Our rivalry will focus primarily on the countries of the Third World. In the next century, when it will be ever more costly to engage in overt aggression, economic power and ideological appeal will become decisive. We must prepare ourselves to compete on those terms. But in our rivalry it makes no sense to restrict the competition to the free world. Soviet leaders take the position that what’s theirs is theirs and what’s ours is negotiable. We should never acquiesce in that unbalanced and dangerous approach.
Whenever the Soviet empire expands, human rights are denied to millions of other people. We should be just as concerned about these people as about those living within the Soviet Union. We can be more effective in preventing the extension of Soviet repression abroad than in reducing its repression at home. But we must also recognize that its external aggression is only an extension of its internal repression. While Soviet foreign policies are more important to our survival than their internal ones, we must not make the mistake of ignoring the latter.
In the short term, our first concern must be Soviet aggression abroad. But we must never forget that until the Soviet Union reduces its repression at home it will continue to export that repression around the world. The Soviet Union is an inherently aggressive power because its totalitarian system cannot survive without expanding. The Soviet system of internal repression is the root cause of its aggressive foreign policy.
We must find ways to compete with the Soviets within their own orbit and within the Soviet Union itself. If we put ourselves on the perpetual defensive and cede the initiative to our adversary, we will lose. No team can win if its defensive players never leave the field. We must adopt an offensive tactic as well.
Those who ask whether Gorbachev is “sincere” in his desire for peace beg the question. He sincerely does not want war. But he just as sincerely wants victory. The Soviets seek victory without war. If we seek peace without victory we are doomed to defeat. Only if we encourage peaceful change within the Soviet bloc can we bring about a genuine reduction in tensions in the American–Soviet conflict. Only then is real peace possible.
Gorbachev wants change in the Soviet Union. We should not, however, conclude from his statements about the Soviet economic plight and the need for reform that he wants to overturn the Soviet system. What he intends to do is make his system run more efficiently. He wants to gain a respite from his external problems to gain breathing space to deal with his internal ones, as his overtures to Western Europe and China show. Our goal is an enduring peace; their goal is a temporary peace—a respite to gain strength for a new offensive toward achieving their goal of victory without war.
In light of Gorbachev’s need for some kind of accommodation, how should we react?
The bottom line is simple. We should give Gorbachev what he wants only if he gives us what we want—the elimination of Soviet superiority in first-strike land-based nuclear missiles which confronts the West with an unacceptable threat of war or nuclear blackmail; a reduction in Soviet repression at home as called for by the Helsinki Accords; and a halt to Soviet aggression abroad.
Unfortunately, American policy toward the Soviet Union has swung back and forth between hopes for perfect peace between Washington and Moscow and fears of total war between the nuclear superpowers.
From the start of the Cold War until 1969, the United States policy was containment. It sought to encircle the Soviet Union with a string of alliances and thereby block Soviet expansionism. It was based on the assumption that in time internal forces would prompt Moscow to reform its political system and mend its aggressive ways. It was totally defensive, avoiding any American actions that might provoke the Soviet Union.
That policy succeeded in the short run but failed in the long run. Its hopeful prediction has not come about. Except for NATO, all of the great alliances sponsored by the United States have long since crumbled. As early as the 1950s, Moscow broke out of containment, leapfrogging our alliances to set up a relationship first with Gamal Abdel Nasser in Egypt, then with several nationalist leaders in Africa, and finally with Fidel Castro in Cuba. The Kremlin now has a string of clients and satellites throughout the world, running from Libya on the Mediterranean Sea to Cuba on the Caribbean Sea, to Vietnam on the South China Sea, to South Yemen on the Arabian Sea, and to Ethiopia on the Red Sea. Containment doomed America to constantly responding to Soviet probes at Western weak points. In the 1950s and 1960s, the United States was trapped in a policy of running around the globe putting out brushfire wars as fast as the Soviet Union started them. Since the arsonist always has the strategic initiative, he also has the advantage over the fireman. In the long run, containment was a prescription for defeat.
Starting in 1969, the United States pursued a policy of hard-headed détente. As distinguished from an entente, which is an agreement between powers with common interests, détente is an agreement between powers with different interests. It did not mean that the United States and the Soviet Union agreed on all issues. Instead, it meant that while we disagreed on most issues, we wanted to work out agreements on some and did not want to go to war over any.
Hardheaded détente sought to combine détente with deterrence. A reduction in tensions did not mean a reduction in vigilance. America maintained a strength of arms and a strength of will sufficient to blunt the threat of Soviet expansion and blackmail. The United States was prepared to stop Soviet aggression, direct and indirect, not only with diplomatic pressures but also with military ones. It did not reassure those who were threatening its interests that it would not use force unless attacked. Instead, it stated that the United States would do whatever was necessary to defend its interests and those of its allies.
What was more important, America had the will to back up its words with actions. In 1970, as a result of U.S. pressure, the Soviet Union retreated from its attempt to establish a nuclear-submarine base at Cienfuegos in Cuba and from its effort, through Syria, to topple King Hussein of Jordan. In 1971, during the Indo–Pakistani war, it pulled in the reins on India when New Delhi sought to gobble up Pakistan. In 1972, after the United States bombed and mined Haiphong in response to a massive North Vietnamese offensive against South Vietnam, Moscow still went forward three weeks later with a planned U.S.–Soviet summit meeting. In 1973, after the United States put its forces on worldwide alert during the Arab–Israeli war, Moscow abandoned its threat to send its forces into the Middle East.
For the Soviet leaders, the sharp deterrent edge of hardheaded détente did not make superpower talks worthless, but rather made the Americans worth talking to.
Deterrence was combined with a mixture of prospective rewards for good behavior and penalties for bad behavior that gave the Soviet Union a positive incentive to keep the peace rather than break it. The United States undertook negotiations with the Soviet Union on a broad range of issues. Some, like arms control, the settlement of World War II debts, and the conclusion of the Berlin accords, were of mutual interest. Others, like the granting of most-favored-nation trading status and the purchase of American grain, were of particular interest to the Soviets.
These negotiations gave the United States a measure of leverage over the Soviet Union. When Moscow threatened U.S. interests, the United States slowed or suspended the talks. Kremlin leaders never failed to get the message. When they relented, the United States proceeded with the talks.
Hardheaded détente was founded on a determination to resist Soviet expansionism while at the same time searching for areas of potential agreement. Détente with deterrence, as practiced from 1969 through 1974, maintained the needed balance that led the Soviet leaders to conclude that limited cooperation was in their interest. The Soviet Union made no territorial gains during the period when the policy of détente with deterrence was vigorously implemented.
After 1975, détente lost the hard edge of military deterrence. When Saigon fell to communist aggression, American will to protect its interests waned, and détente too often degenerated into a naive pursuit of whatever U.S.�
�Soviet agreements the Kremlin would accept. The positive and negative incentives for Moscow to reach a genuine accommodation with the United States were destroyed. That led the Soviet leaders to believe that they could have their détente and swallow other nations too.
The demise of détente began in the halls of Congress. Hard-headed détente requires the use of both the carrot and the stick. Congress undercut both halves of the policy.
In 1973, Congress passed the Jackson-Vanik amendment that blocked the granting of most-favored-nation trading status to the Soviet Union until its citizens were allowed to emigrate freely. As a result, the most important positive incentive for Soviet restraint was revoked.
Between 1968 and 1975, Congress cut a total of $40 billion from the defense budgets submitted by the White House. In addition, Congress cut the administration’s request for military assistance to South Vietnam by half in 1974 and another third in 1975, and reduced aid to Cambodia even more. Furthermore, by passing the War Powers Act over my veto and resolutions banning the use of American airpower in Vietnam, Congress denied my administration and that of President Ford the power to enforce the Paris peace accords. Meanwhile, the Soviet Union was increasing its military aid to North Vietnam. The communists won in Indochina in 1975 because Congress would not allow the United States to do as much for its allies as the Soviets did for theirs. This pattern was repeated in Angola in 1975.
When Congress refused to grant the Soviet Union most-favored-nation status, it took away the carrot. When it cut the defense budget and hamstrung the President’s ability to react to Soviet aggression, it left the United States with a weak stick.
Those actions sent the wrong message to the Kremlin. They in effect telegraphed Moscow that it could pursue its aggressive policies at little or no cost. It was an offer the Soviet Union could not refuse. Kremlin leaders soon embarked on a campaign of foreign adventurism throughout the world.
American leaders failed to learn the right lessons from the U.S. reversals in Southeast Asia and southern Africa. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, American policy toward the Soviet Union swung from one extreme to the other.
At one extreme were the superdoves. In the early years of the Carter administration, they were the dominant influence, even though some of his advisers, like national-security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, were definitely not superdoves. The central argument of the superdoves was that the United States should recognize that the only reason for Soviet aggression was their fear of us and their insecurity. This meant that the fault for East–West tensions was ours, not theirs. Superdoves found excuses for every instance of Soviet aggression, from its domination of Eastern Europe to its invasion of Afghanistan, by conjuring up some threat to which each Soviet action was merely a defensive response. The United States, in their view, should seek to reassure the Soviets that America wanted peace, with unilateral steps if necessary. If we set a peaceful example, the superdoves believed, the Soviets would respond in kind.
That view was naive. It did not recognize the Soviets for what they were. We did not have to convince the Soviet leaders that we wanted peace. They knew that. We had pulled out our forces from Europe after World War II. We had not exploited our nuclear monopoly in the immediate postwar years. We never became involved in distant regions except as a response to communist expansion or subversion. Our military deployments and contingency plans in Europe and elsewhere were totally defensive.
President Carter adopted the policy of the superdoves when he came into office. It led to disaster. When he unilaterally cut back on U.S. defense programs, Moscow accelerated its arms buildup, moving from a position of strategic parity in the mid-1970s to one of decisive superiority in land-based ballistic missiles in the late 1970s. When he broke the linkage between progress on arms control and progress on other East–West issues, Moscow stalled talks except on those issues in which it was most interested. When he exercised unilateral restraint in regional crises, Moscow went on the offensive. It expanded its domination in the Arabian Peninsula, in Southwest Asia, in Africa, and in Latin America. That string of reversals culminating in the invasion of Afghanistan led President Carter to move away from the policy advice of the superdoves. He proclaimed the Carter Doctrine of opposing Soviet probes in the Persian Gulf and asked for an increase in the defense budget.
When the superdoves controlled policy, war became more likely, not less. Unilateral U.S. restraint lowers the costs of Soviet adventurism and raises the chances that Kremlin leaders will embark on an aggressive course.
When President Reagan came into office, American policy swung to the opposite extreme. Some of his most influential advisers were superhawks. They called for the total isolation of the Soviet Union. They argued that the Soviets were in deep trouble economically and that the Kremlin was out to do us in by any and all means. They urged the United States to respond in kind. America, in their view, should not only strive for military superiority but also cut Moscow off from all Western loans, credits, and trade. If we squeezed them enough, the superhawks argued, the faltering Soviet economy would eventually collapse, taking the communist system with it.
That was an appealing view, but an unrealistic one. While it was based on an accurate appraisal of the nature of the Soviet Union, its assumptions about international and domestic American and Soviet political realities were as naive as the superdoves’ lack of understanding of the Kremlin’s motivations.
The superhawks failed to see that a total financial and trade embargo could not work. The United States could never induce Western Europe and Japan to cooperate in such an action. That lesson was finally learned after the fiasco of the Soviet gas pipeline crisis in 1982, which did more damage to the Western alliance than to the Soviet economy. The fact was that without allied participation, an American embargo was meaningless and counterproductive.
The superhawks overestimated the influence of external pressure on the Soviet system. A totalitarian government does not pack up and go home if external powers press it economically. When squeezed, the Soviet Union can clamp down on domestic consumption. The Soviet Union is not going to collapse despite its enormous weaknesses and problems. As they demonstrated in World War I and World War II, the people of the Soviet Union have a great capacity for sacrifice and suffering. A leader as skillful as Gorbachev will be even more successful than Stalin in mobilizing the people against any effort to bring the Soviet empire to its knees.
The superhawks did not understand how to use economic power in the U.S.–Soviet relationship. While economic incentives do not determine Soviet foreign policy, they can influence it. By attempting to isolate the Soviet Union, the administration minimized its own leverage. On the one hand, it did not reduce the Soviet access to Western goods. Moscow simply turned to other suppliers. On the other hand, it did reduce the American proportion of East–West trade. That meant the superhawks had achieved none of their goals but had minimized whatever leverage America could gain from its economic power.
The superhawks failed to understand basic American and allied political realities. American policy too often amounted to belligerent rhetoric without strategy. Unless deeds match words, words become meaningless. American public opinion hopes for a quick resolution of the U.S.–Soviet conflict but does not expect one. It does, however, expect American leaders to try to reduce the risk of war with the only other nuclear superpower. Without hope for peace, free people will not make the sacrifice necessary to deter those who would wage war. Most Americans would categorically reject the theoretical proposition “Better red than dead.” But if they were ever faced with the stark fact of imminent death, it becomes a closer question. We must make sure that they do not have to make that choice. A strategy based on that approach was both practically and politically unsustainable.
A major problem with the Reagan administration has been that some of its policies have appeared to be dictated by politics, not strategy. It repealed President Carter’s grain embargo because of pressure from American farmers.
When polls showed that after the Carter years a majority wanted a strong anti-Soviet policy, it took the position that both SALT I and SALT II were bad agreements and that the United States should find ways to derail any serious efforts to reach new arms-control accords. As the 1984 campaign drew near, President Reagan dropped the approach of the superhawks and indicated more willingness to negotiate with the Soviets. Some say he did so because the polls showed that his principal weakness was the peace issue. This may have been true of some of his political advisers, but I doubt if it was true of the President. I am confident that the man who said no to a bad deal at Reykjavik will say no to a bad deal in Moscow.
We should not, however, underestimate the consequences of an obsession with opinion polls. If Moscow concludes that an administration policy will be affected by the polls it will concentrate on affecting the polls rather than negotiating seriously. In dealing with the Soviets, the worst mistake a President can make is to follow the polls rather than lead them. In the future, Moscow is sure to use public opinion as a lever against the United States. As negotiations near a conclusion and as crises call for a strong American response, Moscow will test the willingness of each U.S. administration to buck the polls in protecting American interests.
Since 1976, our policy toward the Soviet Union has been deeply flawed. It has been inconsistent, ambivalent, defensive, and plagued with starts and stops. Whatever else we say about the Soviets’ foreign policy, we must concede that it is consistently hard-line. We might not like their policy, but we cannot claim we do not know what it is.
As we look to the future, none of the failed policies of the past is adequate for the eleven remaining years of this century. Containment is outdated. Détente has lost its meaning. For the superhawks, it is institutionalized surrender. For the superdoves, it is institutionalized brotherhood. The policy of the superdoves fails to understand the nature of Soviet foreign policy. The superhawks do not make this mistake, but their doctrinaire policies are unrealistic and politically unsustainable.
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