SAMUEL BLAUGRUND, M. D., F. A. A. P.

933 WEST STATE STREET
TRENTON, N. J.

October 31, 1956

Mr. Henry A. Kissinger
Director of Internal Seminar at Harvard
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts

Dear Mr. Kissinger:

I read with deep interest on the editorial
page of our local newspaper yesterday, your
"Essay on Reflections on American Diplomacy".

I would deeply appreciate two reprints of
your essay; one for my son who is a senior
at Yale University, and one for myself.

I trust millions of Americans will read
your essay so that we might possibly
appreciate the operations of our State
Department, so that we may become a more
enlightened citizenry. Trusting these
reprints are available, and with deep appreciation,
I am,

SB: jv

WICKLOW FARM
SOUTH WOODSTOCK, VERMONT

September 24, 1956

Dear Henry:

Here is the signed contract. Will you pass it along to Mr. Creel with my thanks?

Six of seven sectionsof my memorandum went to the
typist a week ago. I'm working on the last. As you can
guess, it's hard to get the sense of perspective needed
to summarize them; generals about our alliances when the
particulars are coming in so fast. What is happening
doesn't, alas, seem out of line with thoughts that we
exchanged earlier -- but the calm confident tone is a bit
elusive. I'll do my best to send it to the typist on the
deadline date.

BOARD OF EDUCATION

CITY OF NEW YORK

SAMUEL J. TILDEN HIGH SCHOOL

TILDEN AVENUE AND EAST 57th STREET
BROOKLYN 3, NEW YORK

ABRAHAM LEFKOWITZ, Principal

Telephone Dickens 6-5300

October 11, 1956

Professor Henry A. Kissinger
Harvard University
Cambridge, Massachusetts

Dear Professor Kissinger:

I should appreciate greatly receiving a
reprint, if one is available, of your article:
"Reflections on American Diplomacy", in the
current issue of _Foreign Affairs_.

I enjoyed this article greatly, especially
the remarks on the need for broader training
of leadership groups in political and
strategic matters and would like to use the
reprint in my educational and military work.

Thank you for your courtesy.

REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY

by Henry A. Kissinger

"Policy" wrote Metternich, the Austrian minister who steered his country through thirty-nine years of crisis by a tour de force perhaps never excelled "is like a play in many acts which unfolds inevitably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the play will not go on is an absurdity. The play will go on either by means of the actors or by means of the spectators who mount the stage...The crucial problem [of statesmanship], therefore, resides in the decision of whether to assemble the audience, whether the curtain is to be raised and above all in the intransic merit of the play."

There can be little doubt that U. S. foreign policy is undergoing a crisis. For several years we have been groping for a concept to deal with the transformation of the cold war from an effort to build defensive barriers into a contest for the allegiance of humanity. But the new Soviet tactics coupled with the equally unassimilated increase in the destructive potential of the new weapons technology have led to a crisis in our system of alliances and to substantial Soviet gains among the uncommitted of the world.

It would be a mistake, however, to ascribe our difficulties to this or that error of policy or to a particular Administration, although the present Administration has not helped matters by its pretense of "normalcy."

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To return to Metternich's metaphor: It can be argued that our policy has reached an impasse because of our penchant for happy endings; the Soviets have been able to use negotiations to their advantage because we insisted on reading from an old script. As in all tragedies, many of these problems have been produced in spite of our best intentions and have been caused, not by our worst qualities, but by our best. What is at issue, therefore, is not a policy, but an attitude.

It is with this attitude and its consequences in the conduct of negotiations and our policy of alliances that this article seeks to deal.

I

It is understandable that a nation which for a century and a half had been preoccupied with its domestic affairs should seek to apply their pattern to international affairs. But the very success of the American experiment and the spontaneity of our social institutions has served to emphasize the dilemma faced at some stage by every country: how to reconcile its vision of itself with the vision of it as seen by others. To itself, a nation is an expression of justice and the more spontaneous its social institutions, the more this is true; for government functions effectively only when most citizens obey voluntarily and they will obey only to the extent that they consider the demands of their rulers just. But to other nations, a state is a force to be balanced. This is inevitable because external sovereignty can be controlled only by superior force and because national strategy must be planned on the basis of the other side's capabilities and not merely a calculation of its intentions. There exists a double

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standard, therefore, in all foreign policy; internally, foreign policy
is justified like all other policy in terms of an absolute standard
because the nation has no other; but abroad, what is defined as justice domestic
becomes a program to be compromised by negotiation. If the institutions
and values of the states comprising the international order are sufficiently
similar, this incommensurability may not become apparent. But in a revolu-
tionary period like the present, it affects profoundly relationships among
states.

Foremost among the attitudes affecting our foreign policy is
American empiricism and its quest for methodological certainty: nothing
is "true" unless it is "objective" and it is not "objective" unless it is
part of experience. This makes for the absence of dogmatism and for the
ease of social relations on the domestic scene. But in the conduct of
foreign policy, it has pernicious consequences. Foreign policy is the art
of weighing probabilities; its mastery is the grasp of the nuances of
possibilities. To attempt to conduct it as a science can only lead to
rigidity. For only the risks are certain, but the opportunities are con-
jectural; one cannot be "sure" about the implications of certain events
until they have happened and when they have occurred it is too late to do
anything about them. Empiricism in foreign policy leads to a penchant for
<u>ad hoc</u> solutions; the rejection of dogmatism makes our policy makers
reluctant to commit themselves until all facts are in; but by the time
the facts are in, a crisis situation has usually developed or an opportunity
has passed. Our policy is, therefore, geared to dealing with emergencies;
it finds difficulty in gaining acceptance for long-range programs that might
forestall them.

Another symptom of our quest for methodological certainty is the
vast number of governmental committees charged with examining and developing
policy. The very multiplicity of committees makes it difficult to arrive
at decisions in time; it injects an element of uncertainty because
responsibility is obscured. As a result, in our governmental structure
sovereign departments negotiate national policy among themselves with no
single authority capable of following up these decisions or of applying them
over a period of time. The temptation to conduct policy administratively
is ever present, of course, in a government organized, as ours is, primarily
for the conduct of domestic affairs. But the spirit of policy and that of
bureaucracy are fundamentally opposed. Profound policy thrives on creativeness;
good administration thrives on routine. Policy involves an adjustment of
risks; administration an avoidance of deviation. The attempt to conduct
policy administratively leads to a standard which evaluates by mistakes
avoided rather than by goals achieved. It is no accident that most great
statesmen were opposed by the "experts" in their foreign offices, for the
very greatness of the statesmen's conception tends to make it inaccessible
to those whose primary concern is with safety and minimum risk.

Our methodological doubt leads to the dispatch of a plethora of
emissaries to foreign capitals to inform themselves without a sufficient
consideration of the impression of vacillation they convey. It makes for
vulnerability to Soviet maneuvers in two ways: On the one hand, every
Soviet change of line is taken at least in part at face value, for we
cannot be certain that the Soviets may not "mean" it this time until they
have proved they do not, and they will do their best to try not to prove it

5

until the tactic has served its purpose. On the other hand, we have found
to new situations
it difficult to adjust our tactics/so that we always tend to speak in the
categories of the most recent threat but one. We are, therefore, in the
paradoxical position that we, the empiricists, appear to the world as
rigid, unimaginative and even somewhat cynical; while the dogmatic Bolsheviks
exhibit flexibility, daring and subtlety. This is because our empiricism
dooms us to an essentially reactive policy that improvises a counter to
every Soviet move. While the Soviet emphasis on theory gives them the
epistemological certainty to act, to maneuver, and to run risks. The very
fact of action shifts the risks of countermoves to the other side; it
absorbs its energies in essentially defensive maneuvers.

The willingness to act need not derive from theory, of course.
Indeed, an overemphasis on theory can lead to losing touch with reality.
In many societies—in Great Britain, for example—policy developed from a
firmly held tradition of a national strategy. Throughout the 19th century
it was a tenet of British policy that Antwerp should not fall into the hands
of a major power. This was not backed by an elaborate metaphysics, but
simply by a tradition of British sea-power whose requirements were so
generally understood that they were never debated. It is the absence of
a tradition of foreign policy which exaggerates the biases of our empiricism
and makes it difficult to conduct our policy with a proper regard for
the timing of measures. It causes us to overlook the fact that policy exists
in time as well as in space, that a measure is correct only if it can be
carried out at the proper moment. To be sure, our cumbersome administrative

6

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mechanism adds immeasurably to the problem. But in addition, our deliberations are conducted as if a policy were eternally true, as if a measure which might meet exactly the needs of a given moment could not backfire if adopted a year later. There is lacking in our policy for this reason the feeling for nuance, the ability to come up with variations on the same theme which have been so notable in Soviet tactics. We consider policy-making concluded when the National Security Council has come to a decision. And in fact, the process of arriving at a decision is so arduous that its very difficulty makes for rigidity and a reluctance to re-examine policies after they have outlived their usefulness. When Mr. Dulles used the words "agonizing reappraisal" he spoke truly for within our government any reappraisal is apt to be extremely painful.

But a written statement of policy is likely to amount to a truism; the real difficulty arises in applying it to concrete situations. And while we have often come up with the proper measures, we have not found it easy to carry them through time, to adapt our approach to the requirements of the situation. The different uses made by the Soviets of the time interval between the summit conference and the Geneva conference of foreign ministers illustrates this point. The Soviets established diplomatic relations with the German Federal Republic, they used the peace offensive to undermine the cohesiveness of NATO and concluded the arms deal with Egypt while we spent the interval working out positions for the imminent negotiations on disarmament and on Germany. By the time we arrived in Geneva, we found ourselves confronted by a series of fait accomplis and the conference foredoomed.

7

Related to the absence of a sense of timing is the difficulty of coming to grips with tragic experience. This is another result of our concentration on domestic problems during the greater part of our history. For while national experience is fraught with hardships, it is notably free of disaster. On the contrary, the American domestic experience exhibits an unparalleled success, of great daring rewarded, and of great obstacles overcome. It is no wonder, therefore, that to many of our most responsible men, particularly in the business community, the warnings of impending peril or of imminent disaster sound like the Cassandra cries of abstracted "egg-heads." For is not the attribute of the "egg-head" his lack of touch with reality, and does not American reality show an unparalleled wealth coupled with an unparalleled growth?

There has been much criticism of Secretaries Humphrey and Wilson for their defense economies. But in fairness, the psychological background of their decisions should be understood: despite all the information at their disposal, they simply cannot believe that in the nuclear age the penalty for miscalculation may be national catastrophe. They may know in their heads, but they cannot accept in their hearts, that the society they helped to build and that gave them the opportunity could disappear as did Rome or Carthage or Byzantium, which probably seemed just as eternal to their inhabitants. These characteristics make for an absence of a sense of urgency, a tendency to believe that everything can be tried once and that the worst consequence of mistakes may be that we may have to redouble our efforts later on. The irrevocable error is not yet part of the American experience.

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Another aspect of this problem is our reluctance to think in terms of power. To be sure, American expansion both economic and geographical was not accomplished without a judicious application of power. But our Calvinist heritage has endowed success with the attribute of justice. Even our great fortunes, however accumulated, were almost invariably justified as imposing a social obligation; the great foundation is after all a peculiarly American phenomenon. As a nation, we have used power almost shamefacedly as if it were inherently wicked. We have wanted to be liked for our own sakes and we have wished to succeed because of the persuasiveness of our principles rather than through our strength. Our feeling of guilt with respect to power has caused us to transform all wars into crusades, to apply our power, when it has been used, in the most absolute terms. Intermediary applications for our power have been rarely conceived and reluctantly undertaken.

But international relations cannot be conducted without an awareness of power relationships. To be sure, the contemporary revolution cannot be managed merely by an exercise of force. But unless we maintain at least an equilibrium of power between us and the Soviet bloc we will have no chance to undertake any positive measures. And maintaining this equilibrium may confront us with some very difficult choices. We are certain to be confronted with situations of extraordinary ambiguity such as civil wars or domestic coups. Every successful Soviet move makes our moral position that much more difficult: Indo-China was more ambiguous than Korea; Egypt more ambiguous than Indo-China. There can be no doubt that we should seek

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to prevent such occurrences. But while we should never give up our
principles, we must also realize that we cannot maintain our principles
unless we survive.

Consistent with our reluctance to think in terms of power has been
our notion of the nature of peace; that peace is the "normal" pattern of
relations among states, that it is equivalent to a consciousness of harmony,
that it can be aimed at directly as a goal of policy--these are truisms
rarely challenged in our political debate. Both major political parties
maintain that they work for a lasting peace, even if they differ about the
best means of attaining it. Both make statements which imply that on a
certain magic day, perhaps after a four-power conference, "peace will break
out."

But no idea could be more dangerous. To begin with, and quite apart
from any ideological disagreement, the polarization of power in the world
would give international relations a degree of instability and the present
volatile state of technology is likely to compound this sense of insecurity.
Moreover, whenever peace--conceived as the avoidance of war---has become
the direct objective of a power or a group of powers, international relations
have been at the mercy of the state willing to forgo peace. There are four
ways of avoiding war: by surrender or by vigilance, by predominance or by
equilibrium. No statesman can entrust the fate of his country entirely to
the continued good will of another sovereign state, if only because the best
guarantee for the will remaining good is not to tempt it by too great a
disproportion of power. Peace, therefore, cannot be aimed at directly; it

10

is the expression of certain conditions and power relationships. It is to
these relationships--not to peace--that diplomacy must address itself.

It is obviously to the Soviet interest to equate peace with a state
of good feeling unconnected with power relationships or past usurpations,
for such an attitude ratifies all their gains since World War II. By
the same token, it is to the U. S. interest to leave no doubt that the
tension of the Cold War was produced not only by the intransigence of the
Soviet tone, but also by the intransigence of their measures. As long as
the Soviets can give the impression that conciliatory statements alone are
a symptom of peaceful intentions, they can control the pace of negotiations
and gain the benefits of the advocacy of peace without paying any price for
its achievement. U. S. diplomacy should, therefore, have set itself the
task of reducing the Soviet peace offensive to concrete terms as quickly
as possible, to make clear that the requisite for a real relaxation of
tension was Soviet concession on issues which had produced the tension in
the first place such as the division of Germany or the satellite orbit. If
the Soviets are given the privilege of initiating negotiations when it suits
their purpose and to break them off without any penalty, diplomacy will
become a tool of Soviet propaganda. And the variety of Soviet maneuvers
will in time erode the cohesion of the Free World.

II

With this we have reached one of the major problems confronting
current U. S. diplomacy: the changed nature of negotiations in a revolutionary
political order. An international order, the basic arrangements of which
are accepted by all the major powers, is "legitimate"; a system which contains

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a power or a group of powers which refuses to accept either the arrangements of the settlement or the domestic structure of the other states is "revolutionary". A legitimate order does not make conflicts impossible; it limits their scope. Wars may arise, but they will be fought in *the name* of the existing system and the peace will be justified as a better expression of the agreed arrangements. In a revolutionary order, on the other hand, disputes do not concern the adjustment of disputes within a given framework, but the framework itself.

There can be little doubt that we are living through a revolutionary period. On the physical plane, there has occurred a disequilibrium between the power of weapons and the objectives for which to employ them, so that at a moment of unparalleled strength, we find ourselves paralyzed by the implications of our own weapons technology.¹ On the political plane, many of the newly independent powers continue to project on the international scene the revolutionary fervor that gained them independence. On the ideological plane, the rapid rate of communicating ideas, the rise in expectations, the newly awakened aspirations of many areas hitherto dormant have combined to lay the groundwork for contemporary ferment. And the Soviet bloc eager to exploit all dissatisfactions for its own ends has given the present situation its revolutionary urgency.

This is true despite the conciliatory statements of the 20th party congress. For "peaceful coexistence" was not advanced as an acceptance of the *status quo*. On the contrary, it was justified as the most efficient

1. For a fuller discussion of the physical factors, see the author's "Force and Diplomacy in the Nuclear Age," *Foreign Affairs*, April 1956.

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offensive tactic, as a more effective means to subvert the existing order.
Neither the class-struggle with its postulate of irreconcilable conflict,
nor the inevitable triumph of Communism with its corollary of the dictatorship
of the proletariat were given up. To be sure, war was declared as no
longer inevitable, but only because soon the USSR would possess preponderant
strength. Behind "peaceful coexistence" stands the prospect of other tactics
should the present method prove less fruitful than anticipated. "In the
world from now on," Mao has said, "neutrality is only a word for deceiving
people."

This has been a hard lesson to come by. Lulled by a century and a
half of tranquility and without experience with disaster, we have been
reluctant to take at face value the often-repeated Soviet assertion that
they mean to smash the existing framework. We have tended to treat Soviet
protestations as if their intent were merely tactical; as if the USSR over-
stated its case for bargaining purposes or were motivated by specific
grievances to be assuaged by individual concessions. There is a measure
of pathos in our effort to find "reasonable" motives for the Soviets to cease
being Bolshevik: the opportunity to develop the resources of their own
country, the unlimited possibilities of nuclear energy, or of international
trade—all examples of a state of mind which cannot come to grips with a
policy of unlimited objectives. The picture of an antagonist vanquished
by the persuasiveness of argument, the belief in the efficacy of the process
of negotiation, reflect the dominant role played in our diplomacy by the
legal profession and our conception of diplomacy as a legal process.

13

But the analogy of the legal method does not apply to a revolutionary situation. The legal method presupposes a framework of agreed rules which supply the background for negotiating skill. It is not the process of negotiation as such which accounts for the settlement of legal disputes, but a social environment which permits this process to operate. This explains why conciliatory American statements have so often missed their mark. To the Soviet, the key to their ultimate triumph resides in their superior understanding of "objective" forces and of the processes of history.² Even if they accept the "subjective" sincerity of American statesmen, they would still believe them powerless to deal with the "objective" factors of American society which will ultimately produce a showdown. Conciliatory American statements will appear to the Soviet leaders either as hypocrisy or as stupidity, as a form of propaganda or a form of ignorance. It is, therefore, futile to seek to sway Soviet leaders through logical persuasion or by invocations of abstract justice. Soviet statesmen consider conferences a means to give expression to an "objective" situation; the only logic they accept is the logic of facts. A Soviet diplomat who wishes to make concessions can justify them at home only if he can demonstrate that they resulted from a proper balancing of risks.

In short, diplomacy has a different function in a revolutionary international order. In a legitimate order diplomacy seeks to compromise differences in order to perpetuate the international system. Adjustments

2. There is no little exasperation in the Soviet replies to our repeated assertion that a change of tactics on their part implies a surrender of Marxism: "We always tell the truth to our friends as well as to our enemies," Khrushchev has said (September 17, 1955). "We are in favor of a detente, but if anybody thinks that for this reason we shall forget about Marx, Engels and Lenin, he is mistaken. This will happen when the shrimps learn to whistle."

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occur because agreement is itself a desirable goal, because of a tacit
agreement to come to an agreement. In a revolutionary order, on the other
hand, adjustments have primarily a tactical significance: to prepare
positions for the next test of strength. Negotiations in a legitimate order
have three functions: to persuade by stating a plausible reason for settlement;
to formulate by expressing agreements or discords in a manner that does not
open unbridgeable schisms; to perpetuate by providing a forum for making
concessions. But in a revolutionary period, most of these functions have
changed their purpose: diplomats can still meet, but they cannot persuade,
for they have ceased to speak the same language. Instead, diplomatic
conferences become elaborate stage plays which seek to attach the uncommitted
to one or the other of the contenders.

Nothing is more futile, therefore, than to seek to deal with a
revolutionary power by "ordinary" diplomatic methods. In a legitimate order,
demands once made are negotiable; they are put forward with the intention
of being compromised. But in a revolutionary order, they are programmatic;
they represent a claim for allegiance. In a legitimate order, it is good
negotiating tactics to formulate maximum demands because this facilitates
compromise without loss of essential objectives. In a revolutionary order,
it is good negotiating tactics to formulate minimum demands in order to gain
the advantage of the advocacy of moderation. In a legitimate order, proposals
are addressed to the opposite number at the conference table. They must,
therefore, be drafted with great attention to their substantive content
and with sufficient ambiguity so that they do not appear as invitations to

15

surrender. But in a revolutionary order the protagonists at the conference table address not so much one another as the world at large. Proposals here must be framed with a maximum of clarity and even simplicity, for their major utility is their symbolic content. In short, in a legitimate order, a conference represents a struggle to find formulae to achieve agreement; in a revolutionary order, it is a struggle to capture the symbols which move humanity.

The major weakness of U.S. diplomacy has been the insufficient attention given to the symbolic aspect of foreign policy. Our positions have usually been worked out with great attention to their legal content, with special emphasis on the step-by-step approach of traditional diplomacy. But while we have addressed the Soviets, the Soviets have used us as a forum to speak to the people of the world. With a few exceptions we have not succeeded in dramatizing our position, in reducing a complex negotiation to its symbolic terms. In major areas of the world the Soviets have captured the "peace offensive" by dint of the endless repetition of slogans that seemed preposterous when first advanced, but which have become common currency through usage.

The power which has added 150 million people to its orbit by force has become the champion of anti-colonialism; the state which has developed slave-labor as an integral part of its economic system has emerged in many parts of the world as the champion of human dignity. Neither on German unity nor on that of Korea nor on the satellite orbit have we succeeded in mobilizing the opinion of the world. But Formosa has become a symbol of American intransigence and our overseas air-bases a token of American aggressiveness. We have replied to every Soviet thrust like a pedantic professor sure of his righteousness; but the world is not moved by legalistic phrases, at least in a revolutionary period.

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This is not to say that negotiation should be conceived as mere propaganda; only that by failing to include the psychological aspect in our calculations, we have left the field free for the Soviets.

As a result, the international debate is carried on almost entirely in the categories and at the pace established by the Soviets; the attention of the world is directed toward the horror of nuclear weapons, but not toward the fact of aggression which would unleash them. The Soviets negotiate when a relaxation of tension serves their purpose and they break off negotiations when it is to their advantage without being forced to shoulder the onus for their failure. We were right to agree to the summit conference and the subsequent meeting of the foreign ministers. But it was not necessary to permit the four-power meetings to become an effort to turn the Soviets respectable; or for the President to give the Soviet a certificate of good conduct by assuring Bulganin he believed in his peaceful intentions. Nor was it wise to let the Soviet build up a distinction between the President and the rest of the U.S. government, so that any increase in tensions will be ascribed to the fact that the President succumbed to the pressures of his advisors or to the operation of the "objective" factors of the U.S. economy or to a change of Administration. Because of our inability to raise the negotiations above the commonplace, they were conducted in a never-never land where a Soviet smile was considered to outweigh the fact of the perpetuated division of Germany, and where problems were evaded simply by denying that they existed.

III

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But could we have carried our allies and the uncommitted along on a
different policy? Perhaps the best way to approach a discussion of our system
of alliances is to analyze the historic role of coalitions. In the past, coali-
tions have generally been held together by a combination of three motivations:
(a) To leave no doubt about the alignment of forces and to discourage aggression
by assembling superior power -- this in effect is the doctrine of collective
security. (b) To provide an obligation for assistance in addition to the requi-
rements of the national interest. Were the national interest unambiguous and
unchangeable, each power would know its obligations and also the course of its
opponents without any formal pact. But the national interest fluctuates within
limits; it must be adapted to changing circumstances. An alliance is a form of
insurance against contingencies, an additional weight when considering whether to
go to war. (c) To provide a legitimacy for the assistance of foreign troops or for
intervention in a foreign country.

An alliance is effective then to the extent that its power appears
formidable and its purpose unambiguous. If an alliance is composed of too many
disparate elements or if its members pursue too varying aims it will not survive
a real test; the legal obligation by itself will not make operative a coalition
which has no common purpose or is incapable of giving its purpose a military
expression. The French system of alliances between the two wars, however imposing
on paper, could not survive the conflicting interests of its components and its
lack of a unifying military doctrine. It is not the fact of alliance which
deters aggression but the application it can be given in any concrete case.

If we examine the structure of the present U.S. system of alliances
we discover that most of the historic conditions for coalitions no longer apply
or apply in a different sense. From the point of view of power relationships

18

none of our alliances, save NATO, adds to our effective strength. And NATO is
in difficulty because we cannot give it a military doctrine which makes sense to
our NATO partners. The U.S. interest in the alliance is twofold: (a) to prevent
Eurasia from being dominated by a hostile power, because the U.S. confined to the
Western Hemisphere could survive, if at all, only through an effort inconsistent
with what is now considered the American way of life; (b) to add to our over-
all strength vis-à-vis the U.S.S.R. by obtaining overseas facilities, particularly
air-bases. Our empiricist bias has, however, caused us to reduce these objectives
to a specific threat -- that of overt Soviet military aggression -- and to look
at this threat only in terms of the total strategic relationship between us and
the Soviet bloc. In these terms, Eurasia is protected not by our capability for
local defense, but by our strategic superiority in an all-out war and we have,
therefore, tended to justify our alliances because of the air-bases they afford us.

An alliance is useless, however, unless it expresses a mutuality of
interest between the partners. We have considered the defense of Eurasia primar-
ily as a problem of the total strategic relationship between us and the Soviet bloc.
But eventual victory is of no interest to our allies if meanwhile they have under-
gone the moral and material ravages of a Soviet occupation. Moreover, our allies
realize that in all-out war they will add to our effective strength only by sup-
plying facilities; they see no significance in a military contribution of their
own. As long as our military doctrine threatens to transform every war into an
all-out war, our system of alliances will be in jeopardy.

This difficulty is compounded by our notion of collective security
drawn from the lessons of the 1930's, when a united front of the powers might

3. See Paul Nitze, "Atoms, Strategy and Policy," *Foreign Affairs*, January 1956.

19

well have deterred Hitler, and motivated by our historical bias in favor of federal structures. We base our coalitions on the assumption that unless all allies resist any aggression anywhere no effective resistance is possible at all. But this notion of collective security has the paradoxical result of paralyzing the partner capable of resisting alone. For governments hard-pressed to act in areas of direct concern to them cannot be brought to run risks outside that area, so that the effort to obtain NATO support in Asia tends to undermine the cohesiveness of NATO even within Europe. On the other hand, in some of our alliances the combinations of purposes even within the geographic area of primary concern to them is extremely various. Pakistan desires arms more for their effect on India than for the protection they afford against the U.S.S.R. or China; Iraq is interested in the Baghdad Pact primarily for the military advantages it gives over Saudi Arabia and Egypt. And in neither SEATO nor the Baghdad Pact are we associated with partners with whom we share the degree of common purpose conferred by the common cultural heritage that connects us with our European allies.

The problems of our system of alliances can, therefore, be summed up under two headings: either the alliances add little to our effective strength or they do not reflect a common purpose, or both. In such circumstances a system of collective security leads in fact to a dilution of purpose and to an air of unreality in which the existence of an alliance, and not the resolution behind it, is considered the guarantee of security. Thus, we speak of plugging gaps in defenses as if a treaty instrument were itself a defense. We will not be able to overcome these difficulties until we develop a new approach to our coalition policy, above all until we set in less ambitious goals: we have to confine our alliances to the purposes we and our allies share.

20

But can such a coalition policy be developed? The implications of the growing Soviet nuclear capacity would seem to impose a measure of harmony between the U.S. interest in an over-all strategy and our allies' concern with local defense. For it appears now that the most effective over-all strategy involves the graduated employment of force and that the best deterrent resides in a capability for local defense. A deterrent is effective only to the degree that it is plausible and as the Soviet nuclear stockpile grows our willingness to run risks of a major war for peripheral objectives will diminish. In any case, in the face of the horrors of an all-out thermo-nuclear war, it is to the U.S. interest to use it only as a last resort; to seek to defend Eurasia by means other than all-out war. The justification for our alliances is, therefore, less that they add to our over-all strength, than that they give us an opportunity to apply our power subtly and with less fearful risks than an all-out thermo-nuclear war.

In these terms our alliances should be conceived from the military point of view as devices to organize local defense and our assistance means to make local defense possible. We should make clear to our allies that their best chance of avoiding thermo-nuclear war resides in our ability to make local aggression too costly. They should understand that they cannot avoid their dilemmas by surrender or neutrality for if we were pushed out of Eurasia they would bring on what they fear most. Confined to the Western Hemisphere we would have no choice but to fight an all out war. To be sure, the Soviets have skillfully fomented neutralism by giving the impression that local resistance must inevitably lead to all-out war. But the Soviets can be no more interested than we in an all-out war; the fear of thermo-nuclear extinction would provide a powerful sanction against expanding a conflict. Regional mutual security arrangements, not

4. See the author's "Force and Diplomacy in the Nuclear Age," *Foreign Affairs*, April 1956. The argument of that article was for a nuclear military establishment with a wide range of capabilities.

21

a doctrine of general collective security would seem to furnish the best basis
for our coalition policy.

The corollary to the regional approach to our system of alliances,
however, is U.S. willingness to act alone if the over-all strategic balance is
imperiled. None of our allies, with the exception of Great Britain, has the
capability or the willingness to act outside its own geographical area. To ask
them to do so will only undermine the domestic position of already weak govern-
ments and demoralize them further. It will lead to subterfuges and to the dilu-
tion of common action behind the form of joint communiqués. We have to face the
fact that only the U.S. is strong enough domestically and economically to assume
worldwide responsibilities and that the attempt to obtain the prior approval by
all our allies of our every step will lead not to common action but to inaction.
For if an alliance is equaled with the consensus of its members, its policy is
certain to be shaped by its weakest component. To be sure, wherever there exists
a community of purpose, as for example with Great Britain in the Middle East
and perhaps in Southeast Asia, we should concert our efforts. But we must re-
serve the right to act alone, or with a regional grouping of powers, if our
strategic interest so dictates. We cannot permit the Soviets to overturn the
balance of power for the sake of allied unity, if only because whatever the
disagreement of our allies on specific measures their survival depends on our
unimpaired strength.

The military point of view must not supply the sole motivation for our
system of alliances, however. In fact, in many areas, particularly those newly
independent, our emphasis on the military factor is the cause for our failure to
develop any sense of common purpose. We are undoubtedly right in our belief in
the Soviet menace. But revolutions are not logical and the Asian revolution is
interested more in economic development than in foreign affairs. Our insistence

22

that they focus some of their energies outward appears to them as an irritating interruption of their primary concern and lends color to Soviet peace offensives. Moreover, the military contribution of both the Baghdad Pact and SEATO does not compensate for the decision of Egypt and India to stand apart and for the domestic pressures these instruments generated in some of the signatory countries.

The primary function of these pacts is to draw a line across which the U.S.S.R. cannot move without the risk of war, and to legitimize U.S. intervention should war break out. But the line could have been better drawn by a unilateral U.S. declaration or by a screen of U.S. token forces. Behind this shield we could then have concentrated on the primary problem of creating a sense of common purpose by emphasizing shared objectives, primarily by striving for the grouping of powers to assist in economic development. Had we emphasized these non-military functions of SEATO, it would have been much more difficult for India or Indonesia to stay aloof. As these political groupings gain in economic strength, their own interest would dictate a more active interest in common defense or at least it would provide the economic base for a meaningful defense. A powerful grouping of states on their borders is against the interests of the U.S.S.R. regardless of whether this grouping comes into being as the result of a military or some other joint effort, and by the same token, such a grouping is desirable from the U.S. point of view even if it does not go along with our every policy.

The problem of the uncommitted cannot be solved merely by an economic grouping of powers, however. It is related to the whole U.S. posture. Anti-Americanism is fashionable today in many parts of the globe. As the richest and most powerful nation, we are the natural target for all frustrations. As the power which bears the primary responsibility for the defense of the Free World,

23

we are unpopular with all who are so preoccupied with the development of their own country that they cannot pay sufficient attention to foreign threats. We should, of course, seek to allay legitimate grievances, but we would be wrong to take every criticism at face value. Many of our most voluble critics in Southeast Asia would be terrified were U.S. military protection suddenly withdrawn. Nehru's neutrality is possible, after all, only as long as the U.S. remains strong. A great deal of anti-Americanism hides a feeling of insecurity both material and spiritual. Popularity is a hopeless mirage in a situation which is revolutionary precisely because old values are disintegrating and millions are groping for a new orientation. It is impossible for this reason to base policy solely on an inquiry into what people desire; it is equally necessary to supply a sense of direction. In the uncommitted areas popularity may be less important than respect.

The U.S. must, therefore, develop in its relations with the uncommitted not only a greater compassion, but also a greater majesty. The picture of high American officials scurrying to all quarters of the globe to inform themselves on each crisis as it develops cannot but make an impression of moral uncertainty. The nervousness exhibited in our reactions to Soviet moves must contrast unfavorably with what seems like the deliberate purposefulness of the Soviets. If every sale of Soviet arms is followed by an offer of economic aid to the recipient country, we shall merely reward unresponsibility. Because of what appears to other nations as vacillation and uncertainty, the pressures of those powers which want above all to preserve the peace are in every crisis directed against us as the more flexible factor in the equation. To the degree that we can project a greater sense of purpose, some of these pressures may be deflected on the Soviet bloc. A revolution, like Egypt's or even India's cannot be managed by understanding alone; it also requires a readiness on our part to bear the psychological burden of difficult decisions.

IV

24

We thus return to our original problem: the adequacy of American attitudes
for dealing with the present crisis. This is above all a problem of leadership.
For nations learn only by experience; they "know" only when it is too late to act.
But statesmen must act _as if_ their intuition were already experience, as if their
aspiration were truth. The statesman is, therefore, like one of the heroes of
classical tragedy who has had an intuition of the future, but who cannot transmit
it directly to his fellowmen and who cannot validate its "truth." This is why
statesmen often share the fate of prophets, that they are without honor in their
own country and that their greatness is usually apparent only in retrospect when
their intuition has become experience. The statesman must be an educator; he must
bridge the gap between a people's experience and his vision, between its tradi-
tion and its future. In this task his possibilities are limited. A statesman
who too far outruns the experience of his people will not be able to sell his
program at home; witness Wilson. A statesman who limits his policy to the
experience of his people will doom himself to sterility; witness French policy
since World War I.

It would be wrong to be too pessimistic. No one would have believed when
World War II ended that the U.S. would so completely end its traditional isola-
tion and assume world-wide commitments. Were we not in mortal peril, we could
take pride in what has been achieved. As it is, it will be a close race between
our maturing and the developing Soviet threat. We wanted to be happy without
being unjust; we wanted to develop our resources without concern with the outside
world. But it was not to be so. The world has come crowding in at an ever-
increasing rate. A power which has never hidden its hostile intent is building
a thermo-nuclear capability and intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of
destroying us. We have wanted peace, above all. But we are confronted by a state
which aims, not for peace but for victory. Perhaps the really tragic element
in our situation is the fact that in order even to maintain peace we cannot aim
for less.

by Henry A. Kissinger

"Policy" wrote Metternich, the Austrian minister who steered his country through thirty-nine years of crisis by a tour de force perhaps never excelled "is like a play in many acts which unfolds inevitably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the play will not go on is an absurdity. The play _will_ go on either by means of the _tkes_ actors or by means of the spectators who mount the stage...The crucial problem _[of statesmanship]_, therefore, resides in the decision of whether to assemble the audience, whether the curtain is to be raised and above all in the intrinsic _pmx_ merit of the play."

There can be little doubt that U. S. foreign policy is undergoing a crisis. For several years we have been groping for a concept to deal with the transformation of the cold war from an effort to build defensive barriers into a contest for the aspirations of humanity. But the new Soviet tactics coupled with the equally unassimilated increase in the destructive potential of the new weapons technology have led to a crisis

destructive potential of the new weapons technology have led to a crisis
Soviet tactics coupled with the equally unassimilated increase in the
barriers into a contest for the aspirations of humanity. But the new
with the transformation of the cold war from an effort to build defensive
a crisis. For several years we have been groaning for a concept to deal
There can be little doubt that U. S. foreign policy is undergoing
all in the intrinsic harm dealt by the play."

to assemble the audience, whether the curtain is to be raised and above
problem of statement, therefore, rests in the decision of whether
the actors or by means of the spectators who want the stage...The crucial
not go on is an spandify. The play will go on either by means of the
vastly once the curtain is raised. To declare them that the play will
beware never excelled "is like a play in many acts which multiplies in-
the company through thirty-nine years of create by a four de force
"play" wrote Metternich, the Austrian minister who attended

by Henry V. Kissinger

2

in our system of alliances and to substantial Soviet gains in the
uncommitted of the world.

It would be a mistake, however, to ascribe our difficulties to this
or that error of policy or to a particular Administration, although the
present Administration has not helped matters by its pretense of "normalcy."
To return to Metternich's metaphor: It can be argued that our policy has
reached an impasse because of our penchant for happy endings; the Soviets
have been able to use negotiations to their advantage because we insisted
on reading from an old script. As in all tragedies, many of these problems
have been produced in spite of our best intentions and caused, not by our
worst qualities, but by our best. What is at issue, therefore, is not a
policy, but an attitude.

It is with this attitude and its consequences in the conduct of
negotiations and our policy of alliances that this article is dealing.

I

pattern to international allaire. But the very success of the American
had been preoccupied with its domestic allaire should seek to ably their
If it is understandable that a nation which for a century and a half

I

negotiations and our policy of affinances that this article is dealing.

policy, put an attitude.

worst qualities, put by our peace. What is at issue, therefore, is not a
have been produced in spite of our peace intentions and caused, not by our
on reading from an old script. As in all tragedies, many of these problems
have been able to use negotiations to their advantage because we insulated
reached an imbalance because of our penchant for happy endings; the Soviets
To return to Metternich's matchbox: It can be argued that our policy has
present Administration has not helped matters by its pretense of "normalky."
or that error of policy or to a particular Administration, although the

If would be a mistake, however, to ascribe our difficulties to this
uncommittees of the world.

in our system of alliances and to supplant Soviet gains in the

5

[2]

3

experiment and the spontaneity of our social institutions has served to
emphasize the dilemma faced at some stage by every country: how to reconcile
its vision of itself with the vision of it by other powers. To itself,
a nation is an expression of justice and the more so, the more spontaneous
its social institutions. This is true because government functions
effectively only when most citizens obey voluntarily and they will obey
only to the extent that they consider the demands of their rulers just.
But to other nations, a state is a force to be balanced. This is inevitable
because the attribute of a sovereign will is that it can be controlled by
only by superior force, because national strategy must be planned against
the other side's capabilities and not only its intentions. There exists
a double standard, therefore, in all foreign policy: internally, foreign
policy is justified like all other policy in terms of/absolute standard
because the nation has no other; but abroad, what is defined as justice
becomes a program to be compromised by negotiation. If the domestic notions
of the states comprising the international order is sufficiently similar,
this incommensurability may not become apparent. But in a revolutionary
period like the present, it structures all relationships.

period like the present, it attunes all relationships.
this incommensurability may not become apparent. But in a revolution-
ary the states comprising the international order is sufficiently similar,
becomes a program to be compromised by negotiation. If the domestic notions
because the nation has no other; but abroad, what is defined as justice
bility is justified like all other policy in terms of absolute standard
a double standard, therefore, in all foreign policy: internally, foreign
the other side's capabilities and not only its intentions. There exists
only by superior force, because national strategy must be planned against
because the attribute of a sovereign will is that it can be controlled by
But to other nations, a state is a force to be balanced. This is inevitable
only to the extent that they consider the demands of their rulers just.
effectively only when most citizens obey voluntarily and they will obey
its social institutions. This is true because government functions
a nation is an expression of justice and the more so, the more spontaneous
its vision of itself with the vision of it by other powers. To itself,
emphasize the dilemma faced at some stage by every country: how to reconcile
experiment and the spontaneity of our social institutions has served to

A

4

Foremost among the attitudes affecting our foreign policy is the
American empiricism and its quest for methodological certainty; nothing
is "true" unless it is "objective" and it is not "objective" unless it is
part of experience. This makes for the absence of dogmatism and for the
ease of social relations on the domestic scene. But in the conduct of
foreign policy, it has pernicious consequences. Foreign policy is the art
of weighing probabilities, its mastery is the grasp of the nuances of
possibilities. To attempt to conduct it as a science can only lead to
rigidity. For only the risks are certain, but the opportunities are
conjectural; one cannot be "sure" about the implications of certain events
until they have happened and when they have occurred it is too late to do
anything about them. Empiricism in foreign policy leads to a penchant for

anything about them. Empiricism in foreign policy leads to a benignant for
until they have happened and when they have occurred it is too late to do
contemplation; one cannot be "amazed" about the implications of certain events
rigidity. For only the risks are certain, but the opportunities are
possibilities. To attempt to conduct it as a science can only lead to
of weighing prophecies, its mastery is the grasp of the nuances of
foreign policy, it has baneful consequences. Foreign policy is the art
of social relations on the domestic scene. But in the conduct of
part of experience. This makes for the absence of dogmatism and for the
is "true" unless it is "objective" and it is not "objective" unless it is
American empiricism and its quest for methodological certainty: nothing
foremost among the attitudes affecting our foreign policy is the

5

ad hoc solutions; the rejection of dogmatism makes our policy makers reluctant to commit themselves until all facts are in; but by the time the facts are in, a crisis situation has usually developed. Our policy is, therefore, geared to dealing with emergencies; it finds it difficult to gain acceptance for long-range programs that might forestall them.

Another symptom of our quest for methodological certainty is the vast number of governmental committees charged with examining and developing policy. But the very multiplicity of committees makes it difficult to arrive at decisions on time; it injects an element of irresponsibility because it obscures responsibility. As a result, in our governmental structure sovereign departments negotiate national policy among themselves with no single authority capable of following up these decisions or of applying them over time. The temptation to conduct policy administratively is ever present, of course, in a government organized as ours primarily for the conduct of domestic affairs.

But the spirit of policy and that of bureaucracy are fundamentally opposed. Profound policy thrives on perpetual creation; good administration thrives on routine, the definition of a relationship which can survive mediocrity.

Policy involves an adjustment of risks; administration an avoidance of deviation. Policy justifies itself by a sense of proportion, the

geavistion. Polity justifies itself by a sense of proportion, the
policy involves an adjustment of risks: administration an avoidance of
on routine, the definition of a relationship which can survive mediocrity.
prolong policy drives on pernicious creation; good administration drives
but the spirit of policy and that of bureaucracy are fundamentally opposed.
in a Government organised as ours primarily for the conduct of domestic affairs.
temptation to conduct policy administratively is ever present, of course,
capsule of following up these decisions or of applying them over time. The
departments negotiate national policy among themselves with no single authority
oppressivesubordinability. As a result, in our governmental structure sovereignty
at decisions on time; it injects an element of irreversibility because it
policy. But the very multiplicity of committees makes it difficult to arrive
at number of governmental committees charged with examining and developing
another example of our great for methodological certainty is the
to get acceptance for long-range programs that might foretell them.
in, therefore, geared to dealing with emergencies; it finds it difficult
the facts are in, a creative situation has naturally developed. Our policy
refutes to commit themselves until all facts are in; put by the time
ad hoc solutions; the rejection of dogmatism makes our policy makers
2

[N]

6

relations of measures to each other; administration, by the rationality of each individual action in terms of a given goal. The attempt to conduct policy administratively leads to a standard which evaluates by mistakes avoided rather than by goals achieved. It is no accident that most great statesmen were opposed by the "experts" in their foreign offices, for the very greatness of the statesmen's conception tends to make it inaccessible to those who primary concern is with safety and minimum risk.

Our methodological doubt leads to the dispatch of the plethora of emissaries to foreign capitals to influence themselves without a sufficient consideration of the impression of vacillation they convey. It makes for our vulnerability to Soviet maneuvers: every Soviet change of line is taken at least in part a t face value, for we cannot be certain that the Soviets may not "mean" it this time until they have proved it, and they will do their best to try not to prove it until the tactic has served its purpose.

["is because our empiricism does us to an essentially reactive policy that\nthe dogmatic Botanévika expedit flexibility, daring and subtlety. This\nabides to the world as right, minimautive and even somewhat chivalrous; while\nWe are, therefore, in the paradoxical position that we, the empiricists,\ntheir part to try not to prove it until the tactic has served its purpose.\nmay not \"mean\" it this time until they have proved it, and they will do\nat least in part a face value, for we cannot be certain that the Soviet\nour vulnerability to Soviet maneuvers: every Soviet change of line is taken\nconsideration of the impression of oscillation they convey. It makes for\nemissaries to foreign capitals to influence themselves without a sufficient\nWe are, therefore, in the paradoxical position that we, the empiricists,\ntheir part to try not to prove it until the tactic has served its purpose.\nmay not \"mean\" it this time until they have proved it, and they will do\nat least in part a face value, for we cannot be certain that the Soviet\nour vulnerability to Soviet maneuvers: every Soviet change of line is taken\nconsideration of the impression of oscillation they convey. It makes for\nemissaries to foreign capitals to influence themselves without a sufficient\nOur methodological doubt leads to the disbandment of the Order of\nthe Order of the Order of the Order of the Order of the Order of the Order

7

improvises a counter to every Soviet move. While the Soviet emphasis on theory gives them the epistemological certainty to act, to maneuver, and to run risks. The very fact of action shifts the risks of countermoves to the other side; it absorbs thenergies in essentially defensive maneuvers.

In many societies--in Great Britain, for example—it developed from a firmly held tradition of a national strategy. Throughout the 19th Century it was a tenet of British policy that Antwerp should not fall into the hands of a major power. This was not backed by an elaborate metaphysics, simply by a tradition of the requirements of British sea-power so generally understood that it was never debated. It is the absence of a tradition of foreign policy which exaggerates the biases of our empiricism and makes it difficult to conduct our policy with a proper regard for the timing of measures. It causes us to overlook the fact that policy exists in time as well as in space, that a measure is correct only if it can be carried out at the proper moment. To be sure, our cumbersome administrative mechanism alone makes it almost accidental if the right policy is adopted at the right moment. But in addition, our

if the right policy is adopted at the right moment. But if not, our
ame, our cumberome administrative mechanism alone makes it almost accidental
mesme is correct only if it can be executed at the proper moment. To be
so to overlook the fact that policy exists in time as well as in space, that a
confront our policy with a proper regard for the timing of measures. It causes
which exaggerates the phases of our empiricism and makes it difficult to
that it was never departed. It is the absence of a tradition of foreign policy
a tradition of the requirements of British sea-power so generally understood
a major power. This was not picked by an elaborate metaphysics, simply by
a fleet of British policy that Answer should not fall into the pangs of
held tradition of a national strategy. Throughout the 19th Century it was
In many societies--in Great Britain, for example--it developed from a timely
Indeed, an overemphasis on theory can lead to losing touch with reality.

The willingness to act need not derive from theory, of course.
to the other side: it spoors the energies in essentially defensive manners.
to run risks. The very fact of action shifts the risks of counter moves
theory gives them the epistemological certainty to act, to maneuver, and
improves a counter to every Soviet move. While the Soviet emphasis on

[4]

8

deliberations are conducted as if a policy were eternally true, as if a
measure which might meet exactly the needs of a given moment could not
backfire if adopted a year later. There is lacking in our policy for this
reason the feeling for nuance, the ability to come up with variations on
the same theme which have been so notable aspects of Soviet tactics. We
consider policy-making concluded when the National Security Council has
come to a decision. And in fact, the process of arriving at a decision is
so arduous that its very difficulty makes for rigidity and a reluctance to
re-examine policies after they have outlived their usefulness. When Mr.
Dulles used the words "agonizing reappraisal" he spoke truly for in
our governmental machinery any reappraisal is apt to be painful. But a
written statement of policy is likely to amount to a truism; the real diffi-
culty arises in applying it to concrete situations. And while we have often
come up with the proper measures, we have not found it easy to carry them
over time, to adapt our approach to the requirements of the situation.
The different uses made by the Soviets of the time interval between the
summit conference and the Geneva conference of foreign ministers illustrates
this point. The Soviets established diplomatic relations with the German

this point. The Soviet established diplomatic relations with the German
summit conference and the Geneva conference of foreign ministers illustrates
the different ways made by the Soviets of the time interval between the
over time, to adapt our approach to the requirements of the situation.

Come up with the broader measures, we have not found it easy to carry them
on, quite areas in applying it to concrete situations. And while we have often
written statement of policy is likely to amount to a truism: the real difficulty-
our Government's machinery and ressources is apt to be painful.] But a
Duffee need the words "aggravating ressources" be aboken makes truly for in
re-examine policies after they have outlined their needs. When Mr.
of arguments that its very difficulty makes for rigidity and a reluctance to
come to a decision. And in fact, the process of arriving at a decision is
consider policy-making concluded when the National Security Council has
the same theme which have been so notable aspects of Soviet tactics. We
reason the feeling for finance, the ability to come up with variations on
policy if adopted a year later. There is lacking in our policy for full
measure which might meet exactly the needs of a given moment could not
deliberations are conducted as if a policy were eternally true, as it is a

[N]

[Y]

9

Federal Republic, they used the peace offensive to undermine the cohesiveness of NATO and concluded the arms deal with Egypt while we spent the interval working out positions for the imminent negotiations on disarmament and on Germany. By the time we arrived in Geneva we found ourselves confronted by a series of fait accomplis and the conference foredoomed.

Related to the absence of a sense of timing is the difficulty of coming to grips with a tragic experience. This is another result of our concentration on domestic problems during the major portions of our history. For while our national experience is fraught with hardships, it is notably free of disaster. On the contrary, the American domestic experience exhibits an unparalleled success, of great daring rewarded, and of great obstacles overcome. It is no wonder, therefore, that to many of our most responsible men, particularly in the business community, the warnings of impending peril or of imminent disaster sound like the Cassandra omens cries of abstracted "egg-heads." For is not the attribute of the egg-head his lack of touch with reality, and does not American reality show an unparalleled wealth coupled with an unparalleled growth?

was in coupled with an unbarrelled crowd?

Jack of ton on with reality, and does not American reality appear an unbarrelled
of apportioned "egg-heads." For is not the attribute of the egg-headed man
impending peril or of imminent disaster sought like the Casandrarixixna crie
reasonable men, baronarily in the business community, the running of
opponents overcome. It is no wonder, therefore, that to many of our most
exemplifies an unbarrelled success, of great during rewards, and of great
free of disaster. On the contrary, the American domestic experience
for while our national experience is brought with hard work, it is not only
concentration on domestic problems during the major portion of our history,
coming to grip with a tragic experience. This is another result of our
related to the absence of a sense of timing is the difficulty of
doomed.

ourselves confronted by a series of felt accomplishments and the conference fore-
despairment and on Germany. By the time we arrived in Geneva we found
abent the interval working out positions for the imminent negotiation-
couevernance of NATO and concluded the arms deal with Britain while we
Federal Republic, they need the baseless alternative to undermine the

[x]

10

There has been much criticism of Secretaries Humphrey and Wilson for their defense economies. But in fairness the psychological background of their decisions should be understood: despite all the information at their disposal, they simply cannot believe that in the nuclear age the penalty for miscalculation may be national catastrophe. They may know in their heads, but they cannot accept in their hearts, that the society they helped to build and that gave them their opportunity could disappear as if it had did Rome or Carthage or Byzantium, which probably seemed just as eternal to their inhabitants. These characteristics make for an absence of a sense of urgency, a tendency to believe that everything can be tried once and that the worst consequence of mistakes may be that we may have to redouble our efforts later on. The irrevocable error is not yet part of the American experience.

Another aspect of this problem is our reluctance to think in terms of power. To be sure, American expansion both economic and geographical was not accomplished without a judicious application of power. But our Calvinist heritage has endowed success with the attribute of justice. Even our great fortunes, however accumulated, were usually justified in terms

ix

11

other than their mere existence; the great foundation is after all
a peculiarly American phenomenon. As a nation, we have used power almost
shamefacedly as if it were inherently wicked. We have wanted to be liked
for our own sakes and we have wished to xmdmd succeed because of the persua-
siveness of our principles rather than through our strength. Our feeling
of guilt with respect to power has caused us to transform all wars into
crusades, to apply our power when it has been used in the most absolute terms.
It has also made us reluctant to consider intermediary applications for our
power.

But international relations cannot be conducted without an awareness
of power relationships. To be sure, the contemporary revolution cannot be
managed merely by an exercise of power. But unless we maintain at least
an equilibrium of power between us and the Soviet bloc we will have no
chance to do anything else. And maintaining this equilibrium may confront
us with some very difficult choices. We may see areas essential for our
security vote themselves into a Communist dictatorship. We are certain to
be confronted with situations such as civil wars of extraordinary ambiguity.

Early associates of Soviet move makes one more position that much more
be confronted with situations such as civil wars of extraordinary ambiguity.
security vote themselves into a Communist government. We are certain to
na with some very difficult choices. We may see areas essential for our
chance to do anything else. And maintaining this equilibrium may confront
an equilibrium of power between us and the Soviet Union we will have no
managed merely by an exercise of power. But unless we maintain at least
of power relationships. To be sure, the contemporary revolution cannot be
But international relations cannot be conducted without an awareness
power.

If we also made us reluctant to consider intermedially applications for our
claims, to ably our power when it has been used in the most adverse terms.
of Gift with respect to power has caused us to transcribe all was into
advantages of our principles rather than through our strength. Our feeling
tor our own ideas and we have wished to make them acceded because of the perils
assuredly as if it were inherently wicked. We have wanted to be fixed
a benefitously American phenomenon. As a nation, we have need power almost
other than their were existence; the great combination is after all

11

12

difficult: Indo-China was more ambiguous than Korea; Egypt more ambiguous than Indo-China. There can be no doubt that we should seek to prevent such occurrences. But while we should never give up our principles; we must also realize that we cannot maintain our principles unless we survive.

The reverse side of the reluctance to think in terms of power has been our notion of the nature of peace. That peace is the "normal" pattern of relations among states, that it is equivalent to a consciousness of harmony, that it can be aimed at directly as a goal of policy -- these are truisms rarely challenged in our political debate. Both major political parties maintain that they work for a lasting peace, even if they differ about the best means of attaining it. Both embrace the notion that on a certain magic day, perhaps after a four-power conference "peace" will break out."

But no idea could be more dangerous. To begin with, and quite apart from any ideological disagreement, the polarization of power in the world would give international relations a sense of instability and the present volatile state of technology is likely to compound this sense of insecurity. The necessity of keeping up in the technological race would force the nations into a competitive struggle even if no other disagreements existed.

into a competitive atmosphere even if no other disagreements existed.

necessity of keeping up in the technological race would force the nations
state of technology is likely to compound this sense of insecurity. The

give international relations a sense of insatibility and the present volatile

certain magic dust, perhaps after a torn-bone conference "bless" will preclude one.

barries maintain that they work for a lasting peace, even if they differ

principles rarely challenged in our political debate. Both major political

The reverse side of the refinance to think in terms of power has

than Indo-China. There can be no doubt that we should seek to prevent such
difficulties: Indo-China was more ambitious than Korea; Britain more ambitious

15

13

But the impact of this attitude on the effectiveness of our
diplomacy is even more pernicious. Whenever peace becomes the direct
objective of a power or a group of powers, international relations are
at the mercy of the state willing to forgo peace. Whenever objectives
are limited in this manner, unlimited war or loss of the national substance
have been the consequence. There are four ways of achieving peace: by
surrender or by vigilance, by predominance or by equilibrium. No
statesman can entrust the fate of his charge entirely to the continued
good will of another sovereign state, if only because the best
guarantee for the will remaining good is not to tempt it by too great a
disportion of power. Peace, therefore, cannot be aimed at directly; it
is the expression of certain conditions and power relationships. It is to
these relationships—not to peace—that diplomacy must address itself.

It is obviously to the Soviet interest to equate peace with a state
of good feeling unconnected with power relationships or past usurpations
for such an attitude ratifies all their gains since World War II. By
the same token, it is to the U. S. interest to leave no doubt that the
tension of the Cold War was produced not only by the intrna
ansigence of
THE

tenation of the Cold War was produced not only by the intense
snaginess of
the same token, it is to the U. S. interest to leave no doubt that the
torment an attitude betrays all their gains since World War II. By
of good feeling unconnected with power relationships or beat namibiaes
It is obviously to the Soviet interest to advance peace with a state
these relationships—not to peace—that diplomacy must address itself.
is the expression of certain conditions and power relationships. It is to
dissorporation of power. Peace, therefore, cannot be aimed at directly: it
guarantee for the will remaining good is not to tempt it by too great a
good will of another mmex sovereign state, it only because the best
statesman can entreat the fate of his charge entirely to the continued
enranger or dy alacrance, dy brieconixm or dy ediliprium. No
vice
have been the consequence. There are four ways of achieving peace: dy
are limited in this manner, unlimited war or loss of the national and personal
at the mercies of the state willing to forgo peace. Whenever objectives
objective of a power or a group of powers, international relations are
diplomacy is even more benEFicial. Whenever peace becomes the direct
But the impact of this attitude on the effectiveness of om.

13

14

Soviet tone, but also by the intransigence of their measures. As long as the Soviet can give the impression that conciliatory statements alone are a symptom of peaceful intentions, they can control the pace of negotiations and gain the benefits of the advocacy of peace without paying any price for its achievement. U. S. diplomacy should, therefore, have set itself the task of reducing the Soviet peace offensive to concrete terms as quickly as possible, to make clear that a real relaxation of tension presupposed Soviet concession on issues which had produced the tension in the first place such as the division of Germany or the satellite orbit.
As long as the Soviets are given the privilege of initiating negotiations when it suits their purpose and it breaks them off without any penalty, diplomacy will become a tool of Soviet propaganda. And the variety of Soviet maneuvers will in time erode the cohesion of the Free World.

Soviet maneuvers will in time erode the confidence of the Free World.

Diplomacy will become a tool of Soviet propaganda. And the result will be

when it suits their purpose and will to preclude them all without any benefit.

in the first place and as the division of Germany or the satellite orbit,

breached Soviet concession on issues which had produced the tension

baying any price for its achievement. U. S. diplomacy should, therefore,

fog as the Soviet can give the impression that conciliatory statements

Soviet tone, but also by the intrusiveness of their measures. As

IV

15

II

With this we have reached one of the major problems confronted by current U.S. diplomacy: the changed nature of negotiations in a revolutionary political order. An international order the basic arrangements of which are accepted by all the major powers is "legitimate"; a system which contains a power or a group of powers which refuses to accept either the arrangements of the settlement or the domestic structure of the other states is "revolutionary".

Wars may arise, but they will be fought in *the name* of the existing system and the peace will be justified as a better expression of the agreed arrangements. For a revolutionary order, on the other hand, disputes do not concern the adjustment of disputes within a given framework but the framework itself.

There is general agreement that we are living through a revolutionary period. On the physical plane there has occurred a disequilibrium between the power of weapons and the objectives for which to employ them, so that at a moment of unparalleled strength we find ourselves paralyzed by the implications

of our own weapons technology. On the political plane, many of the newly 1. For a fuller discussion of the physical factors, see the author's "Physics and Diplomacy in the Nuclear Age," *Foreign Affairs*, April 1956

16

independent powers continue to project the revolutionary fervor that gained them independence on the international scene. On the ideological plane, the rapid rate of communicating ideas, the rise in expectations, the newly awakened aspirations of many areas hitherto dormant have combined to lay the groundwork for contemporary ferment. And the existence of the Soviet bloc eager to exploit all dissatisfactions for its own ends have given the present situation its revolutionary urgency.

What then are the Soviet ends? For purposes of this article we can take the Soviets at their own evaluation of themselves. We can grant them that they are not interested in world domination for its own sake; they may be even sincere in their protests of feeling threatened; their policy may well be defensive. Still, this would offer few opportunities for U.S. policy. For the Soviet feels endangered as a result of Marxist theory which teaches that the internal contradictions of the capitalist system must inevitably lead to war with the Soviet bloc. Thus the Soviets feel threatened not by our policy but by our existence. Only absolute security, the neutralization of the U.S. at-a-minimum by expelling our influence from Eurasia, is considered a

17

sufficient guarantee. And because absolute security for the USSR means
absolute insecurity for us, American-Soviet relations have assumed the
character of a mortal struggle, whatever tactics the Soviets may adopt at
the moment.

This is true despite the conciliatory statements of the 20th
party congress. This was well-understood by the Soviets. There is no little
exasperation in their replies to our repeated assertion that a change of
tactics on their part implies a surrender of Marxism: "We always tell the
truth to our friends as well as to our enemies," Khrushchev has said
(September 17, 1955) "We are in favor of a detente but if anybody thinks
that for this reason we shall forget about Marx, Engels and Lenin, he is
mistaken. This will happen when the shrimps learn to whistle." Nor was
"peaceful coexistence" advanced as an acceptance of the status quo. On the
dontrary, it was justified as the most efficient offensive tactic, as a more
effective means to subvert the existing order. War was declared as no longer
inevitable, because soon the USSR would possess preponderant strength. Behind
"peaceful coexistence" stands the prospect of other tactics should the present
method prove less fruitful than anticipated. "In the world from now on,"
Mao has said, "neutrality is only a word for deceiving people."

Mao said, "neutrality is only a word for deceiving people."

method prove less fruitful than unrelieved. "In the world from now on," "beautiful coexistence" stands the prospect of other tactics should the present inevitable, because soon would become preponderant strength. Bearing effective means to support the existing order. War was declared as no longer contrary, it was justified as the most efficient alternative tactic, as a more "beautiful coexistence," advanced as an acceptance of the status quo. On the mistaken. This will happen when the shrinks learn to whack it. "Nor was that for this reason we shall forget spont. Marx, Engels and Lenin, he is (September 17, 1922) "We are in favor of a detente but it anybody thinks true to our friends as well as to our enemies," Khrushchev has said tactics on their part implies a surrender of Marxism: "We always tell the exasperation in the next issue to our repeated assertion that a change of party congress. "This will tell us about the Soviet governments. There is no little

This is true despite the conflagration statements of the 20th
the moment.

character of a moral struggle, whatever tactics the Soviets may adopt at
absolute insecurity for us, American-Soviet relations have assumed the
insufficient guarantee.

17

18

This has been a hard lesson to come by. Lulled by a century and
a half of tranquility and without experience with disaster, we have been
reluctant to take at face value the often-repeated Soviet assertion that they
mean to smash the existing framework. We have tended to treat Soviet protes-
tations as if their intent were merely tactical; as if the USSR overstated
its case for bargaining purposes or were motivated by specific grievances to
be assuaged by individual concessions. There is a measure of pathos in our
effort to find "reasonable" motives for the Soviets to cease being Bolshevik:
the opportunity to develop the resources of their own country, the unlimited
possibilities of nuclear energy, or of international trade--all examples
of a state of mind which cannot come to grips with a policy of unlimited
objectives. The picture of an antagonist vanquished by the persuasiveness
of argument, the belief in the efficacy of the process of negotiation, reflect
the dominant role played in our diplomacy by the legal profession and our
conception of diplomacy as a legal process.

which permits this process to operate, and which accounts for the settlement of legal disputes, put a social environment
the background for negotiating skills. It is not the process of negotiation as
situation. The legal method harnesses a framework of agreed rules which subsumes
But the analogy of the legal method does not apply to a revolutionarily
conception of diplomacy as a legal process.

the dominant role played in our diplomacy by the legal profession and our
of argument, the belief in the efficacy of the process of negotiation, reflect
objectives. The picture of an antagonist accompanied by the perenarriveness
of a state of mind which cannot come to grip with a policy of unlimited
benevolences of unclear energy, or of international trade—all examples
the opportunity to develop the resources of their own country, the unmitigated
effort to find "reasonable" motives for theroveto to cease being Boshnevich:
be arranged by individual concessions. There is a measure of benevolence in our
its case for pursuing purposes or were motivated by specific grievances to
fations as if their intent were merely tactical; as if the U28K overestimated
mean to amass the existing framework. We have tended to treat Soviet profes-
reluctant to take at face value the often-repeated Soviet assertion that they
a half of tranquillity and without experience with disaster, we have been
This has been a hard lesson to come by. Imposed by a century and

18

19

(September 17, 1955) "We are in favor of a detente but if anybody thinks that for this reason we shall forget about Mark, Engles and Lenin, he is mistaken. This will happen when the shrimps may learn to whistle."

This explains why conciliatory American statements have so often missed their mark. To the Soviet the key to their ultimate triumph resides in their superior understanding of "objectives" forces and of the processes of history. Even if they accept the "subjective" sincerity of American statesmen, they would still believe them powerless to deal with the "objective" factors of American society which will ultimately produce a showdown. Conciliatory American statements will appear to the Soviet leaders either as hypocrisy or as stupidity, as a form of propaganda or a form of ignorance. It is, therefore, futile to seek to sway Soviet leaders through logical persuasion or by invocations of abstract justice. Soviet statements consider conferences a means to give expression to an "objective" situation; the only logic they accept is the logic of facts. A Soviet diplomat who wishes to make concessions can justify them at home only if he can demonstrate that they resulted from a proper balancing of risks. This is not an argument for intransigence either in our

20

attitude or in our words. Nor have conciliatory statements become meaningless,

But we have to be clear about their significance and we must not confuse a
tune
change of/kim with a change of heart.

For diplomacy has a different function in a revolutionary inter-
national order. In a legitimate order diplomacy seeks to compromise differences
in order to perpetuate the international system. Adjustments occur because
agreement is itself a desirable goal, because of a tacit agreement to come to
an agreement. In a revolutionary order, on the other hand, adjustments have
primarily a tactical significance: to prepare positions for the inevitable show-
of strength,
down/Negotiations in a legitimate order have three functions: to persuade by
stating a plausible reason for settlement; to formulate by expressing agreements
or discords in a manner that does not open unbridgeable schisms; to perpetuate by
providing a forum for making concessions. But in a revolutionary period, most
of these functions have changed their purpose: Diplomats can still meet but
they cannot persuade for they have ceased to speak the same language. Instead,
Diplomatic conferences become elaborate stage plays which seek to attach the
uncommitted to one or the other of the contenders.

21

Nothing is more futile, therefore, than to seek to deal with a
revolutionary power by "ordinary" Diplomatic methods. In a legitimate
order, demands once made are negotiable; they are put forward with the intention
of being compromised. But in a revolutionary order they are programmatic,
they represent a statement of objectives. In a legitimate order, it is good
negotiating tactics to formulate maximum demands because this facilitates com-
promise without loss of essential objectives. In a revolutionary order it is
good negotiating tactics to formulate minimum demands in order to gain the
advantage of the advocacy of moderation. In a legitimate order, proposals are
addressed to the opposite number at the conference table. They must, therefore,
be drafted with great attention to their substantive content and with sufficient
ambiguity so that they do not appear as invitations to surrender. But in a
revolutionary order the protagonists at the conference table tend to provide,
at least in part, an opportunity to address those not present at the meeting.
Proposals here must be framed with a maximum of clarity and even simplicity,
for their major utility is their symbolic content. In short, in a legitimate
order, a conference represents a struggle to find formulae to achieve agreement;

21 a

22

become a symbol of American intransigence and our overseas air-bases a token of American aggressiveness. We have replied to every Soviet thrust like a pedantic professor sure of his righteousness, but the world is not moved by legalistic phrases, at least in a revolutionary period. This is not to say that negotiation should be conceived as mere propaganda; only that by failing to include the psychological aspect in our calculations, we have left the field free for the Soviets. As a result, the international debate is carried on almost entirely in the categories and at the pace established by the Soviets: the attention of the world is directed toward the horror of nuclear weapons, but not toward the fact of aggression which would unleash them.

The Soviets negotiate when a relaxation of tension serves their purpose and they break off negotiations when it is to their advantage without being forced to shoulder the onus for their failure. This is not to say that it was a mistake, to agree to the summit conference and the subsequent meeting of the foreign ministers. To refuse the Soviet overtures would have enabled the Soviets to make even greater strides among our allies and the uncommitted. But it was not necessary to permit the four-power meetings to become an effort to turn the

23

Soviets respectable; or for the President to give the Soviet a certificate of good conduct by assuring Bulgarin he believed in his peaceful intentions.

Nor was it wise to let the Soviet build up a distinction between the President and the rest of the U.S. government, so that any increase in tension will be ascribed to the fact that the President succumbed to the pressures of his advisors or to the operation of the "objective" factors of the U.S. economy. Because of our inability to raise the negotiations above the commonplace, they were conducted in a never-never land where a Soviet smile was considered to outweigh the fact of the perpetuated division of Germany, and where problems were evaded simply by denying that they existed.

24

III

But could we have carried our allies and the uncommitted along
on a different policy? Perhaps the Best way to approach a discussion of
our system of alliances is to analyze the historic role of coalitions.
In the past, coalitions have generally been held together by a combination
of three motivations: (a) To leave no doubt about the alignment of forces
and to discourage aggression by assembling superior power--this in effect
is the doctrine of collective security. (b) To provide an obligation for
assistance in addition to the requirements of the national interest. Were
the national interest unambiguous and unchangeable, each power would know
its obligations and also the course of its opponents without any formal pact.
But the national interest fluctuates widely within limits; it must be adapted
to changing circumstances. An alliance is a form of insurance against
contingencies, an additional weight when considering whether to go to war.
(c) To provide a legitimacy for the assistance of foreign troops or for
intervention in a foreign country.

25

[Y]

survive a real test; the legal obligation by itself will not make operative
a coalition which ¨has no purpose save its existence or is incapable of
giving its purpose a military expression. The French system of alliances
between the two wars, however imposing on paper, could not survive the
conflicting interests of its components and its lack of a unifying military
doctrine. It is not the fact of alliance then which deters aggression
but the application it can be given in any concrete case.

If we examine the structure of the present US system of alliances
we discover that most of the historic conditions for coalitions no longer
apply or apply in a different sense. From the point of view of power
relationships none of our alliances save NATO, adds to our effective strength.
And NATO is in difficulty because we cannot give it a military doctrine
which makes sense to our NATO partners. The US interest in the alliance
is two-fold: (a) to prevent Eurasia from being dominated by a hostile power,
because the U.S. confined to the Western Hemisphere could survive, if at all,
only through an effort inconsistent with what is now considered the American
way of life; (b) to add to our over-all strength vis-a-vis the USSR by
obtaining overseas facilities, particularly air-bases. Our empiricist bias

26

[Y]

has, however, caused us to reduce these objectives to a specific threat--
that of overt Soviet military aggression-- and to look at this threat only
in terms of the total strategic relationship between us and the Soviet bloc.
In these terms, Eurasia is protected not by our capability for local defense,
but by our strategic superiority in an all-out war and we have, therefore,
tended to justify our alliances because of the air-bases they afford us.*

But an alliance is useless unless it expresses a mutuality of interest
between the partners. We have considered the defense of Eurasia primarily
as a problem of the total strategic superiority of one partner over another
as a means of securing a strategic relationship between us and the Soviet bloc.

Eventual victory is of no interest to our allies if meanwhile they have
undergone the moral and material ravages of a Soviet occupation. Moreover,
our allies realize that in all-out war they will add to our effective
strength only by supplying facilities; they see no significance in a military
contribution of their own. As long as our military doctrine threatens to
transform every war into an all-out war, our system of alliances will be in jeopardy.

*See Nitze, "Atoms, Strategy and Policy," *Foreign Affairs*. January 1956.

28

In such circumstances a system of collective security leads in fact to a diffusion of purpose and to an air of unreality in which the existence of an alliance, and not the resolution behind it, is considered the guarantee of security. Thus, we speak of plugging gaps in defenses as if a treaty insturment were a defense and not the effective power it represents. We will not be able to overcome these difficulties until we develop a new approach to our coalition policy, above all until we set it less ambitious goals: WE HAVE TO CONFINE OUR ALLIANCES TO THE PURPOSES WE AND OUR ALLIES SHARE.

But can such a coalition policy be developed? The implications of the growing Soviet nuclear capacity would seem to impose a measure of harmony between the U.S. interest in an over-all strategy and our allies concern with local defense. For it appears now that the most effective over-all strategy involves the graduated employment of force and that the best deterrent resides in a capability for local defense.* A deterrent is effective only to the degree that it is plausible and as the

*See the author's "Force and Diplomacy in the Nuclear Age," Foreign Affairs.
April 1956. The argument of that article was for a nuclear military establishment

29

[Y]

the Soviet nuclear stockpile grows our willingness to run risks of a major war for peripheral objectives will diminish. In any case, in the face of the horrors of an all-out thermo-nuclear war, it is to the U. S. interest to use it only as a last resort; to seek to defend Eurasia by means other than all-out war. The justification for our alliances is, therefore, less that they add to our over-all strength, than that they give us an opportunity to apply our power subtly and with less fearful risks than an all-out thermo-nuclear war.

In these terms our alliances should be conceived from the military point-of-view as devices to organize local defense and our assistance a means to make local defense possible. We should make clear to our allies that their best chance of avoiding thermo-nuclear war resides in our ability to make local aggression too costly. They should understand that they cannot avoid their dilemmas by surrender or neutrality for if we were pushed out of Eurasia they would bring on what they fear most: Confined to the Western Hemisphere we would have no choice but to fight an all-out war.

30

of thermo-nuclear extinction would provide a powerful sanction against expanding a conflict. Regional mutual security arrangements, not a doctrine of general collective security, would seem to furnish the best basis for our coalition policy.

The corollary to the regional approach to our system of alliances, however is U. S. willingness to act alone if the over-all strategic balance is imperiled. None of our allies, with the exception of Great Britain, has the capability or the willingness to act outside its own geographical area. To ask them to do so will only undermine the domestic position of already weak governments and demoralize them further. It will lead to subterfuges and to the dilution of common action behind the form of joint communiqués. We have to face the fact that only the U. S. is strong enough domestically and economically to assume worldwide responsibilities and that the attempt to obtain the prior approval of all our allies of our every step will lead not to common action but to inaction. To be sure, wherever there exists a community of purpose, as for example with Great Britain in Southeast Asia and perhaps the Middle East, we should concert our efforts.

But we must reserve the right to act alone, or with a regional grouping of powers, if our strategic interest so dictates. We cannot permit the

Soviets to overturn the balance of power for the sake of allied *xxvi* unity,
if only because whatever the disagreement of our allies on specific measures
their survival depends on our unimpaired strength.

the
The military point of view should not supply/sole motivation for
our system of alliances, however. In fact, in many areas, particularly
those newly independent, our emphasis on the military factor is the cause
for our failure to develop any sense of common purpose. We are undoubtedly
right in our belief that the Soviet menace is paramount. But revolutions
are not logical and the Asian revolution is interested more in economic
development than in foreign affairs. Our insistence that they focus some
of their energies outward appears to them as an irritating interruption
of their primary concern and lends color to Soviet peace offensives.

Moreover, the military contribution of both the Baghdad Pact and SEATO does
not compensate for the decision of Egypt and India to stand apart and for
the domestic pressures these instruments brought about in some of the signatory countries.

The primary function of these pacts is to draw a line across which
the USSR cannot move without the risk of war, and to legitimize U. S.
intervention should war break out. But the line could have been better

32

[N]

drawn by a unilateral U. S. declaration or by a screen of U. S. token forces. Behind this shield we could then have concentrated on the primary problem of creating a sense of common purpose by concentrating on shared objectives, primarily by striving for the grouping of powers to assist in economic development. Had we emphasized these non-military functions of SEATO, it would have been much more difficult for India or Indonesia to stay aloof. As these political groupings gain in economic strength, their own interest would dictate a more active interest in common defense or at least it would provide the economic base for a meaningful defense. A powerful grouping of states on their borders is against the interests of the USSR regardless of whether this grouping comes into being as the result of a military or some other joint effort.

As the richest and most powerful nation, we are the natural target for all frustrations. As the power which bears the primary responsibility for the defense of the Free World, we are unpopular with all who are so preoccupied with the development of their own country that they cannot pay sufficient attention to foreign threats. We should, of course, seek to allay

33

legitimate grievances, but we would be wrong to take very criticism at
face value. Many of our most voluble critics in Southeast Asia would be
terrified were U. S. military protection suddenly withdrawn. Nehru's
next neutrality is possible, after all, only as long as the U. S. remains
strong. A great deal of Anti-Americanism hides a feeling of insecurity both
material and spiritual. Popularity is a hopeless mirage in a situation which
is revolutionary precisely because old values are disintegrating and millions
are groping for a new orientation. It is impossible for this reason to base
policy solely on an inquiry in what people desire; it is equally necessary
to supply a sense of direction. In the uncommitted areas popularity may be
less important than respect.

The U. S. must, therefore, develop in its relations with
the uncommitted not only a greater compassion, but also a greater majesty.
The picture of high American officials scurrying to all quarters of the
globe to infrom themselves on each crisis as it develops cannot but make
an impression of moral uncertainty. The nervousness exhibited in our reactions
to Soviet moves must contrast unfavorably with what seems like
the deliberate purposefulness of the Soviets. Because of what

the deliberate burpoeliness of the Soviets. Because of what
to Soviet moves must contrast mulvolyarily with that what seems like
an impression of moral under certainty. The nervousness exhibited in our reactions
frogs to infront themselves on each criteria as it develops cannot put make
The picture of high American officialsурrying to sell quarters of the
the uncommitted not only a greater compassion, but also a greater malady.

The U. S. must, therefore, develop in its relations with
less important than respect.

to imply a sense of direction. In the uncommitted areas belligerity may be
boldly so far on an indurily in what people desire; it is usually necessarily
are growing for a new orientation. It is improbable for this reason to pass
is revolutionary precisely because old lines are disintegrating and millions
material and spiritual. Popularity is a popesee mirage in a situation which
strong. A great deal of Anti-Americanism rides a feeling of insecurity both
in security is possible, after all, only as long as the U. S. remains
terrified were U. S. military protection suddenly withdrawn. Herrn's
face value. Many of our meat機關 critics in Southeast Asia would be
legitimate grievances, put we would be wrong to take very criticism at

33

34

[N]

appears to ~~all other nations~~ as vacillation and uncertainty, the pressures
of those powers which want above all to preserve the peace, are in every
crisis directed against us as the more flexible factor in the equation.

ACT OF LEADERSHIP
balancing of risks

Our alliance policy today stands in danger of misunderstood
historical analogies. Perhaps Hitler would have been deterred from war
had he been aware of the forces which would eventually be ranged against
him. But he would have been deterred only to the extent that he had
believed in their capability for action. An alliance cannot be run like
a parliamentary meeting; if equated with the consensus of all members its
policy is certain to be shaped by the weakest component. It is, therefore,
necessary to restore a greater flexibility to our diplomacy as well as
to our military policy; a firmness mixed with patience but also a readiness
to bear the psychological burden of difficult decisions.

to peak the bayonetical pressure of difficult decisions.

to our military policy; a firmness mixed with patience but also a readiness
necessary to reacquire a greater flexibility to our diplomacy as well as

policy is certain to be abated by the weakest component. If it is, therefore,
a parliamentary meeting; it educated with the consciousness of its members its
beliefs in their capability for action. An alliance cannot be run like
him. But he would have been deferred only to the extent that he had
had he been aware of the forces which would eventually be ranged against
historical analogies. Perhaps Hoffer would have deferred from war

Our alliance policy today stands in danger of mammapatood
superficiality of LEADERS.

or even India's a cannot be managed by underpinning alone; it also requires
breamses may be deflected on the Soviet bloc. A revolution, like Russia's,
To the degree that we can protect a greater sense of purpose, some of these
 create directed against us the more flexible factor in the equation.

of those powers which want to apave all to preserve the peace, are in every
abuse to in other nations as avocational and uncertainty, the breaches

[Y]

35

IV

We have to return to our original problem: the adequacy of American attitudes for dealing with the present crisis. This is above all a problem of leadership. For nations learn only by experience; they "know" only when it is too late to act. But statesmen must act as if their intuition were already experience, as if their aspiration were truth. The statesman, is, therefore, like one of the heroes of classical tragedy who has had an intuition of the future, but who cannot transmit it directly to his fellowmen and who cannot validate its "truth." It is for this reason that statesmen often share the fate of prophets, that they are without honor in their own country and that their greatness is usually apparent only in retrospect when their intuition has become experience. The statesman must be an educator; he must bridge the gap between & people's experience and his vision, between its tradition and its future. In this task his possibilities are limited. A statesman who too far outruns the experience of his people will not be able to sell his program at home, witness Wilson. A statesman who limits his policy to the experience of his people will doom himself to sterility, witness French policy since World War I.

36

[Y]

It is for this reason that most great statesmen have been repre-
sentatives of essentially conservative social structures or revolutionaries.

The representative of a conservative social structure is legitimized by an agreement on the basic goals of the social effort; there is, therefore, no need to justify every step along the way. The revolutionary is legitimized by his charismatic quality, by an agreement on the legitimacy of his person or of his principle. His means are, therefore, considered incidental; his ends or his person legitimize the means. A conservative structure produces a notion of *quality*, which provides the framework of great conception; a revolutionary order is impelled by a notion of *exaltation* which dissolves technical limitations. Both thus tend to deal with the fundamental problem of statesmanship: how to produce an understanding of the *complexity* of policy when it is impossible to produce an understanding of its *substance*.

It would be wrong to be too pessimistic. The U. S. over the past decade and a half has proved the vitality of the oldest operating political structure. No one would have believed when World War II ended that within ten years the U. S. would end its traditional isolation and assume world-wide commitments. It was possible because there existed a reservoir of confidence

in our political leadership; because the U. S. political structure is
essentially conservative, whatever party happens to be at the helm.

was not to be so. The world has come crowding in at an ever-increasing rate.

A power which has never hidden its hostile intent is building a thermonuclear
capability and intercontinental ballistic missiles to destroy us. We have

[LC]

# REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY

By Henry A. Kissinger

“POLICY,” wrote Metternich, the Austrian minister who steered his country through 39 years of crisis by a tour de force perhaps never excelled, “is like a play in many acts which unfolds inevitably once the curtain is raised. To declare then that the play will not go on is an absurdity. The play *will* go on either by means of the actors or by means of the spectators who mount the stage. . . . The crucial problem [of statesmanship], therefore, resides in the decision of whether to assemble the audience, whether the curtain is to be raised and above all in the intrinsic merit of the play.”

There can be little doubt that the foreign policy of the United States has reached an impasse. For several years we have been groping for a concept to deal with the transformation of the cold war from an effort to build defensive barriers into a contest for the allegiance of humanity. But the new Soviet tactics, coupled with the equally unassimilated increase in the destructive potential of the new weapons technology, have led to a crisis in our system of alliances and to substantial Soviet gains among the uncommitted peoples of the world.

It would be a mistake, however, to ascribe our difficulties to this or that error of policy or to a particular administration, although the present Administration has not helped matters by its pretense of “normalcy.” To return to Metternich’s metaphor: It can be argued that our policy has reached an impasse because of our penchant for happy endings; the Soviet rulers have been able to use negotiations to their advantage because we insisted on reading from an old script. As in all tragedies, many of our problems have been produced in spite of our good intentions and have been caused, not by our worst qualities, but by our best. What is at issue, therefore, is not a policy but an attitude.

II

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to apply the pattern of these to international affairs. But the very success of the American experiment and the spontaneity of our social institutions have served to emphasize the dilemma faced at some stage by every country: how to reconcile its vision of itself with the vision of it as seen by others. To itself, a nation is an expression of justice, and the more spontaneous has been the growth of its social institutions the more this is true; for government functions effectively only when most citizens obey voluntarily and they will obey only to the extent that they consider the demands of their rulers just. But to other nations, a state is a force to be balanced. This is inevitable because national strategy must be planned on the basis of the other side's capabilities and not merely a calculation of its intentions. There exists a double standard, therefore, in all foreign policy: internally, foreign policy is justified like all other policy in terms of an absolute standard; but abroad, what is defined as justice domestically becomes a program to be compromised by negotiation. If the institutions and values of the states comprising the international order are sufficiently similar, this incommensurability may not become apparent. But in a revolutionary period like the present, it affects profoundly relationships among states.

Foremost among the attitudes affecting our foreign policy is American empiricism and its quest for methodological certainty: nothing is "true" unless it is "objective" and it is not "objective" unless it is part of experience. This makes for the absence of dogmatism and for the ease of social relations on the domestic scene. But in the conduct of foreign policy it has pernicious consequences. Foreign policy is the art of weighing probabilities; mastery of it lies in grasping the nuances of possibilities. To attempt to conduct it as a science must lead to rigidity. For only the risks are certain; the opportunities are conjectural. One cannot be "sure" about the implications of events until they have happened and when they have occurred it is too late to do anything about them. Empiricism in foreign policy leads to a penchant for *ad hoc* solutions; the rejection of dogmatism inclines our policy-makers to postpone committing themselves until all facts are in; but by the time the facts are in, a crisis has usually developed or an opportunity has passed. Our policy is therefore geared to dealing with emergencies; it finds difficulty in developing the long-range program that might forestall them.

A symptom of our need for methodological certainty is the

REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 39

vast number of committees charged with examining and devel-
oping policy. The very multiplicity of committees makes it dif-
ficult to arrive at decisions in time. It tends to give a dispro-
portionate influence to subordinate officials who prepare the
initial memoranda and it overwhelms our higher officials with
trivia. Because of our cult of specialization, sovereign depart-
ments negotiate national policy among each other with no single
authority able to take an over-all view or to apply decisions over
a period of time.¹ This results in a hiatus between grand strategy
and particular tactics, between the definition of general objec-
tives so vague as to be truistic and the concern with immediate
problems. The gap is bridged only when a crisis forces the
bureaucratic machinery into accelerated action, and then the top
leadership has little choice but to concur in the administrative
proposals. In short, we are trying to cope with political problems
by administrative means.

The temptation to formulate policy administratively is ever
present in a government organized, as ours is, primarily for the
conduct of domestic affairs. But the spirit of policy and that of
bureaucracy are fundamentally opposed. Profound policy thrives
on creativeness; good administration thrives on routine—a pro-
cedure which can assimilate mediocrity. Policy involves an ad-
justment of risks; administration an avoidance of deviation. The
attempt to formulate policy administratively leads to the accept-
ance of a standard which evaluates by mistakes avoided rather
than by goals achieved. It is no accident that most great states-
men were opposed by the “experts” in their foreign offices, for
the very greatness of the statesman’s conception tends to make
it inaccessible to those whose primary concern is with safety and
minimum risk.

Our methodological doubt makes for vulnerability to Soviet
manœuvres in two ways: on the one hand, every Soviet change
of line is taken at least in part at face value, for we cannot be
certain that the Soviets may not “mean” it this time until they
have proved they do not; and they will try their best not to prove
it until the tactic has served its purpose. On the other hand, we
have found it difficult to adjust our tactics to new situations, so
that we always tend to speak in the categories of the most recent

¹ This is true despite the National Security Council. Since the N.S.C. is composed mainly of department heads overwhelmed with administrative responsibilities, all the pressures make for a departmental outlook and a concern with immediate problems.

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threat but one. The paradoxical result is that we, the empiricists, appear to the world as rigid, unimaginative and even somewhat cynical, while the dogmatic Bolsheviks exhibit flexibility, daring and subtlety. This is because our empiricism dooms us to an essentially reactive policy that improvises a counter to every Soviet move, while the Soviet emphasis on theory gives them the certainty to act, to manœuvre and to run risks. The very fact of action forces us to assume the risks of countermoves and absorbs our energies in essentially defensive manœuvres.

The willingness to act need not derive from theory, of course. Indeed, an overemphasis on theory can lead to a loss of touch with reality. In many societies—in Great Britain, for example—policy developed from a firmly held tradition of a national strategy. Throughout the nineteenth century it was a tenet of British policy that Antwerp should not fall into the hands of a major Power. This was not backed by an elaborate metaphysics but simply by a tradition of British sea power whose requirements were so generally understood that they were never debated. It is the absence of a tradition of foreign policy which exaggerates the biases of our empiricism and makes it difficult to conduct our policy with a proper regard for the timing of measures. It causes us to overlook the fact that policy exists in time as well as in space, that a measure is correct only if it can be carried out at the proper moment. To be sure, our cumbersome administrative mechanism adds immeasurably to the problem. But in addition, our deliberations are conducted as if a course of action were eternally valid, as if a measure which might meet exactly the needs of a given moment could not backfire if adopted a year later. For this reason our policy lacks a feeling for nuance, the ability to come up with variations on the same theme, as the Soviets have done so effectively. We consider policy-making concluded when the National Security Council has come to a decision. And in fact, the process of arriving at a decision is so arduous and a reappraisal is necessarily so "agonizing" that we are reluctant to reëxamine policies after they have outlived their usefulness.

But a written statement of policy is likely to amount to a truism; the real difficulty arises in applying it to concrete situations. And while we have often come up with the proper measures, we have not found it easy to adapt our approach to the requirements of the situation over a period of time. The different

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REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 41

uses made by the Soviets of the time interval between the "summit conference" and the Geneva conference of foreign ministers illustrates this point. The Soviets established diplomatic relations with the German Federal Republic and thus placed themselves in position to deal directly with both German governments; they used the peace offensive to undermine the cohesiveness of NATO and concluded the arms deal with Egypt. By the time we returned to Geneva, we found ourselves confronted by a series of faits accomplis and the conference foredoomed.

Another factor shaping our attitude toward foreign affairs is our lack of tragic experience. Though we have known severe hardships, our history has been notably free of disaster. Indeed, the American domestic experience exhibits an unparalleled success, of great daring rewarded and of great obstacles overcome. It is no wonder, therefore, that to many of our most responsible men, particularly in the business community, the warnings of impending peril or of imminent disaster sound like the Cassandra cries of abstracted "egg-heads." For is not the attribute of the "egg-head" his lack of touch with reality, and does not American reality show an unparalleled wealth coupled with an unparalleled growth?

There has been much criticism of Secretaries Humphrey and Wilson for their defense economies. But in fairness the psychological background of their decisions should be understood; despite all the information at their disposal, they simply cannot believe that in the nuclear age the penalty for miscalculation may be national catastrophe. They may know in their heads, but they cannot accept in their hearts, that the society they helped to build could disappear as did Rome or Carthage or Byzantium, which probably seemed as eternal to their citizens. These characteristics make for an absence of a sense of urgency, a tendency to believe that everything can be tried once and that the worst consequence mistakes can have is that we may be forced to redouble our efforts later on. The irrevocable error is not yet part of the American experience.

Related to this problem is our reluctance to think in terms of power. To be sure, American expansion both economic and geographical was not accomplished without a judicious application of power. But our Calvinist heritage has required success to display the attribute of justice. Even our great fortunes, however ac-

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cumulated, were almost invariably held to impose a social obligation; the great foundation is after all a peculiarly American phenomenon. As a nation, we have used power almost shamefacedly as if it were inherently wicked. We have wanted to be liked for our own sakes and we have wished to succeed because of the persuasiveness of our principles rather than through our strength. Our feeling of guilt with respect to power has caused us to transform all wars into crusades, and then to apply our power in the most absolute terms. We have rarely found intermediary ways to apply our power and in those cases we have done so reluctantly.

But international relations cannot be conducted without an awareness of power relationships. To be sure, the contemporary revolution cannot be managed merely by an exercise of force. But unless we maintain at least an equilibrium of power between us and the Soviet bloc we will have no chance to undertake any positive measures. And maintaining this equilibrium may confront us with some very difficult choices. We are certain to be confronted with situations of extraordinary ambiguity such as civil wars or domestic coups. Every successful Soviet move makes our moral position that much more difficult: Indochina was more ambiguous than Korea; the Soviet arms deal with Egypt more ambiguous than Indochina; the Suez crisis more ambiguous than the arms deal. There can be no doubt that we should seek to prevent such occurrences. But once they have occurred, we must find the will to act and to run risks in a situation which permits only a choice among evils. While we should never give up our principles, we must also realize that we cannot maintain our principles unless we survive.

Consistent with our reluctance to think in terms of power has been our notion of the nature of peace. We assume that peace is the "normal" pattern of relations among states, that it is equivalent to a consciousness of harmony, that it can be aimed at directly as a goal of policy. These are truisms rarely challenged in our political debate. Both major political parties maintain that they work for a lasting peace, even if they differ about the best means of attaining it. Both make statements which imply that on a certain magic day, perhaps after a four-power conference, "peace will break out."

No idea could be more dangerous. To begin with, the polarization of power in the world would give international relations a degree of instability even if there were no ideological disagree-

REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 43

ment, and the present volatile state of technology is likely to com-
pound this sense of insecurity. Moreover, whenever peace—con-
ceived as the avoidance of war—has become the direct objective
of a Power or a group of Powers, international relations have been
at the mercy of the state willing to forego peace. No statesman
can entrust the fate of his country entirely to the continued good
will of another sovereign state, if only because the best guarantee
for the will remaining good is not to tempt it by too great a dis-
proportion of power. Peace, therefore, cannot be aimed at di-
rectly; it is the expression of certain conditions and power rela-
tionships. It is to these relationships—not to peace—that diplo-
macy must address itself.

It is obviously to the interest of the Soviet Union to equate
peace with a state of good feeling unconnected with power rela-
tionships or past usurpations, for such an attitude ratifies all
its gains since World War II. By the same token, it is to the
interest of the United States to leave no doubt that the tension
of the cold war was produced not only by the intransigence of the
Soviet tone but also by the intransigence of their measures. As
long as the Soviets can give the impression that conciliatory
statements by themselves are a symptom of peaceful intentions,
they can control the pace of negotiations and gain the benefits
of the advocacy of peace without paying any price for its achieve-
ment. If the Soviets are given the privilege of initiating negotia-
tions when it suits their purpose and of breaking them off without
any penalty, diplomacy will become a tool of Soviet propaganda.
And the variety of Soviet manœuvres will in time erode the
cohesion of the free world.

III

With this we have reached one of the major problems confront-
ing current American diplomacy: the changed nature of nego-
tiations in a revolutionary political order. An international order,
the basic arrangements of which are accepted by all the major
Powers, may be called "legitimate;" a system which contains a
Power or group of Powers which refuses to accept either the
arrangements of the settlement or the domestic structure of the
other states is "revolutionary." A legitimate order does not make
conflicts impossible; it limits their scope. Wars may arise, but
they will be fought in *the name* of the existing system and the
peace will be justified as a better expression of the agreed ar-

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rangements. In a revolutionary order, on the other hand, disputes
do not concern adjustments within a given framework, but the
framework itself.

There can be little doubt that we are living through a revolu-
tionary period. On the physical plane, the power of weapons is
out of balance with the objectives for which they might be em-
ployed; as a result, at a moment of unparalleled strength we find
ourselves paralyzed by the implications of our own weapons
technology. On the political plane, many of the newly independ-
ent Powers continue to inject into their international policies the
revolutionary fervor that gained them independence. On the
ideological plane, the contemporary ferment is fed by the newly
awakened hopes and expectations of hitherto inarticulate peoples
and by the rapidity with which ideas can be communicated. And
the Soviet bloc, eager to exploit all dissatisfactions for its own
ends, has given the present situation its revolutionary urgency.

This is true despite the conciliatory statements of the Twen-
tieth Party Congress. For "peaceful coexistence" was not ad-
vanced as an acceptance of the *status quo*. On the contrary, it
was justified as the most efficient offensive tactic, as a more
effective means to subvert the existing order. The Soviet leaders
gave up neither the class struggle with its postulate of irreconcil-
able conflict, nor the inevitable triumph of Communism with its
corollary of the dictatorship of the proletariat. To be sure, war
was held to be no longer inevitable, but only because soon the
U.S.S.R. would possess preponderant strength. Should the policy
of "peaceful coexistence" prove less fruitful than expected, we
can look for other tactics. "In the world from now on," Mao has
said, "neutrality is only a word for deceiving people."²

These have been hard lessons to come by. Lulled by a century
and a half of comparative tranquillity and without experience
with disaster, we have been reluctant to take at face value the
often-repeated Soviet assertion that they mean to smash the
existing framework. We have tended to treat Soviet protesta-
tions as if their intent were merely tactical—as if the U.S.S.R.
overstated its case for bargaining purposes or were motivated by
specific grievances to be assuaged by individual concessions.
There is a measure of pathos in our effort to find “reasonable”
motives for the Soviets to cease being Bolshevik: the opportun-

² Quoted in Richard Walker, "China Under Communism" (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1955), p. 272.

REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 45

ity to develop the resources of their own country, the unlimited
possibilities of nuclear energy or of international trade. We re-
veal thereby a state of mind which cannot come to grips with
a policy of unlimited objectives. Our belief that an antagonist
can be vanquished by the persuasiveness of argument, our trust
in the efficacy of the process of negotiation, reflect the dominant
rôle played in our diplomacy by the legal profession and their
conception of diplomacy as a legal process.

But the legal method cannot be applied in a revolutionary
situation, for it presupposes a framework of agreed rules within
which negotiating skill is exercised. It is not the process of nego-
tiation as such which accounts for the settlement of legal dis-
putes, but a social environment which permits that process to
operate. This explains why conciliatory American statements
have so often missed their mark. To the Soviets, the key to their
ultimate triumph resides in their superior understanding of
"objective" forces and of the processes of history.³ Even when
they accept the "subjective" sincerity of American statesmen,
they still believe them powerless to deal with the "objective"
factors of American society which will ultimately produce a
showdown. Conciliatory American statements will appear to the
Soviet leaders either as hypocrisy or stupidity, ignorance or
propaganda. It is therefore futile to seek to sway Soviet leaders
through logical persuasion or by invocations of abstract justice.
Soviet statesmen consider conferences a means to confirm an
"objective" situation. A Soviet diplomat who wishes to make
concessions can justify them at home only if he can demonstrate
that they resulted from a proper balancing of risks.

In short, diplomacy has a different function in a revolutionary
international order. In a legitimate order, diplomacy seeks to
compromise disagreements in order to perpetuate the interna-
tional system. Adjustments occur because agreement is itself a
desirable goal, because of a tacit agreement to come to an agree-
ment. In a revolutionary order, on the other hand, adjustments
have primarily a tactical significance: to prepare positions for the
next test of strength. Negotiations in a legitimate order have
three functions: to formulate by expressing agreements or dis-

³ There is no little exasperation in the Soviet replies to our repeated assertion that a change of tactics on their part implies a surrender of Marxism. Khrushchev has said (September 17, 1955), "If anyone believes that our smiles involve abandonment of the teaching of Marx, Engels and Lenin he deceives himself poorly. Those who wait for that must wait until a shrimp learns to whistle."

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cords in a manner that does not open unbridgeable schisms; to perpetuate by providing a forum for making concessions; to persuade by stating a plausible reason for settlement. But in a revolutionary period, most of these functions have changed their purpose: diplomats can still meet, but they cannot persuade, for they have ceased to speak the same language. Instead, diplomatic conferences become elaborate stage plays which seek to attach the uncommitted to one or the other of the contenders.

Nothing is more futile, therefore, than to attempt to deal with a revolutionary power by ordinary diplomatic methods. In a legitimate order, demands once made are negotiable; they are put forward with the intention of being compromised. But in a revolutionary order, they are programmatic; they represent a claim for allegiance. In a legitimate order, it is good negotiating tactics to formulate maximum demands because this facilitates compromise without loss of essential objectives. In a revolutionary order, it is good negotiating tactics to formulate minimum demands in order to gain the advantage of advocating moderation. In a legitimate order, proposals are addressed to the opposite number at the conference table. They must, therefore, be drafted with great attention to their substantive content and with sufficient ambiguity so that they do not appear as invitations to surrender. But in a revolutionary order the protagonists at the conference table address not so much one another as the world at large. Proposals here must be framed with a maximum of clarity and even simplicity, for their major utility is their symbolic content. In short, in a legitimate order, a conference represents a struggle to find formulae to achieve agreement; in a revolutionary order, it is a struggle to capture the symbols which move humanity.

The major weakness of U.S. diplomacy has been the insufficient attention given to the symbolic aspect of foreign policy. Our positions have usually been worked out with great attention to their legal content, with special emphasis on the step-by-step approach of traditional diplomacy. But while we have been addressing the Soviets, they have been speaking to the people of the world. With a few exceptions we have not succeeded in dramatizing our position, in reducing a complex negotiation to its symbolic terms. In major areas of the world the Soviets have captured the "peace offensive" by dint of the endless repetition of slogans that seemed preposterous when first advanced, but which have be-

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REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 47

come common currency through usage. The Power which has
added 150 million people to its orbit by force has become the
champion of anti-colonialism; the state which has developed slave
labor as an integral part of its economic system has emerged in
many parts of the world as the champion of human dignity.
Neither regarding German unity nor Korea nor the satellite orbit
have we succeeded in mobilizing world opinion. But Formosa has
become a symbol of American intransigence and our overseas air
bases a token of American aggressiveness. We have replied to
every Soviet thrust like a pedantic professor sure of his right-
eousness; but the world is not moved by legalistic phrases, at
least in a revolutionary period. This is not to say that negotia-
tion should be conceived as mere propaganda; only that by failing
to cope adequately with their psychological aspect we have given
the Soviets unnecessary opportunities.

As a result, the international debate is carried on almost en-
tirely in the categories and at the pace established by the Soviets;
the world's attention is directed toward the horror of nuclear
weapons but not toward the fact of aggression which would un-
leash them. The Soviets negotiate when a relaxation of tension
serves their purpose and they break off negotiations when it is
to their advantage, without being forced to shoulder the onus
for the failure. We were right to agree to the summit conference
and the subsequent meeting of the foreign ministers. But it was
not necessary to permit the Four-Power meetings to become an
effort to turn the Soviets respectable; or for the President to give
the Soviet Union a certificate of good conduct by assuring Bul-
ganin he believed in his peaceful intentions. Nor was it wise to let
the Soviet leaders build up a distinction between the President
and the rest of the United States Government, so that any in-
crease in tensions will be ascribed to the fact that the President
succumbed to the pressures of his advisors or to the operation of
the "objective" factors of the U.S. economy or to a change of
administration. Because of our inability to raise the negotiations
above the commonplace, they were conducted in a never-never
land where a Soviet smile was considered to outweigh the fact of
the perpetuated division of Germany and where problems were
evaded simply by denying that they existed.

IV

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along on a different policy? Perhaps the best way to approach a discussion of our system of alliances is to analyze the historic rôle of coalitions. In the past, coalitions have generally been held together by a combination of three motivations: (1) To leave no doubt about the alignment of forces and to discourage aggres- sion by assembling superior power—this in effect is the doctrine of collective security. (2) To provide an obligation for assistance. Were the national interest unambiguous and unchangeable, each Power would know its obligations without any formal pact. But the national interest fluctuates within limits; it must be adapted to changing circumstances. An alliance is a form of insurance against contingencies, an additional weight when considering whether to go to war. (3) To legitimize the assistance of foreign troops or intervention in a foreign country.

An alliance is effective, then, to the extent that its power appears formidable and its purpose unambiguous. If an alliance is composed of too many disparate elements or if its members pursue too varying aims it will not survive a real test. The legal obligation by itself will not suffice if the coalition has no common purpose or is incapable of giving its purpose a military expression. The French system of alliances between the two wars, however imposing on paper, could not survive the conflicting interests of its components and its lack of a unifying military doctrine. It is not the fact of alliance which deters aggression but the application it can be given in any concrete case.

If we examine the structure of the present system of alliances created by the United States we discover that most of the historic conditions for coalitions no longer apply, or apply in a different sense. From the point of view of power relationships none of our alliances, save NATO, adds to our effective strength. And NATO is in difficulty because we cannot give it a military doctrine which makes sense to our NATO partners. Our interest in the alliance is twofold: a, to prevent Eurasia from being controlled by a hostile Power, because if the United States were confined to the Western Hemisphere it could survive, if at all, only through an effort inconsistent with what is now considered the American way of life; b, to add to our over-all strength vis-à-vis the U.S.S.R. by obtaining overseas facilities, particularly air bases. Our empiricist bias has, however, caused us to place these objectives in the framework of a specific threat—that of overt Soviet military aggression—and to look at this threat only in

REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 49

terms of the total strategic relationship between us and the
Soviet bloc. In these terms, Eurasia is protected not by our capa-
bility for local defense, but by our strategic superiority in an
all-out war, and we have therefore tended to justify our alliances
because of the overseas air bases they afford us.

An alliance is useless, however, unless it expresses a mutuality
of interest between the partners. Our military policy is increas-
ingly based on a strategy of "revenge," the objective of which is
to retaliate with greater destruction than we suffer. But in all
situations short of all-out war (and perhaps even then) deter-
rence is produced not by a capability to inflict disproportionate
losses, but a capability to inflict losses unacceptable in relation
to specific objectives in dispute. The Soviet successes in the
postwar period demonstrate that in certain circumstances even
an inferior retaliatory capability can produce deterrence. Despite
our strategic superiority we refused to intervene in Indochina or
expand the war in Korea, because Korea and Indochina did not
seem "worth" an all-out war and because we had inadequate
alternative capabilities to make the Soviet calculus of risks seem
unattractive. An all-out strategy, moreover, not only increases
our own inhibitions but runs counter to a coalition policy. Our
allies realize that in all-out war they will add to our effective
strength only by supplying facilities; they see no significance in
a military contribution of their own. As long as our military
doctrine threatens to transform every war into an all-out war,
our system of alliances will be in jeopardy.

Our policies have, moreover, been inhibited by the notion of
collective security drawn from the lessons of the 1930s, when a
united front might well have deterred Hitler, and by our his-
torical bias in favor of federal structures. We base our coalitions
on the assumption that unless all allies resist any aggression any-
where no effective resistance is possible at all. But this notion
of collective security has the paradoxical result of paralyzing the
partner capable of resisting alone. For governments hard pressed
to act in areas of direct concern to them cannot be brought to
run risks outside that area, so that the effort to obtain NATO
support in Asia tends to undermine the cohesiveness of NATO
in Europe. Even within the purely regional alliances the combina-
tions of purposes are extremely various. Pakistan desires arms
more for their effect on India than for the protection they afford
against the U.S.S.R. or China; Iraq is interested in the Baghdad

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Pact primarily for the military advantages it gives over Saudi Arabia and Egypt. And in neither SEATO nor the Baghdad Pact are we associated with partners with whom we share the degree of common purpose conferred by the cultural heritage that we share with our European allies.

The problems of our system of alliances can be summed up under two headings: either the alliances add little to our effective strength or they do not reflect a common purpose, or both. In such circumstances a system of collective security leads in fact to a dilution of purpose and to an air of unreality in which the existence of an alliance, and not the resolution behind it, is considered the guarantee of security.¹ Thus, we speak of plugging gaps in defenses as if a treaty instrument were itself a defense. We will not be able to overcome these difficulties until we develop a new approach to our coalition policy, above all until we set less ambitious goals. We must confine our alliances to the purposes we and our allies share.

But can such a coalition policy be developed? The implications of the growing Soviet nuclear capability would seem to impose a measure of harmony between the interest of the United States in an over-all strategy and our allies' concern with local defense. For with the end of our immunity from nuclear attack the nature of deterrence has altered. A deterrent is effective only to the degree that it is plausible and as the Soviet nuclear stockpile grows our willingness to run the risk of an all-out war for any objective save a direct attack on the continental United States will diminish. In such a situation, deterrence with respect to the issues most likely to be in dispute is above all achieved by a capability for local defense.⁴ In the face of the horrors of thermonuclear war, it is in our interest to seek to defend Eurasia by means other than all-out war: to devise a strategy which will allow us to inflict the minimum amount of damage consistent with deterrence. The justification for our alliances, therefore, is less that they add to our over-all strength than that they give us an opportunity to apply our power subtly and with less fearful risks.

From the military point of view, our alliances should be conceived as devices to organize local defense and our assistance as a means to make local defense possible. We should make clear to our allies that their best chance of avoiding thermonuclear war resides in our ability to make local aggression too costly.

⁴ See the author's "Force and Diplomacy in the Nuclear Age," *Foreign Affairs*, April 1956.

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REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 51

They should understand that they cannot avoid their dilemma by neutrality or surrender, for if we are pushed out of Eurasia they will bring on what they fear most. Confined to the Western Hemisphere, we would have no choice but to fight an all-out war. To be sure, the Soviets have skillfully fomented neutralism by giving the impression that local resistance must inevitably lead to all-out war. But the Soviets can be no more interested than we in total war; the fear of thermonuclear extinction would provide a powerful sanction against expanding a conflict.

The corollary to a regional system of alliances, however, is willingness on our part to act alone if the over-all strategic balance is imperiled. None of our allies, with the exception of Great Britain, has the capability or the willingness to act outside its own geographical area. To ask them to do so will only undermine the domestic position of already weak governments and demoralize them further. It will lead to subterfuges and to the dilution of common action behind the form of joint communique's. We have to face the fact that only the United States is strong enough domestically and economically to assume worldwide responsibilities and that the attempt to obtain the prior approval by all our allies of our every step will lead not to common action but to inaction. To be sure, whenever there exists a community of purpose, as for example with Great Britain in the Middle East and perhaps in Southeast Asia, we should concert our efforts. But we must reserve the right to act alone, or with a regional grouping of Powers, if our strategic interest so dictates. We cannot permit the Soviets to overturn the balance of power for the sake of allied unity, for whatever the disagreement of our allies on specific measures their survival depends on our unimpaired strength.

The military point of view must not supply the sole motivation for our system of alliances, however. In fact, in many areas, particularly those newly independent, our emphasis on the military factor is the cause of our failure to develop a sense of common purpose. We are undoubtedly right in our belief in the Soviet menace. But revolutions are not logical and the Asian revolution is interested more in internal development than in foreign affairs. Our insistence that they focus some of their energies outward appears to them as an irritating interruption of their primary concern and lends color to Soviet peace offensives. Moreover, the military contribution of both the Baghdad Pact and SEATO

52

FOREIGN AFFAIRS

The primary function of these pacts is to draw a line across which the U.S.S.R. cannot move without the risk of war, and to legitimize intervention by the United States should war break out. But the line could have been better drawn by a unilateral declaration. Behind this shield we could then have concentrated on the primary problem of creating a sense of common purpose by emphasizing shared objectives, primarily by striving for the grouping of Powers to assist in economic development. Had we emphasized these nonmilitary functions of SEATO, it would have been much more difficult for India or Indonesia to stay aloof. As these political groupings gain in economic strength, their own interest would dictate a more active concern for common defense; at least it would provide the economic base for a meaningful defense. A powerful grouping of states on the Russian borders is against the interests of the Soviet Union regardless of whether the purpose of this grouping is primarily military. And by the same token, such a grouping is desirable from the American point of view even if it does not go along with our every policy.

The problem of the uncommitted states cannot be solved, however, merely by an economic grouping of Powers. It is related to the whole U.S. posture. Anti-Americanism is fashionable today in many parts of the globe. As the richest and most powerful nation, we are the natural target for all frustrations. As the Power which bears the primary responsibility for the defense of the free world, we are unpopular with all who are so preoccupied with the development of their own countries that they are unwilling to pay sufficient attention to foreign threats. We should, of course, seek to allay legitimate grievances, but we would be wrong to take every criticism at face value. Many of our most voluble critics in Southeast Asia would be terrified were our military protection suddenly withdrawn. Nehru's neutrality is possible, after all, only as long as the United States remains strong. A great deal of anti-Americanism hides a feeling of insecurity both material and spiritual. Popularity is a hopeless mirage in a situation which is revolutionary precisely because old values are disintegrating and millions are groping for a new orientation. For this reason, it is impossible to base policy solely on an inquiry into what people desire; a revolutionary situation is distinguished by its dissatisfac-

[LC]

REFLECTIONS ON AMERICAN DIPLOMACY 53

tions, which join in protest against the existing order but can
propose no clear substitute. This is the reason why most revolu-
tions have been captured by a small minority which could give
a sense of direction to popular resentments. In the uncommitted
areas popularity may therefore be less important than respect.

In its relations with the uncommitted, the United States must
develop not only a greater compassion but also a greater majesty.
The picture of high American officials scurrying to all quarters
of the globe to inform themselves on each crisis as it develops
cannot but make an impression of uncertainty. The nervous-
ness exhibited in our reactions to Soviet moves must contrast
unfavorably with what appears to be the deliberate purposeful-
ness of the Soviets. Moreover, for understandable reasons, many
of the uncommitted nations are eager to preserve the peace at
almost any price. Because of what appears to them as vacillation
and uncertainty, they choose in every crisis to direct pressure
against us as the more malleable of the two super-Powers. To the
degree that we can project a greater sense of purpose, some of
these pressures may be deflected on the Soviet bloc. A revolution
like Egypt's or even India's cannot be managed by understand-
ing alone; it also requires a readiness on our part to bear the
psychological burden of difficult decisions.

v

We thus return to our original problem: the adequacy of
American attitudes for dealing with the present crisis. This is
above all a problem of leadership. For nations learn only by ex-
perience; they "know" only when it is too late to act. But states-
men must act as if their intuition were already experience, as if
their aspiration were truth. The statesman is, therefore, like one
of the heroes of classical tragedy who has had an intuition of the
future, but who cannot transmit it directly to his fellowmen and
who cannot validate its "truth." This is why statesmen often
share the fate of prophets, that they are without honor in their
own country and that their greatness is usually apparent only in
retrospect when their intuition has become experience. The
statesman must be an educator; he must bridge the gap between
a people's experience and his vision, between its tradition and its
future. In this task his possibilities are limited. A statesman who
too far outruns the experience of his people will not be able to
sell his program at home; witness Wilson. A statesman who limits