CYJ

HAK:

This form gives the American Assembly/CFR
the right to have W.W. Norton publish your
essay (compiled from 3 of your articles).

I have checked it out with Josephson, who
says to go ahead.

You retain the copyright and serial rights,
as Josephson recommended.

ssm

OFFICE OF

HENRY A. KISSINGER

6/13

Dear Mr. Josephson:

The Council on Foreign Relations and the American Assembly are compiling a book of essays on *Rethinking American Security*, to which Dr. Kissinger is contributing a chapter. W.W. Norton will be the publisher.

You advised Dr. Kissinger to retain the copyright and the first and second serial rights, to which Norton has agreed.

Now the American Assembly has sent an Agreement, to be signed by Dr. Kissinger, which they represented to me as merely allowing Norton to publish the material. However, on reading it, the phrase "in all countries and in all languages" (i.e., foreign rights) bothered me. Of course, HAK gets no royalties, so it may be moot.

Do you think there is any harm in his signing?

With thanks for your advice,

Suzanne McFarlane

CYJ

To: HAK

From: SSM

Re: The chapter for the American Assembly book, *Rethinking American Security*, which Greg Treverton created under your name from three of your LAT articles and the last Newsweek piece.

W.W. Norton will be the publisher and has traditionally controlled the copyright.

In your case, they are willing to exempt your chapter in exchange for first and second serial rights (which I am told will include foreign publication.)

But, since they have never made this exception before and fear setting a precedent, American assembly much prefers to allow Norton the copyright on the entire book.

Unfortunately, it goes to press June 3, so it has to be settled quickly.

The chapter is attached. They were to send me a copy of the standard contract, but it hasn't come and I don't dare wait much longer.

Let Norton have copyright ______

Want to retain copyright; they can have serial rights ______

Want to review with lawyer, they'll just have to wait for my answer ______

1

TO: HAK

FROM:

LPB/5/13

May 13, 1991

SUBJECT: Article for Allison/Treverton Book

You agreed to let Greg Treverton see if he could cobble together a chapter for their book on Rethinking American Security. He has essentially copied out three of your recent articles -- on the need for a US balancing role; the post-war problems of the Middle East; and the Soviet Union.

The book will be put to bed this June and be published in the Fall. The plan is to indicate in a footnote at the end of the article that the piece has been assembled from your previous LA Times articles (see end of draft).

The first and last articles stand up very well and will certainly still be relevant come autumn. You may want to look back through the Middle East one, however, since that situation could change before the book comes out. On the other hand, the basic points in it are certainly still valid (particularly as Baker's mission appears to be cratering). If you are uncomfortable with the middle article, it could be deleted or Greg could revise it somehow.

I recommend you give them permission to reprint the articles as a chapter as proposed.

Agree __________

Prefer __________

BALANCE OF POWER SUSTAINED

Henry A. Kissinger

GFT draft, 4/14/91

In his speech of January 16, 1991 announcing hostilities
with Iraq, President Bush described the opportunity for building
a new world order "where the rule of law...governs the conduct
of nations," and "in which a credible United Nations can use its
peacekeeping role to fulfill the promise and the vision of the
U.N.'s founders." I greatly admired President Bush's skill and
fortitude in building the coalition to oppose Iraq's
aggression. But the new world order cannot possibly fulfill the
idealistic expectations expressed by the president; I doubt
indeed whether they accurately describe what happened during the
Gulf crisis.

Today, conventional American thinking about foreign policy
translates into the notion of "a new world order," which would
emerge from a set of legal arrangements and be safeguarded by
collective security. The problem with such an approach is that
it assumes that every nation perceives every challenge to the
international order in the same way, and is prepared to run the
same risks to preserve it. In fact, the new international order
will see many centers of power, both within regions and among
them. These power centers reflect different histories and
perceptions.

In such a world, the deepest challenge to America will be
philosophical: how to define order. History so far has shown
us only two roads to international stability: domination or

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equilibrium. We do not have the resources for domination, nor
is such a course compatible with our values. So we are brought
back to a concept maligned in much of America's intellectual
history -- the balance of power. Of course, it is possible to
define the problem away by postulating the absence of clashing
interests. I would welcome such an outcome, but find little
support for it either in history or in the circumstances we have
recently confronted -- in the Gulf or in Europe.

The Need for a Balancer

Despite the near unanimity of UN decisions, historians will
in all likelihood treat the Gulf crisis as a special case rather
than as a watershed. An unusual set of circumstances combined
to foster consensus. The Soviet Union, wracked by domestic
crises and needing foreign economic assistance, had no stomach
for conflict with the United States and had already curtailed
their interests in the Middle East. But this does not mean that
post-war Soviet objectives in the Middle East will necessarily
be identical or even compatible with those of the United
States. China, though wary of superpower military action,
sought to demonstrate the advantages of practical cooperation
despite Tiananmen Square and ideological conflict. For Beijing
considers Washington an important partner in China's
determination to resist either Soviet or Japanese hegemony in
Asia.

The Gulf states and Saudi Arabia saw their very survival at
stake and were not much concerned with the principle involved to
safeguard their existence. Syria's President Hafez Assad had
been in mortal conflict with Saddam Hussein for ten years

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preceding the Gulf crisis. As for Egypt, the rulers of the Nile competed with the rulers of Mesopotamia for 4,000 years before the doctrine of collective security was invented. The Persian-Arab conflict is of more recent vintage as history is measured in the Middle East; it is only 2,000 years old. This is why after Iraq is sufficiently weakened, Iran will probably continue its historical quest for dominance in the Gulf by pressuring America to leave.

Finally, two special nonrecurring circumstances facilitated the creation of the global alliance. The first was the noxious character of Saddam Hussein. Another aggressor is unlikely to present so unambiguous a challenge.

The second key element was American leadership -- symbolized by the extraordinary set of personal relations between President Bush and world leaders. Poignantly, though, American preeminence cannot last. Had Kuwait been invaded two years later, the American defense budget would have declined so as to preclude a massive overseas deployment. Nor can the American economy indefinitely sustain a policy of essentially unilateral global intervention -- indeed, we had to seek a subsidy of at least $50 billion to sustain this crisis. Therefore, neither the United States nor foreign nations should treat the concept of a new world order as an institutionalization of recent practices.

The world into which we are moving will be infinitely more complex than Cold War. Then, the ideological conflict led to a

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more or less uniform perception of the threat, at least among
the industrial democracies which produce 72 percent of the
world's GNP. The military and -- for the greater period of
those years -- technological predominance of the United States
also shaped a common military policy. Economically,
interdependence moved from slogan to reality.

In the world ahead, ideological challenges will be fewer;
the danger of nuclear war with the Soviet Union will be sharply
reduced. On the other hand, no one can know how well Soviet
command and control arrangements for nuclear weapons will
withstand domestic upheaval. Elsewhere, local conflicts will be
both more likely and, given modern technology, more lethal. The
collapse of the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe and the
loosening bonds of the Western Alliance have unleashed
nationalist rivalries not seen since World War I. The
post-colonial period has spawned fanatical fundamentalist forces
very hard for the comfortable, if not smug, industrial
democracies to comprehend, much less to master. Economic
rivalry among Japan, which is growing into superpower status,
the European Community, which is becoming increasingly
assertive, and the United States, will no longer be restrained
by overriding security concerns. The confluence of these
elements will characterize the new era as one of turmoil, and
will require major adjustments in how we think about
international relations.

In the world before us, United States policy makers face a

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number of imperatives:

* They must recognize that it is not possible to deal with every issue simultaneously. America must be selective, husbanding its resources as well as its credibility. Three levels of threat must be distinguished: those we must be prepared to deal with alone if necessary, those we will deal with only in association with other nations and those threats that do not sufficiently challenge American interests to justify any military intervention.

* They need to reexamine alliance policy and reallocate responsibility. Countries associated with us must be brought to understand that the United States' armed forces are not a mercenary force-for-hire. The special circumstance of the Persian Gulf left President Bush no choice except a disproportionate assumption of risk by the United States. As a general rule in the future, however, American military forces should be employed only for causes for which we are prepared to pay ourselves. That, in fact, is a good working definition of American national interest.

United States policy makers must recognize that the new world order cannot be built to American specifications. America cannot force-feed a global sense of community where none exists. But it has an opportunity for creating more limited communities based on a genuine sense of shared purpose. This is why perhaps the most creative -- if least well known -- foreign policy initiative of the Bush administration is its effort to create a Western Hemispheric Free Trade Area, beginning with Mexico, Canada and the United States.

-6-

There is no escaping the irony that our triumph in the Cold
War has projected us into a world where we must operate by
maxima that historically have made Americans uncomfortable. To
many Americans, the most objectionable feature of the balance of
power is its apparent moral neutrality. For the balance of
power is concerned above all with preventing one power or group
of powers from achieving hegemony. Winston Churchill described
it:

> The policy of England takes no account of which nation it
> is that seeks the overlordship of Europe. It is concerned
> solely with whoever is the strongest or the potentially
> dominating tyrant. It is a law of public policy which we
> are following, and not a mere expedient dictated by
> accidental circumstances of likes or dislikes...

Restoring Balance in the Gulf

To that end, ironically, maintaining equilibrium in the
Gulf requires us to navigate between a solution that leaves Iraq
too strong and an outcome that would leave Iraq too weak. The
tragedy of the Kurds demonstrates just how hard it is to so
navigate. But, after all, one of the causes of the present
crisis is the one-sided way the Western nations rushed to the
defense of Iraq in its war against Iran, forgetting that if Iran
was excessively weakened Iraq might become the next aggressor.

It would be ironic if another bout of tunnel vision
produced an Iraq so weak that its neighbors, especially Iran,
sought to refill the vacuum.

As the UN peace terms stipulate, we should take care that
Scud missiles are not reintroduced. We should prevent Iraq from
importing high-technology equipment, including high-performance
aircraft with long ranges, and from reacquiring the means to

-7-

manufacture biological and nuclear weapons. However, Iraq's capacity to defense itself with conventional weapons against ground attack from its neighbors would in the long run not be a threat to stability but a contribution to it.

In the Gulf, the new balance of power cannot be based on the permanent presence of American ground forces. This was the weakness of diplomatic solutions that would have kept Iraq's military preponderance intact. The cultural gap between even the best-behaved American troops and the local population is unbridgeable. A major Western ground force in the area would inevitably become the target of radical and nationalist agitation. After a brief period, American ground forces would be considered foreign intruders. There would be a repetition of our experience in Lebanon, including terrorism and sabotage. American ground forces in the area should be withdrawn after victory; residual forces should be stationed beyond the horizon -- at sea or perhaps at a few remote air bases.

Military equilibrium, however, cannot be the sole aim of American policy in the Gulf. It is essential that America learn to become less dependent on oil and generate a viable energy program. We cannot suffer through an energy crisis every decade. We should stress conservation and develop alternative sources of energy, avoiding the self-indulgent attitudes of the 1980s, when plentiful oil caused the search for alternative energy sources to be largely abandoned.

We must also remember the possibility of renewed Soviet designs on the region. For the time being, domestic problems keep the Soviets from running any significant foreign risks.

-8-

But two hundred years of Russian expansionism toward the Gulf indicate a certain proclivity. And this drive may be compounded as Moscow's preoccupation with its more than fifty million Muslim citizens grows. After some domestic equilibrium is restored, the Kremlin might become more active in the Middle East -- especially in Iran, Iraq, Pakistan and Turkey, which border the Soviet Union. The intensity of that thrust will depend on internal developments within the Soviet Union. If the Muslim republics remain Soviet, Moscow will be wary of Muslim radicalism lest it inflame its own Muslim population. But if the Muslim republics break off and become independent, Moscow may seek favor in the breakaway states by embracing Islamic radicalism -- especially if the Muslim world turns more extremist.

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, a new balance of power will revive prospects for progress on the Arab-Israeli conflict. A peace process dominated by Saddam Hussein, or heavily influenced by him, would have been a debacle. For it would have taught the lesson that radicalism, terrorism and force are the road to diplomatic progress in the Middle East. This is why President Bush was right in resisting the linkage of the Kuwait and Palestinian problems.

Yet the peace process as currently conceived is likely to lead to a dead end. The Arab-Israeli problem is usually stated as a negotiating issue: how to convene an international conference that returns Israel to the 1967 border, defines a new status for Jerusalem, induces the Arabs to "accept" Israel and provides international guarantees for the resulting

-9-

arrangements. I have grave doubts about every one of these propositions.

The United States would be totally isolated at such an international forum; instead of being a mediator, it would be maneuvered into the role of Israel's lawyer. Worse, the formula would force each side to accept something they find unbearably difficult: for the Israelis, it is a Palestinian state; and for the Arabs, it is the Israeli state. How, then, does one define "credible guarantees"? Even in the case of Kuwait, where there was unanimous international support for the victim (something that would be inconceivable for Israel), it took six months to organize resistance while the country was looted and pillaged and the population expelled.

I know of no conflict between Arab nations -- let alone between the Arabs and Israel -- that has ever been resolved by the method suggested for the Palestinian issue: namely, with one conclusive negotiation resulting in a legal document intended to last for all time.

A revived peace process should begin by redefining the objectives. A final settlement at this moment seems a legalistic mirage. On the other hand, the status quo will sooner or later sound the death knell for moderates on all sides. As it is, too many Israelis consider the peace process a one-sided means to gain acceptance without sacrifice. They are unwilling to give up any occupied territory, or will do so only if de facto Israeli control is maintained. Too many Arabs, especially in the PLO, see in the Middle East a replay of Vietnam, where peace talks were used to soften up the opponent

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for escalating pressures leading to his ultimate collapse.

An interim solution might seek to introduce the moderate
Arab governments, fresh from the victory over Iraq, as a buffer
between Israel and the PLO. It might reduce the amount of
territory Israel is asked to give up in return for something
less than formal peace.

The aftermath of the allied victory over Iraq offers a
perhaps never-to-recur opportunity. Moderate Arab states are
disillusioned with the PLO, which in effect has backed Iraq.
They are also dismayed by the fact that the PLO has never
unambiguously dissociated itself even from terrorism aimed at
the moderate Arabs. As a result, these government may no longer
be prepared to give the PLO a veto over their actions.

As for Israel, it must avoid two possible nightmares. If
it insists on holding onto every square inch of occupied
territory, it could suffer the fate of South Africa and fine
itself ostracized, and even ultimately under UN sanctions. On
the other hand, it if follows the maxims of conventional wisdom
and gives up all the occupied territories, it runs the risk of
winding up like Lebanon, gradually squeezed to the point of
obliteration. For its own sake, Israel must find a middle way.
And there is no better moment to do that than when its most
dangerous enemy has been defeated.

## Dealing with the Soviet Union

The end of the Cold War permitted the West to stop treating
the Soviet Union as a permanent adversary; the recent return to
autocracy in the Soviet Union should cause us to abandon the
illusion of considering it a permanent partner. The task now is

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to find a method for dealing with it as a major power with
sometimes compatible and occasionally clashing interests,
promoting our basic values and giving new impetus to
reconstructing the historic Europe.

No outcome of the current conflict in the Soviet Union is
likely to be clear-cut, and the country will probably experience
all three possibilities in succession -- disintegration followed
by attempted repression and, failing that, a gradual drift
toward confederation of at least some of the key republics.

Since the 18th century, the Russian monolithic state has
been pressing against its border as Russian armies have invaded
Europe at least a dozen times in pursuit of a variety of
causes. Now, all foreseeable Soviet outcomes will reduce for a
considerable time that threat that has been hanging over the
heads of all of Russia's neighbors since the time of Peter the
Great.

The weakening of the central authority of America's
principal strategic rival is certainly a short-term geopolitical
advantage. At the same time, a collapse of the Soviet Union
would produce dangers of its own. Almost all the Soviet
republics contain large, unhappy minorities. Civil war could
trigger mass migration into the fragile new democracies of
eastern Europe or into adjoining countries of the Middle East.
Repression could spill over into military actions against
neighboring territories. And who in the end will control the
Soviet military forces, especially the nuclear forces? What
will be the legal status of existing agreements with the Soviet
Union?

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Moreover, Russia's historical role in preventing hegemony in Europe (even while, at times, itself seeking it) must also be recognized. The defeats of Napoleon, of Imperial Germany and of Hitler would have been impossible without Russian help. Thus, Russia faces us with a paradox. When monolithic, its threatens domination; but if impotent, it threatens disequilibrium.

That paradox imposes on us the need to safeguard essential national interests even in relations with states that do not share our fundamental values. But there need to be criteria distinguishing the legitimate and moral pursuit of the national interest from opportunistic collaboration with tyranny and encouragement of it.

The following principles seem to me crucial:

(1) We must stop basing policy on Soviet personalities. We know too little of Soviet dynamics and even less about how to affect them to make strengthening any leader a cardinal principle of Western policy. Focusing relations on balancing fundamental interests rather than on psychological speculation will in fact bring greater stability to the relationship.

(2) The Western security interest in the Soviet Union is its peaceful conduct outside its borders. The moral objective of the West is compatible domestic institutions. What we need is a definition of coexistence and an agenda for its achievement even as we disapprove of some Soviet domestic actions. Coexistence should not be lightly abandoned. But we should recognize that it is based on self-interest and not delude ourselves into believing that it is a means to help

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Gorbachev promote democracy inside the Soviet Union.

(3) An analysis must be made of those areas of common action that are necessary for a structure of peace and those which are undertaken to promote democratic values. The latter -- including economic aid -- are subject to modifications if Soviet internal conduct becomes too offensive. In any event economic aid should generally be given for political and economic, not psychological, reasons except in periods of humanitarian emergency. It is sure to be wasted without appropriate economic reforms.

(4) On the issue of self-determination, the United States needs to stick to its historic position with respect to the independence of the Baltic states. The situation is more complex with respect to the other republics, especially in the Caucasus, where different ethnic populations have been mixed over centuries and intercommunal violence is a permanent threat. On the other hand, Soviet leaders must understand that even when we continue to deal with them on the security agenda, other areas of cooperation are narrowed by the convictions of our people should Moscow's conduct offend America's deepest values.

(5) The changes in Moscow should recall to the West the importance of strengthening the ties within the Atlantic area and above all between Eastern and Western Europe. While the Soviet Union is dealing with its internal problems, the West should give the highest priority to reestablishing as rapidly as possible the historic Europe. Eastern Europe -- especially Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia -- should be given the

-14-

opportunity to join the West European political and economic
system on an urgent basis.

The West is presently in danger of neglecting the countries
of Eastern Europe whose successful struggle for freedom inspired
us only yesterday. Two steps are needed. First, the West --
and especially Western Europe -- must move quickly to integrate
Eastern Europe into the European Community and other Atlantic
institutions (with the exception of NATO). Second, we must give
Eastern Europe an economic breathing space. As a step in that
direction, the European Community should take immediate steps to
open its markets to East European agricultural products.

Soviet turmoil casts doubt on the expectation that
democracy and market economics produce peaceful Soviet conduct.
Nevertheless, if the Soviet Union transforms itself from a cause
to a nation, and if the United States learns to deal with it on
a non-ideological basis, prudence may bring about what idealism
precludes at the moment -- a Soviet Union strong enough to
defend itself but not so centralized as to be able to conduct
geopolitical offensives; sufficiently cohesive to fulfill
aspiration truly common to all its peoples but not subject to
absolutist rulers manipulating foreign dangers and embarking on
international proselytizing missions.

A policy based on balancing power knows few permanent
enemies and few permanent friends. In the current Gulf crisis
it would avoid branding Iraq as forever beyond the pale.
Rather, it would seek to balance rivalries as old as history by
striving for an equilibrium between Iraq, Iran, Syria and other
regional powers. In Northeast Asia it would seek to maintain

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equilibrium between China, Japan and the Soviet Union. In Europe, where the old balance has collapsed, the shape of its successor will depend on the outcome of the Soviet Union's internal struggles, especially on the Soviet capacity to continue its historic role in Europe.

These balances all need a balancer -- a role the United States can no longer play entirely by itself and in some circumstances may not choose to exercise at all. But it needs criteria to establish priorities.

It is a paradox that no nation is in a better position to contribute to a new world order than the United States: it is domestically cohesive, its economy is less vulnerable to outside forces, its military capacity for the foreseeable future is still the world's largest and most effective. Our challenge is the price of success: triumph in the Cold War has produced a world requiring adjustment of traditional concepts. But the price of success is one for which most other nations would envy us.

Assembled from "No Illusions About the USSR," "False Dreams of a New World Order," and "A Sea Change in U.S.-Soviet Relations," all *Washington Post*, respectively, January 22, 1991, February 26, 1991 and April 2, 1991; and "A Postwar Agenda," *Newsweek*, January 28, 1991.

Jerry:

The corresponding titles and dates of the LA Times versions of
the articles are:

January 20, 1991: "It's Back to Czarist Russia - And Western Policy-Makers Aren't Ready"

February 24, 1991: "The Delicate Balance"

March 31, 1991: "The Soviet Union Searches For Its Own New Order"

The NEWSWEEK piece is, of course, the only version.

ssm