Norman
Podhoretz, “The Present Danger,” NY Simon and Schuster 1980.
The Main
Point
The basic argument of
“The Present Danger” is that the United States is losing the leadership of the
free world to the Soviet Union mostly because we don’t have the will to oppose,
with force, Soviet infiltration of other countries. We lack the will because we
consider ourselves to have been morally wrong in Vietnam. As a result of our loss of confidence in
our “moral and political leadership,” we are endangering our future. Continued refusal to contain the Soviet
Union will leave us with only two alternatives: surrender or
war.
Summary
“The Present Danger” is
divided into 2 sections. Podhoretz
begins the book with details of doctrines and policies of past American
Presidents and how they worked and didn’t work. Then Podhoretz offers his opinions on
the way the country is moving because of these doctrines and policies and how we
must learn from them.
The Truman
Doctrine and Containment
The Truman Doctrine was
established in March 1947 as a program to aid Greece and Turkey from the threat
of puppet regimes installed by Russians.
According to Truman, “it must be the policy of the United States to
support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities
or by outside pressure.” The
Marshal Plan was established to reconstruct war-torn economies of Western
Europe. NATO formed in response to
Communist dangers of invasion.
Containment became the word used for America’s political-military
strategy of resistance during the Cold War.
Mr. X
According to George F.
Kennan, we could only stop the Soviets with equal force and things would not be
“talked out of existence.” There
were two main views on how we would handle Communist Russia and “contain”
them. On the Left, people believed
that “disarmament” and “understanding” was key, where as the Right believed that
“rollback” and “liberation” was key. The Korean War provided the backdrop for
American ideals. The war proved the
seriousness of America to contain Communism. Kennan believed that there was a
national consensus that pulled the nation together and accepting the
responsibilities of moral and political leadership. It caused a “self-confident energy” that
caused huge prosperity within the United States. Life, opportunity, and production
improved all across the country.
The question now was not whether to contain, but
how?
Enter
Vietnam
John F. Kennedy took another
approach to containment. He backed
down from the Republican doctrine of “massive retaliation” which provided atomic
war as the answer to Communist aggression, to his own approach of “indirect
non-overt aggression, intimidation and subversion, internal revolution. In his inaugural address, Kennedy said
“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any
price, bear and burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe,
to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” Kennedy’s invasion of Cuba at the Bay of
Pigs was considered an unfortunate blunder by an inexperienced president, but it
was still considered to fall under “containment.” Vietnam, however, was not. The South Vietnamese, according to Hans
J. Morgenthau, could not be saved with troops because we are unable to win in
those conditions. There were many
ongoing debates about Vietnam: Are we guarding against the Soviets? China? Local uprisings? Civil war? These questions were followed by many
more uncertainties. The Vietnam War
produced blood, American casualties, and worse off uncertainty, loss of clarity
in United States policy. America
was supposed to be the big brother, but there was a loss of confidence in our
abilities to provide moral and political leadership.
Nixon
Doctrine
Nixon took the opposite
approach to Kennedy. Nixon believed
that America should sponsor other countries such as China and Iran with arms
supply rather than fight with our own troops. At this point, it was the only way Nixon
could “contain” because of congress’ support for defense cutbacks and the
post-Vietnam political climate.
Nixon opted for peace instead of confrontation in his containment. The problem with this approach was that
it assumed that any force other than America could contain the Soviet
Union. For example, Nixon believed
that we could slowly pull our troops out of Vietnam and continue to supply the
South Vietnamese with arms to “assume responsibility for the defense of their
own country.” Well it might have
held up, but not only was the surrogate power unable to hold the line on it’s
own, but we never even gave it a chance since the United States refused aid that
it promised.
The Arms
Race
There was a developing
pattern of Soviet advance and American retreat. There was a definite changing in balance
between the two superpowers. The
United States began to cutback on defense spending while the Russians began to
triple United States production.
Fears rose of Finlandization: political and economic control over Western
Europe, Japan, and ultimately even the United States.
Mature
Restraint
President Carter believed
that there was no need for containment anymore. He felt that military power was less
useful as an instrument of policy.
An example supporting his theory would be Russians expulsion from
Egypt. Carter felt that it was no
longer a conflict between east and west; rather it was a conflict between north
and south. Carter said “Historical
trends have weakened the foundation of the two principles which guided our
foreign policy in the past: a belief that Soviet expansion was almost inevitable
and that it must be contained.
The Collapse
of Carter’s Policy
The United States quickly
found out that military power was still influential. There were instances that pushed this
fact. A prime example would be the
hostage situation in our embassy in Teheran where the United States was left in
humiliating helplessness. You can
see “the contrast between the attack on our embassy in Teheran and the
protection afforded to the Soviet embassy there when a group of protesters tried
to storm it after the invasion of Afghanistan.” “The retreat of American power has
opened the way to soviet adventurism and expansionism.” The invasion in Afghanistan had
convinced Carter that it was still east versus west. In any case, it was always still east
vs. west because when we fought the north there was the chance of confrontation
with the east.
The Carter
Doctrine
According to Podhoretz,
deterioration of our forces and the Soviet buildup is our Present Danger. Is it too late? 10 years of retreat might have allowed
the Russians to advance their military, arms, and worse nuclear capabilities far
past our own. “If the Soviets
decide for one reason or another to pause, there is a danger that the finally
aroused American giant will once again be lulled back to sleep.” Meanwhile, the Soviets would consolidate
their gains, go on increasing and refining their arsenal, and wait for the
window of opportunity to open even wider and lock itself permanently into
position.”
Finlandization
If Finlandization takes
place, “a world in which the Soviet Union had the military power to seize
control of the oil fields would be a world shaped by the will and tailored to
the convenience of the Soviet Union.”
The New York Times: “Why…should we, at the risk of starting World
War III, keep the Russians from displacing the present owners? They might be more efficient producers,
and they might save us money by eliminating the corruption that is an element of
the present price.”