Robert Conquest , “Present Danger, Towards a Foreign Policy”

                                            Stanford, 1979

 

The Main Point

 

This article is not to provide any solution to problems with current foreign policy.  It addresses problems which come from differences in political culture in different nations.  The main problem or danger comes from applying our(Western policy) to nations with different mentalities, thus misunderstanding the world and conducting policies that are not suitable to other nations.

 

Summary

 

The article addresses  problem that begun in 1980s when “The Third World” appeared.  Since the article was written in 1979, the author assumed that the Western civilization would eventually fail due to the Communist activities.  This summary, thus doesn’t consider current foreign conditions. 

 

Facing the Eighties

 

The 1980s was followed by the Vietnam war, end of Khrushchev government in the Soviet Union and activities by other Communists countries.  The Western countries had their own internal difficulties in areas in economy, education, and etc.  The United States alone cannot solve problems in the world.  It is necessary to understand the world situation and provide applicable solution rather than applying the Western mentalities to the rest of the world and see failures such as the Vietnam war.

 

Soviet Motivations 

 

The relations with the Soviet Union are central to the international problems before the United States.  Thus it is necessary to have deep and accurate understanding of the Soviet Union.  To understand the Soviet Union correctly, it is crucial to free us from the habit of making unconscious assumptions about the present thoughts and future actions of the Soviet leaders.  This important point is not how much we approve or disapprove of the Soviet leaders but how much we understand them.  The continual effort to understand them is necessary, rather than applying same policy which had formed in the past.  The leaders in the Soviet Union saw the world as they are in world’s center.  We should not condemn their doings but understand the differences in different culture.

 

Détente?

 

According to Soviet theory, it is important that ‘détente’ is not interpreted as granting the West equivalent rights, but is free operations by Communists suppressing any Western ideas.  Like overthrow of Khrushchev, Soviet Union overthrows any government that opposes terms of this Soviet ‘détente’.  None should worry about Russian control of, or close alliance with, Third World countries, on the grounds that it may be temporary.  But such temporary control might be extremely damaging the Western interest.  But how many have to go before we are entitled to feel a little anxious?  So, the struggle against Soviet penetration must continue, and we must ignore the notion that no fundamental differences exist between ourselves and the USSR.  The acceptance of this paradoxical  standard by Westerners is part of a more general failure.  Accepting terms of Soviet ‘détente’ to deter further problem has created a great international danger.  It granted further development of nuclear capabilities.  If the Soviet leaders were to find themselves in a position where they thought they could destroy the American nuclear strike capability, they would take that advantage.       

 

Arms

 

In the present situation the subject of armaments, and the appropriate level of Western arms, has become a central issue of foreign policy.  The author argued that the most serious task facing us must be the avoidance on the one hand of nuclear war.  This means an armaments policy which leaves the USSR inability to win a nuclear war.  Since economic potential of the West is so much greater than that of USSR, there is no reason why the West can’t achieve this goal.  A recent report suggested that neither side should try to win a nuclear war.  However, if the Soviet Union thinks that they can inflict more damage then it suffered, they might take initiation.  It is true that the Soviet leaders want peace, but only to the extent compatible with the eventual destruction of the Western political system.  IT would be admirable to have international agreements limiting but not compromising the deterrent.  But we can have the deterrent without the agreement; and we can have the agreement without the deterrent.  Given the choice, weapons are a sounder defense than paper.

 

The Western Alliance

 

The unity of the West is vital if we are to match the unity of purpose of the Soviet programmer of armament and expansion.  The Western alliance is in serious trouble.  First, the negotiations on nuclear armaments between the USA and the USSR have been bilateral, and the other NATO nations have been given no effective voice.  Since NATO is by definition only concerned with the defense of one area of the globe, it does not present a united policy towards the rest of the world, such as Africa.    As by far the most powerful member of the Western alliance, the United States is bound to have a preponderant influence on the alliance’s policies.  The United states is nowadays less willing to undertake the enormously preponderant role in the West’s foreign and military arrangements which has fallen to it since the war. 

 

The Third World

 

The fundamental problem of international politics is the resolution of divergences between the richer and poorer countries.  “The desire for prosperity in the Third World will not be met by the moral Danegeld methods now largely accepted on both sides ( and many Third World leaders have enough sense not to kill of f the golden geese); and secondly any political and military threat from them is quite unreal except as a minor weight in the scales of the Soviet-Western conflict”  The Third World countries obviously rely on larger, more financially, militantly capable countries.  “In all international bodies, we should proclaim the superiority of the Western political process…Diplomatic problems are inevitable in relations with Africa and the rest of the Third World, though these are made more virulent locally and more dangerous on a world scale by the Soviet presence.  It is absurd to argue that we can leave these vast, riach and heavily populated territories to the USSR and retreat to ‘Fortress Democacy’…”  The dangers would be reduced if the West turned to a sounder armament policy and prepared to take a firmer political line through out the Third World.