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The Chairman: Thank you very much, Dr. Kissinger.

We will rotate around with our six minute rule. I will
lead off.

Dr. Kissinger, you say on page 3 of your statement that
-- I believe it is the second paragraph. You say: "The
situation is made more complex because in nearly every NATO
country the consensus on defense and foreign policy has
broken down."

Could you elaborate on that and tell us what you mean by
that?

Dr. Kissinger: Well, I think -- well, let us begin with
our country. I believe that we lack right now a clearcut
national consensus, not so much -- well, we lack a clearcut
national consensus of what our defense policy is supposed to
accomplish.

But we are better off than, say, the Federal Republic or
Great Britain, in which case were the opposition party to
come into office, in each case were the opposition party to
come into office, they are committed to the most drastic
changes in defense policy. In the British case, the
abandonment of the nuclear deterrent; in the German case, the
adoption of the zero option and various other devices that
would run counter to what has heretofore been established
NATO doctrine.

In France this is not the case. There seems to be

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amazing consensus on defense policy. But France is not fully
Integrated into NATO. So perhaps the sentence was
overstated.

But as we saw when the deployment decision had to be made
with respect to INF, there are in many European countries
significant neutrallists and even pacifists current.

The Chairman: One of the points you emphasize, which I
strongly agree with, is the United States should be in a
position of encouraging more European cooperation and
European Initiative in the overall NATO, both contributions
and policymaking.

How do you view the French-German brigade in that respect
and the new council they have created?

Dr. Kissinger: I think I view it very favorably. I
believe that one of the results of the INF negotiations and
of Reykjavik and other events that have happened in the last
few years has been that the pro-western element in the
Federal Republic has been cut adrift to some extent. And if
one wants to keep them from pursuing substantially
nationalistic goals, they must find some home in a
relationship beyond Germany's borders.

And I think it is an act of statesmanship on the part of
both Chancellor Kohl and the French leadership to have
created these organizations.

Now, I know there is some concern in Britain, for

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example, that this might lead to the alienation of the United
States. I think it is up to us to make clear that we view it
favorably, ~~that it is not~~ that we ~~do not~~ consider the defense
a greater European role in European defense as consistent
with the Atlantic alliance, ~~because after all~~ in the economic
field competition is almost inherent in the creation of
~~European unity~~.

In the defense field, I cannot conceive any attack from
the East on Europe in which Europe would not be better off
with American assistance than without it. And so I would
have enough confidence that the Europeans would see that the
same way.

The Chairman: Do you see the need, in light of your
feeling about the breakdown of consensus and also your
feeling, which is well stated here, about NATO not really
having a broad strategy that encompasses both security and
arms control, and arms control has become sort of the end in
itself rather than the means to a broader end -- we do not
really know where we are going.

And I detect from your statement that you feel that we do
not really have a comprehensive proposal to put on the table
before Gorbachev that involves both conventional and nuclear
and also the broader issues, and so we in the West have not
formulated our own position.

In light of all of that, if I have correctly come close

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to paraphrasing it, do you believe we need a new Commission
of some kind, like the Harmel Commission in the late
sixties? Do you believe this should be the subject at the
summit conference, with the direct leaders taking the
initiative here?

How do you believe the western alliance --

Dr. Kissinger: Mr. Chairman, I have not given any
concrete thought to how to resolve the problem, but I would
certainly favor if one could get a non-partisan Commission
like the Harmel Commission to address these issues. Any
device that could state this in a coherent manner that then
the governments could adopt I would consider highly
desirable.

I do not think the existing NATO machinery will generate
it by itself, because they have too many current tactical
problems to address.

The Chairman: It is also awfully hard for even summit
leaders to develop the consensus back in countries like
Britain and Germany, where you noted the opposition party is
in almost diametric opposition to some of the fundamentals.
They are talking some about a Harmel Commission in France. I
have heard several of them mention that that might be an
approach.

Dr. Kissinger: I had not heard it, but I think it is an
excellent idea.

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The Chairman: I think they are reflecting in France about the same view you reflected here, that there has been sort of a breakdown of consensus.

I was amazed. Senator Warner and I were over there a week ago, and I was amazed that, particularly in some of the younger leaders, that they seemingly have, perhaps because of INF but probably because of Reykjavik, INF and the talk about immorality of deterrence and all of those things, eliminating all nuclear weapons -- probably a combination as I read it, not just INF.

Dr. Kissinger: No, no, it is a combination of all these factors.

The Chairman: They are really doing some soul-searching in France now, I think.

Dr. Kissinger: I think Reykjavik was a serious shock to many Europeans.

The Chairman: And also, as you note, they talk about going to zero nuclear weapons. The Europeans have to ask, what is America's policy, where are we going.

Senator Warner, my time has expired and you are next.

Senator Warner: Dr. Kissinger, I will just pick up on my chairman's reference to the trip that Senator Byrd and Pell and Boren and Nunn and myself took. Almost without exception, every leader of the five nations that we visited -- and you are familiar with the trip -- foreign ministers