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technical point of view, it is highly probable that missiles can perform
most of the functions heretofore assigned to airplanes. The shift to missiles
and the elimination of airplanes envisaged by the former Deputy Secretary of
Defense Roswell Gilpatric¹ makes a great deal of sense technically. But has
adequate attention been given to the kind of diplomacy which results--parti-
cularly in crisis situations--when the retaliatory threat depends entirely
on solid-fuel missiles in underground silos? During the Cuban missile crisis,
dispersing SAC planes to civilian airports proved an effective warning. What
will be an equivalent move when our strategic forces are composed entirely of
missiles?

Similar intangibles underlie much of the strategic debate between
some of our European allies and the United States. Since 1961 the United
States has insisted that deterrence was best achieved by posing a credible
risk. And it has related credibility to whether the risks were tolerable if
deterrence fails. For a variety of reasons, many Europeans have argued that

¹"Our Defense Needs: The Long View", *Foreign Affairs*, April 1964, p. 313

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deterrence is most effective if the threat is extreme. The promise of all-out retaliation has seemed to most of our allies a more certain guarantee than the promise of retaliation carefully proportioned to the challenge.

A later chapter will deal with these problems in greater detail.

For present purposes, it is enough to point out that they involve psychological judgments not subject to clear-cut proof. And their intimacy is such that an ever-widening gap has appeared between the sophistication of United States technical studies and the capacity of allied leaders to absorb their intricacy.

It is unlikely that even the most conscientious allied leader--or U.S.

President, for that matter--can devote as many hours to a given problem as the weapons analyst has had years to study it. The decision-maker will have to work with approximations, and his decisions will have to be made under stress. Doctrines of too great complexity can bring about the psychological collapse of those with the final responsibility for implementing them--as happened with the elaborately intricate Schlieffen Plan on which Germany based its strategy in 1914. The Plan, for all its careful calculations and

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paintaking rehearsals, provided for every contingency except the psychological
strain on the Commander.

The United States-European dialogue on strategy is thus confused
by ambiguities which are essentially psychological in nature. The United
States tendency to treat political and psychological problems as if they
were primarily technical exacerbates disagreements beyond their intrinsic
significance. Acquiescence in American strategic hegemony can have two
meanings: It can either represent a sincere commitment to Atlantic partner-
ship or disguise a neutralist wish to abdicate responsibility. Many of
those who applaud our views may do so for reasons which will not prove
very comforting in the long run. For the American nuclear umbrella, now
sometimes exploited by President de Gaulle for his own purposes, can also
be used--and more dangerously for the West--to support policies amounting
to neutralism. In many countries it is the leaders and groups traditionally
most committed to national defense who have developed views on strategy
which challenge American concepts while some of those most ready to accept

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U.S. strategic hegemony have in the past been the least interested in making
a serious defense effort. An understanding policy must therefore go beyond
the technical analysis of weapons systems. Its test will be the political
vitality of the members of the Alliance.

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## IV. The Growth in European Strength and Self-Confidence

The most important change in United States-European relations is due to one of the great successes of America in the post-war period: the restoration of European vigor and self-confidence. Through a series of far-sighted and bold measures starting with the Greek-Turkish aid program and culminating in the Marshall Plan, the United States helped Europe over the shock of six years of war.

But as with all great achievements, there is the danger that their memory may become an obstacle to the creativeness required by new situations. Many of those Americans most responsible for European recovery are finding it difficult to adjust to conditions where American leadership is no longer unquestioned. To many of them the face to a challenge to American pre-eminence is almost as irritating as its content. They are still subject to the distortion of perspective produced by the immediate post-war period when the end of America's isolation coincided with the temporary loss of Europe's ability to play an effective international role or to protect

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itself against foreign danger. Every European country--with the exception
of Britain--had known defeat at one time or another during World War II.
Every country--again with the exception of Great Britain--had been, at
some point, the victim of foreign occupation. Societies were shattered.
Europe was dependent on the United States for its material well-being,
domestic cohesion and safety from invasion.

United States-European relationships took on their present cast
during this period. It has, of course, never been correct to speak of
Europe as if it were an entity and as if every country were going through
the same process. Considerable differences exist as to the vigor with
which European countries attempt to assert their own role in international
affairs. But whatever the differences among European countries--some of
which are becoming significant now--the trend is clearly in the direction
of increased European assertiveness. To be sure, many of the actual
disputes which now rend the Alliance have been produced by the strong-
willed personality of President de Gaulle. But equally many other
Europeans have muted views not too different from those of the French

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President, because they object to his style of government and his
diplomatic methods.

In itself this is not undesirable. For in the immediate post-war
years Atlantic relationships developed on a basis which was psychologically
unhealthy in the long run. Faced with an impotent Europe, the United States
came to deal with its allies on a paternalistic basis. This involved a
certain self-righteousness, impatient of criticism, eager above all to
remove the obstacles to the achievement of whatever plans we might have at
the moment. As a result, the United States and Europe too often conducted
their dialogue over the technical implementation of a blueprint manufactured
in America.

In part this American attitude was both the cause and the product of
some bad habits developed by Europe during the period of unchallengeable
American hegemony. The policy of our European allies essentially consisted
of influencing American decisions rather than developing conceptions of
their own. This in turn, produced querulousness and insecurity. At times,

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our allies seemed more eager to extract American reassurance than to encourage
a consistent United States policy. Excessive suspicion was coupled with
formal pliancy. For a decade, European statesmen showed whatever dis-
agreement they felt by delaying the implementation of agreed measures rather
than by confronting the issues before the Alliance. This led to a negativism
characterized by a greater awareness of risks than of opportunities and by
a general fear of any departure from the status quo.

The period of American hegemony came to an end in the late Fifties
and early Sixties under the impact of four events in which United States
policy had played a major role: European economic recovery, European
integration, decolonization and the Cuban missile crisis and its aftermath.
Each of these events illustrates that even the most successful policies
create their own dynamism. Results cannot always be judged by the in-
tentions of those who start a historical process, even less by their public
pronouncements.

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European recovery was promoted by the United States in a constructive and far-sighted spirit. Europe was seen as a potential partner which could eventually share with us the burdens and responsibilities of world leadership. Most pronouncements of American purposes reflected our expectation that after its recovery Europe would no longer require American economic assistance but would continue to pursue parallel, if not identical, policies.

This was, however, always unlikely. With the growth of European economic vigor, Europe's traditional political dynamism was bound to return. The trend was given impetus by the existence of an intact younger generation--the first since the carnage of World War I--eager to assert its own view of the world.

The process of European economic integration magnified Europe's new-found assertiveness. The orthodox view of the European Economic Community was that it should be "outward looking" and that its economic strength would buttress all free peoples on a non-discriminatory basis.

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However, it is the essence of a Common Market that it will inevitably maintain *some* tariff barriers to the outside world. As internal barriers are lower than external ones, a measure of discrimination is inherent in the creation of any common market. Moreover, the reduction of external barriers will have to be the result of negotiations. And, obviously, the stronger the economic unit, the more formidable its bargaining power.

The increasing power of the Common Market was bound to complicate economic negotiations with Europe--a fact not to be eliminated by epithets like "inward looking". It is no accident that in most economic negotiations-- whether they concerned Britain's entry into the Common Market or the Kennedy Round--the position of the Common Market Commission has been close to that of France despite profound differences about the organization of Europe. The economic interests of the Common Market--by its own inner logic--often coincide with the political goal of France to vindicate a more independent role for Europe. Many American spokesmen talk as if a

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politically unified Europe making decisions by some sort of majority voting of the European states would end the current impasse in Atlantic relationships.¹ The experience of the Common Market suggests that this conclusion is far from inevitable and that France might have little to fear from such a system.

Then, too, the process of decolonization, in which we often sided against our European allies, has produced a new assertion of European vigor. Ironically, the end of Europe's colonial empire has led to a reversal of roles between us and Europe in many underdeveloped countries.

Some European leaders are now repeating the American argument of the Fifties: that the larger interests of the free world are sometimes served by allowing for differing, sometimes even competing, Western approaches to the emerging nations.

This attitude, too, was inevitable, even when it bears the marks of de Gaulle's high-handed tactics. Having shed their colonial possessions,

¹See below, Chapter

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often under American pressure, our European allies have a psychological
bloc against running major risks on behalf of areas from which they have
been so recently ejected. As a result of the process of decolonization,
our European allies have ceased to think of themselves as world powers.
They possess neither the resources nor the domestic framework for distant
enterprises. No European government is likely to be convinced that its
security is jeopardized by events in a different part of the globe. Each
European ally has a general concern in the maintenance of peace. But
this will produce at best token support for such enterprises as the war
in South East Asia. The motive of our European allies will be to obtain
a veto over United States actions, and their major concern will be that
United States policy not involve them in a direct show-down--a policy
which will always incline them to avoid even the semblance of risk.
Henceforth, we are the only member of NATO with worldwide interests,
and this produces inevitable differences in perspective.

In a way the United States is now paying the price for the self-
righteous and shortsighted policies best epitomized by the Suez fiasco

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of 1956. This illustrates that the penalties in foreign policy while inevitable are often deferred and must be paid by people different from those bearing the major responsibility. That this policy reflected a wide consensus at the time should give pause to those who today conduct policies geared to overcoming immediate symptoms of crisis while neglecting the long-run implications of their actions.

Finally, relations with the Communist world have changed dramatically since the Cuban missile crisis. Most of our European allies have drawn the conclusion that the two main nuclear powers will avoid a direct confrontation for an indefinite period. This conviction has been strengthened by the hope in some, and the suspicion in others, that bilateral United States-Soviet dealings are under way. Such an atmosphere of detente removes the previous urgency for Allied cohesion. As the Soviet threat appears to recede, the scope for national action widens proportionately. As the impression grows that bilateral Soviet-United States negotiations are under way, Third Force tendencies in Europe are stimulated. The issue

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is not whether the United States would make a "deal" contrary to the interests of its allies. It is rather that in an alliance of sovereign states, each ally will think that it is a better judge of its interests than any partner, however close. No country will be prepared to let another settle what it considers its vital interests. As the detente develops, only wise and restrained statesmanship can mitigate its corrosive impact on North Atlantic unity.

Thus major structural changes have occurred in U.S.-European relations which perhaps are exploited by President de Gaulle but which have not been caused by him. On both sides of the Atlantic this has led to ambivalence caused by a persistence of old attitudes in new circumstances. It is always difficult for a country which has enjoyed a hegemonial position to adjust to a loss of pre-eminence. Grown accustomed to finding its views unchallenged, it tends to identify its policies with the general interest. A network of connections with people accustomed to the relationships of dominance reinforces the

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conviction. The quest for autonomy appears as distrust; independence
seems indistinguishable from self-will. Why should a country want
freedom of action when its interests cannot diverge from those of the
dominant partner?

By the same token, countries striving to alter a relationship
of tutelage will be tempted to emphasize the burdensome aspects of the
existing relationship and to neglect its benefits. They will not credit
the motives of the senior partner and look for hegemonial designs in
sincere efforts to achieve a consensus. This process makes it difficult
to confront the central issue. Which Atlantic structure is more vital
in the long run: one that deprives all partners (except the United States)
of the capacity of autonomous action or one that grants the capacity for
autonomous action but seeks to reduce the desire for it? The answer
to this question will determine the shape of Atlantic relationships for
decades to come.

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V. Differences in Historical Perspective

Perhaps the deepest cause of transatlantic misunderstandings
is a difference in historical perspective. Americans live in an
environment uniquely suited to an engineering approach to policymaking.
As a result, our society has been characterized by a conviction that any
problem will yield if subjected to a sufficient dose of expertise. With
such an approach, problems tend to appear as discrete issues without any
inner relationship. It is thought that they can be solved "on their
merits" as they arise. It is rarely understood that a "solution" to a
problem may mortgage the future--especially as there is sufficient optimism
to assume that even should this prove to be the case, it will still be
possible to overcome the new problem when it materializes. When applied
to foreign policy, such an approach tends to consider division of labor
its own justification. Allies are considered factors in a security ar-
rangement; their utility is measured in terms of their contribution to
a common effort, whose criteria are often determined abstractly with

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each nation assigned a specific role with little regard to its history
or domestic structure.

But, Europeans live on a continent covered with ruins testifying
to the fallibility of human foresight. In European history, the re-
cognition of a problem has often defined a dilemma rather than pointed
to an answer. The margin of survival of European countries has been
more precarious than that of the United States. Each country--with the
possible exception of Great Britain--has known national catastrophe as
America has not. European reasoning is thus likely to be more com-
plicated and less confident than ours. Our European allies think of
themselves not simply as components of security schemes but as expressions
of an historical experience. Policies that neglect their sense of
identity may destroy the psychological basis of whatever common effort
is attempted to be organized.

This explains some of the strains in Atlantic relationships.

Americans tend to be impatient with what seems to them Europe's almost

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morbid obsession with the past, while Europeans sometimes complain about
a lack of sensitivity and compassion on the part of Americans. In the
fall of 1963, our newspapers were filled with derisory comments about
French maneuvers then taking place. The scenario of these maneuvers
supposed that an aggressor force was attacking France through Germany.
France's allies had surrendered. As the aggressor's armies were approaching
her borders, France resorted to her nuclear weapons.

It is, of course, easy to ridicule this scenario by contrasting
the small size of the French bomber force with the magnitude of the
disaster envisaged. But the crucial issue is not technical. It arises
from the fact that France has undergone shattering historical experiences
with which Americans find it difficult to identify. The scenario of the
French maneuvers recalled importantly--perhaps too rigidly--France's
traumatic experience of 1940, when foreign armies attacked all along
the Western front and France's allies collapsed. The British Fighter
Command remained in England; the fact that this critical decision was wise

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does not affect the basic psychological point. Moreover, the French
disaster came at the end of two decades in which France almost single-
hanedly shouldered the responsibility for the defense of Europe while
her erstwhile allies withdrew into isolation or offered strictures about
France's obsession with security. The nightmare that some day France
might again stand alone goes far deeper than the obstinate ill-will of
a single individual.

A comparable problem exists in Germany. Washington has at times
shown signs of impatience toward the German leaders and their constant
need for reassurance. Secretary Rusk has been reported more than once
to be restless with what he has called the "pledging sessions" which the
Germans seem so often to demand. However, insecurity is endemic in the
German situation. A divided country with frontiers that correspond to
no historical experience, a society which has lived through two disastrous
defeats and four domestic upheavals in 40 years cannot know inward
stability. The need to belong to something, to rescue some predictability
out of chaos, is overwhelming. The memories of our allies should be factors

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as real in the discussions of our policy-makers as the analysis of weapons
systems.

The importance of this difference in historical perspective is
compounded by the continuing disparity in strength between the two sides
of the Atlantic. While it has become fashionable to speak of Europe's
new-found equality, it is important not to take it too literally. Europe
**has** gained in strength over the past decade and a half. It can and should
play an increasingly responsible role. But for the foreseeable future we
are likely to be by far the stronger partner.

It is important to be clear about this because it requires that
the United States show unusual tact and steadiness. Many of our allies
have been guilty of unilateral actions far more flagrant than ours. But
when we act unilaterally, disarray in the Alliance is almost inevitable.
Sudden, drastic, and, above all, unilateral changes in U.S. strategic
doctrine--whatever their merit--create a sense of impotence and are
resisted as much for symbolic as for substantive reasons. Actions without
adequate consultation--such as the removal of IRBM's from Italy and Turkey

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or the withdrawal of troops from Germany--increase the pressure for more autonomy. Bilateral dealings with the Soviets, from which our allies are excluded or about which they are informed only at the last moment, are bound to magnify Third Force tendencies. When our allies oppose such practices, it is not necessarily because they disagree with our view but because they are afraid of creating a precedent for unilateral changes in other policies. (Even statements of substantive disagreement may be a smoke screen for deeper concerns.)

Moreover, many allied leaders who have staked their prestige on U.S. policies can suffer serious domestic consequences if we change them drastically. This causes the voice of Europe to reach us in extremely distorted form. President de Gaulle sharpens all disputes and even creates them in pursuit of his policy of independence. But some other leaders do not give full expression to their disquiet because they do not want to undermine further the solidarity on which their security is thought to depend. Whereas France exaggerates her disagreements, some other countries obscure theirs. Thus the dialogue with Europe is often conducted on false

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issues, while real issues--like the future of Germany, or arms control,
or the role of tactical nuclear weapons--are swept under the rug in order
not to magnify the existing discord.

We, in turn, are faced with the problem that technology and
political conditions are changing so rapidly that no policy can be
maintained over an indefinite period of time. How to shape policies
that are responsive to change while maintaining the confidence of our
allies? How to develop a sense of unity from the diverse conceptions
of so many proud peoples?

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## VI. Whither the Atlantic Alliance?

Nothing is more dangerous than the fashionable theory that all problems in the Atlantic Alliance have been caused by one man and that the major problem is to await his disappearance from the scene so that the traditional patterns can be resumed. No doubt President de Gaulle's style of diplomacy, which is not really compatible with the requirements of coalition, has exacerbated tensions. The United States shares the responsibility through too much insistence on technical solutions and too little allowance for intangibles of political judgment and will.

However, it would be a mistake to confuse these symptoms with the causes. Regardless of the personalities of the leading statesmen, a redefinition of Allied relationships would have been inevitable. Any new act of construction, moreover, would involve stress. The danger is that an attempt may be made to solve new problems by applying traditional concepts. There is a great deal of talk about "unity," "community," or "indivisible interests." But the issue before the West is precisely to give these terms a new meaning. Invoking the need for unity will not change

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the fact that American and European interests are not identical outside
of Europe. Inveighing against exalting national sovereignty only
emphasizes the contradiction of United States policy which has nationalism
as the most reliable bulwark against Communist domination everywhere
except in Western Europe. Proclaiming indivisible interests does not
solve the problem of how allied cohesion can be maintained in negotiations
with a suddenly multifaceted Communism. Slogans of integration do not
answer the question of how in the era of nuclear weapons sovereignty
can be related to community. Above all, the United States will not for
long be able to evade this issue of how much of its own sovereignty it
is prepared to give up.

Under the impact of the strong personality of President de Gaulle,
it has become commonplace to speak of the recovery of Europe's strength
and self-confidence. American spokesmen never tire of emphasizing the
folly of an excessive estimate of Europe's power while many U.S. policies
seem based on the assumption that European vitality will be permanent
and that the only obstacle to Atlantic cohesion is the traditional form of

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European nationalism.

However, de Gaulle's policy may have produced an illusion of
European strength and self-confidence which is more a reflection of his
personality than of underlying factors. If one moves from Europe in the
abstract to an examination of the individual European countries, it
becomes apparent how precarious Europe's recovery really is. On the
Iberian peninsula, stability may not survive two aged dictators. Italy's
center-left coalition is tenuous; its capacity for major policy initiatives
is limited. Its policy tends to confuse maneuvering with statesmanship
and in times of crisis may verge on neutralism.

A post-de Gaulle France may be rent by internal schisms. Germany
suffers from the absence of traditions and the pressures produced by
a divided country. The vigor so noticeable in Europe today is very close
in time to nihilism; European self-confidence is still precarious. Little
would be gained by replacing a nationalism of insufficient strength by a
neutralism which exalts impotence. To avoid both dangers and to create
a new and more vital structure is the challenge before the Atlantic Alliance.

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Justifiable irritation with de Gaulle's tactics should not obscure the fact that he has asked an important question which the West has yet to answer. There is merit in his contention that before a political unit can mean something to others, it must first mean something to itself. Though de Gaulle has often acted as if he achieved identity by opposing our purposes, our definition of unity has occasionally carried overtones of tutelage.

Every great act of construction was an idea before it became a reality. Immediate crises must not become an obsession. The nations bordering the North Atlantic require above all a vision of their future. Only then will discussions of specific remedies prove meaningful.