we cannot divine the ultimate political and military effects of these force augmentations on the overall strategic relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union, we can safely assume that Moscow hopes to achieve a more dominant voice in world affairs. Obviously, the Soviets have domestic economic constraints and demands on their resources which constitute inducements for avoiding an indefinite strategic arms race with the United States. Obviously, too, what the United States does, on its own, or in response to Soviet programs,

10

constitutes part of the equation and will affect Soviet calculations. Moscow's purpose
in expressing a willingness to discuss strategic arms-limitation agreements remains
uncertain in detail, if not in outline. But surely the opportunity to explore what that
purpose is should not be dismissed out of hand. Preoccupation with only worst-case
possibilities could prevent mutual steps in directions that would serve the real interests
of both sides. Admittedly, as much from deep emotional commitment as from any sense
of expertise, I tend to side with Carl Kaysen in his recent Brookings essay, when he says
that "The course of arms limitation, restrictions in deployments, and arms control is
not only cheaper than that of continuing competition in arms and military confrontation,
it is safer." Here then, is another major issue that confronts the Reappraisers: Can
national survival and world order be best assured through efforts to achieve a nuclear
stand-down or in a strategic arms race for clearcut definitive superiority? Mr. Nixon's
pre-election views may indicate that the latter course has already been decided upon,
but major new efforts in offensive capabilities would seem bootless even in terms of the
macabre arithmetic of a Doctor Strangelove. And vast programs to develop effective
defensive capabilities would seem at least as difficult and infinitely more expensive to
achieve as efforts to control and sharply reduce the risks of nuclear confrontation.

Both Moscow and Washington have been acutely aware of the risks of direct
confrontation; their policies and postures in Europe over the past decade or more attest
to this. But there is great and constant danger in the peripheral areas where the metes
and bounds of Great Power relationships are much more fluid. The Middle East is such
an area. The increased Soviet naval presence in the Mediterranean is more likely to be
augmented than withdrawn and the danger of a confrontation, albeit one which neither side
may desire, will haunt the new Administration as tensions between the not altogether-