LIAISON OFFICE
SUPREME HEADQUARTERS ALLIED POWERS EUROPE

DATE 9 November 1970

MEMORANDUM for: COMMANDER HOWE

Attached is a recording of activities which transpired at the SHAPE Alumni Banquet on 29 October 70. In addition, a separate recording of Dr. Kissinger's address is included as requested.

The following distribution was made:

a. General Gruenther

b. SACEUR

c. SHAPE Liaison Office

H. E. TAUCHER
MAJ, GS
Acting SHAPE Liaison Officer

THE WHITE HOUSE
WASHINGTON

November 12, 1970

MEMO FOR DICK KENNEDY

FROM : Jon Howe

SUBJECT: SHAPE Banquet Memcon

The acting SHAPE liaison officer informs
me that there is no written transcription
of the enclosed tape of HAK's address.

NATIONAL SECURITY COUNCIL

November 14, 1970

MEMORANDUM FOR DR. KISSINGER

FROM: Richard T. Kennedy

SUBJECT: Transcript of Remarks at SHAPE Dinner

Enclosed is a transcript of your remarks at the SHAPE dinner on Thursday, October 29.

The talk was taped and a copy of the tape was also furnished to you for your files. Peter Rodman has this.

Enclosure

Remarks of Henry A. Kissinger at
SHAPE Alumni Banquet, October 29, 1970

General Gruenther, Mrs. Eisenhower, Ladies and Gentlemen:

To follow General Gruenther is not the easiest thing in the world.
Before you get too impressed by the second half of the introduction, let
me tell you what a British reviewer wrote about one of my books. He
said, "I don't know whether Mr. Kissinger is a great writer, but anyone
finishing this book is a great reader." I should also point out that the
book about NATO, which General Gruenther was kind enough to refer to,
had the title *The Troubled Partnership*; it enjoyed phenomenal sales in
one book store in Chicago until we made a little check and we found that
it was under Marriage Manuals.

Now, I am very glad to have this opportunity to be here with so many
men whom I have admired, with many of whom I have worked, and also
because the organization with which you are connected represents so
much of what is needed in the free world today.

None of our problems can be solved on a national basis, and one of
the great strengths of SHAPE is the spirit that was brought to it first by
General Eisenhower and the inspiration which he passed on to all of his
successors -- that we were dealing with a problem that transcended
nations. A situation arose where, after a while, the American Commander
was considered not as an American but as representing the interests of

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the entire Alliance. Indeed I remember when I served as a consultant
in the White House in the early 60's, one of the criticisms that was
occasionally leveled against General Norstad was precisely that -- that
he represented the interests of all of the Allies. I was on the side, I
must say, of General Norstad.

What I thought I could do tonight is to talk to you a bit about our view
of foreign policy in this Administration. And I always welcome the
opportunity to talk to a military group, even though I'm not used to it.

I don't know how to respond to basically friendly audiences. Ever
since the incursion into Cambodia I have been on the White House tour as
an example of the depths human depravity can reach. I realize that in
the climate that exists in many quarters in America today those of you
who serve the country, who have served the country, must sometimes
feel rather lonely and isolated, and many of the values that you have
represented, and because of which this nation has managed to survive,
sometimes seem under attack. I want you to know that no matter what
you may read, no matter what may be said in other quarters, we in the
White House know that when the chips are down it is the military that we
must rely upon, and that the values you represent, of duty and dedication,
are what will preserve freedom and, for that matter, preserve the peace.

I say this to you because we are now at a difficult period of American
Foreign Policy. It is not only that our domestic pressures have mounted;

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it is also that the international situation with which we dealt in the imme-
diate post-war period has rather substantially changed. In the late 1940's
the United States was the only free country strong enough to conduct a
global foreign policy. Most of the other countries of the world, including
many of our European Allies, had had their economies disrupted by the
war. All of them except Great Britain had been occupied at one stage or
another during the war. It was, therefore, inevitable that security and
progress in many parts of the world came to be identified as American
leadership with American programs. It was one of the inspirations of
first General Eisenhower and then of his successors that, despite this
disparity in strength, they always insisted on the concept of partnership
because they realized that no single nation can over an indefinite period
of time carry such a burden.

The second thing that was true in the 50's that has now changed is
that at that time we were dealing with one monolithic communist state,
which dominated the greater part of Eastern Europe.

The third thing that was true in the 1950's was the overwhelming
American superiority in the realm of nuclear weapons.

We came into office at a time when all of these conditions had to some
extent changed. First of all, our European Allies and some Asian
countries have gained in strength and in self-confidence and, therefore,

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what was an act of policy in the early 50's has become an imperative in the
70's: We can no longer, if we would, dominate a relationship with countries
of that historical background. The second change is something one can
read in the papers every day: What was a near monopoly of nuclear
-weapons in the 1950's has become something close to strategic parity.
That is to say, the decision to rely on strategic war has become entirely
different in the period into which we are heading than it was even fifteen
years ago, indeed even ten years ago. Then the communist world has
changed. The profoundest rivalry in the world today is no longer that
between the Soviet Union and the United States; it probably is that between
the Soviet Union and Communist China. Geopolitical differences and an
ideological rift combine there to produce a rivalry which may become
more or less intense as time goes on, but whose basic thrust seems
pretty well determined.

These conditions would have existed in any event, but this Administra-
tion also came into office at a time when the intellectual community was
alienated from public policy in an absolutely unprecedented way, when it
was no longer possible to get sustained support from those people who
devised many of the concepts on which our previous foreign policy was
based. We came into office in the sixth year of a war that had been fought
inconclusively and which had eroded public support. And it is in this
context that you must understand what this Administration has attempted to do.

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We have attempted to find a policy which could adjust America's relation to the world over a longer period of time, which could regain the maximum degree of public support, and which could maintain this support over a protracted period. We wanted to avoid the peaks of euphoria and the depths of despair that had characterized so much of previous policy. Some of this came to expression in what became known as the Nixon Doctrine, which was enunciated in Guam in the summer of 1969. The Nixon Doctrine was an attempt to take account of the fact that we were no longer the only country that could conduct foreign policy; that physically we could not do it and above all psychologically we could not do it.

I am often asked what the chief difference is, or what is it that I learned in my present job that I didn't know before. This is a dangerous question to ask a Harvard professor, of course; it is not an admission that comes naturally to him. But one of the things that I have learned that was not so obvious to me previously is, of course, what all of the gentlemen at the head table and most of you have known throughout your experience -- the limitation of time under which real decisions have to be made. As an outsider, one can concentrate on one problem and work on it until it is solved. On the inside, the higher the office, the more it is true that there is just so much time available to deal with problems, and the trick is to order the problems in such a way that the high priority ones

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get solved before some lower priority one hits you.

The more you concentrate decisions into one country, or into one person, the more difficult that problem becomes, and it is therefore beyond our psychological ability, apart from our physical ability, to try to run the world by a Pax Americana.

What we have attempted to do is to define three principles: One, that we would stand by our commitments; second, that we have a special obligation to countries that are threatened by nuclear attack; and thirdly, that the defense of other areas depends in the first instance on the efforts that these areas make for themselves, and that the American contribution must be one where it makes a difference between success and failure, but where we cannot supply and should not attempt to supply the only component of the defense. Now, this is a doctrine which we applied primarily to Southeast Asia; I will make a few observations of what we believe about Europe in a minute.

There are many publishers and, I confess, some members of the bureaucracy, who have eagerly picked up the Nixon Doctrine as a new version of isolationism, as an American withdrawal from the world. But anybody who has spoken to the President knows that this is his way of committing America to remain connected to the rest of the world. What we are saying is that we will participate with other nations, provided that those other nations are prepared to make some effort in their defense and

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some effort in their development. We cannot conduct a policy on the proposition that the threat to the security of other countries is worse for us than it is for them. We cannot conduct policy in which everything must be decided in Washington and developed by Washington. But within those limitations, we want to work out relationships of cooperation and of partnership. In short, we want to implement on a global basis what I understand NATO has always practiced.

Now, I heard with some interest the telegram of General Goodpaster and I know that there are many in Washington that are concerned about an imminent cut in NATO forces. I therefore would like to speak to you for a few minutes about our general attitude towards NATO. No matter what you may hear, this Administration is _not_ committed to cutting forces in NATO. No matter what you may hear, this Administration is _not_ determined to reduce the American presence in Europe. No matter what you may hear, a President who served as Vice President to President Eisenhower will not begin his administration by dismantling one of America's greatest achievements, the construction of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

But, we have to recognize that the conditions in the 1970's will be different from the conditions in the 1950's and the 1960's, and we need the help of our European Allies in understanding the changed circumstances. So many of our European Allies have been so used to the period of American

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strategic predominance that they see in NATO partly a device to get end-
less reassurances about American determination to defend Europe. Of
course we will defend Europe, but it is as much in the interest of Europe
as it is in the interest of the United States to try to figure out a strategy
which makes sense over a period of time. What we want from the Europeans
is joint thinking about how to conduct the defense of the West over the next
ten to fifteen years in the circumstances that now exist. We believe that
the best way that anyone who is concerned about the presence of American
forces in Europe could cooperate with us is in developing a strategy in
which these forces are an integral part and in which everybody can believe.

Our primary concern, therefore, in the discussions which we will be
starting with the Europeans is not to convince the Europeans that it is
safe for us to withdraw substantial numbers of Europeans -- although I do
not deny that there are individuals who hold these views; they do not happen
to be in the White House -- our primary concern rather is to try to begin
a discussion with the Europeans on the realities of the 70's and to see what
it is that we would need over a period of time that makes some sense, in
which all the Allies can believe and which can be a program for the 70's
such as we have had a program for every decade that NATO has existed.
We do not believe that there is necessarily reassurance in stagnation, but
we also do not believe that the withdrawal of American forces is an end in
itself.

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There is no sense in going into detail on this occasion about some of the questions that we would like to discuss, except to say that General Goodpaster is well and favorably known to all of us and that his views will weigh extremely heavily in formulating any propositions that we would make to the Europeans.

The President's primary concern is not financial assistance, helpful as that will be, but to build a meaningful defense capability. Our primary concern is not the level of American forces as such but the total level of forces to which we can commit ourselves for an indefinite period of time. And this will be the thrust of our efforts.

I may say one other thing to the serving officers; it would help us in the White House a great deal if we were not psychoanalyzed ahead of time by the serving officers, and if they would tell us what they really believe and not what they think the traffic will bear.

Now, this is in general our approach to NATO, and it is in general, although our budget levels do not always show it, our attitude toward the problem of the defense budget. We have had to deal with a rather complicated Congressional situation, and we have had to conduct a war and adjust a neglected military establishment to new conditions while all the pressures have been in the direction of reducing forces, and, indeed, while many forces have had to be reduced.

We have had in recent months a rather dramatic set of experiences in

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several parts of the world about the problem of the relationship between
military force and diplomacy. For example, in the Middle East we had
a very complicated problem: We had to make sure that we would show
enough strength so that no aggressor would believe that he could get away
with irresponsible acts, while using it with sufficient restraint so that the
other side did not think that a showdown had already been decided upon;
we had to be able to mobilize some of the assistance of possible Allies
while retaining some control over events. The fact that we still had a
military establishment that permitted us to do this, I can assure you, was
a sobering reminder of what might have happened if these conditions had
not been met.

Now, in this period of a curious and unprecedented domestic situation
we have the problem, first of all, of trying to maintain enough public
support to conduct any long-range foreign policy and to lay the basis for
any defense policy at all. And this sometimes forces us into measures that
perhaps in another period one would have preferred not to take. The
concept of the national interest which one used to take for granted fifteen
years ago is now decried in many of the universities and in many of the
publications. The attacks on the Administration and on this sort of policy
are unremitting. Nevertheless, I want you to know that we are aware of the
fact that the public will not forgive disasters to its leaders, even if these
disasters are caused by acquiescence in the public's wishes: In 1938

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Chamberlain would have had the support of ninety percent of the British public; in 1940 he was through because the consequences of his actions had become clear.

We are often told that we have a problem with the younger generation. This is an issue about which I feel rather strongly, having taught the younger generation for the better part of my life. I do not believe that the problems of the younger generation are caused by the war in Vietnam or by pollution or by whatever else the slogan of the moment may be. I believe that they may be the victims of excessive materialism and excessive psychiatry. They may have had, if the ladies will forgive me, the hell understood out of them since the age of seven. When they became adolescents and needed someone to admire, there was no one left to look up to. I do not believe, and what is more important, the President does not believe, that we will solve the problems of this period by taking polls on university campuses on which direction we should go. Students are not in universities because they know the answers to all the problems.

Therefore, we propose to go our course. We are dealing with an extremely complicated situation, but what you should remember is that a man whose whole public life has been to call attention to the importance of national defense, a man who served as Vice President to President Eisenhower, did not take this office in order to end the war dishonorably or to liquidate what has been built up in the twenty-five years of the post-war period.

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Therefore, I would like to go back to where I started. The great achievement of SHAPE and the spirit that is exemplified by this sort of meeting is the realization that freedom transcends national boundaries and certainly service boundaries, and that if we all ask the same question we are bound to come up, if we are honest and serious, with similar answers. Now, we do not believe that freedom can survive in the world unless we encourage this attitude within our nation and across the nations. This is what we are attempting to do in building a structure for peace around the world. We would like to think, and we would like you to think, even if occasionally you are exposed to unwarranted criticism, that in the years ahead it will be known who was responsible for the preservation of peace in our time. Thank you.