East-West Relations In Europe

Observations And Advice From The Sidelines, 1971-1982

Paul E Zinner

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2022
• Print ISBN:
  9780367020606
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9780429717109
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Politics
• Index: Politics & International Relations

First published in 1984. As scholar, researcher, and commentator, Dr. Paul E. Zinner has spent much of the last six years in Europe studying the development of East-West relations, observing negotiations on arms reduction, and conducting interviews with foreign policy and national security experts from key countries. This book brings together eleven of his essays~-nearly all previously unpublished--that emphasize developments since 1977. The essays cover a broad range of topics, among them the status and prospects of the Vienna troops reduction talks; the political and military implications of NATO's "double track" decision concerning modernization of intermediate-range nuclear forces in Europe; the impact of the crises in Afghanistan and Poland on the Western alliance; and the foreign policy options available to the Reagan administration. Also included are assessments of current trends in the NATO alliance and a cautious projection of the political climate in Western Europe by the end of the 198Os. Updated throughout with introductory and commentary notes, the essays provide insight into the dominant themes in the interaction between the NATO and Warsaw Pact powers.

1 On the Brink of Detente

DOI: 10.4324/9780429050466-1

This appraisal of Soviet foreign policy in transition was first delivered as a lecture at the National War College in Washington, D.C., in the fall of 1970. Subsequently, it appeared as an article in the spring 1971 issue of the National War College Forum. The nature of the occasion called for a review or tour d’horizon of Soviet policies in major geographic areas, if not around the world. My aim was to outline an analytic framework in which Soviet foreign policy might be usefully evaluated and to project certain policy trends that might be anticipated. Straws of change in the orientation of American and Soviet foreign policies were in the wind. Yet in specific detail, the Soviet-American relationship bristled with hostility.

It is clear from what I wrote that I did not expect detente to be consummated as soon as May 1972, at which time a summit meeting between President Richard Nixon and Secretary General Leonid I. Brezhnev took place in Moscow. Obviously, I was not privy to closely guarded preparatory negotiations. Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko’s extraordinary speech in July 1969 (from which I quote at some length) clearly signaled that the general line of Soviet foreign policy was about to change. Gromyko’s son Anatoly, who visited me in California in 1970, cautiously and without giving away any secrets intimated that a peace offensive would be unveiled at the forthcoming Twenty-fourth Congress of the Communist party of the Soviet Union (CPSU). The congress, which convened in March 1971 when my analysis was already typeset, indeed inaugurated a comprehensive “peace program” under the aegis of detente. The term itself was significant. It appeared to have been deliberately selected to differentiate the new policy from the more familiar policy of “peaceful coexistence” dating back to Lenin, toward which the West, after repeated disappointments, had developed a skeptical, not to say jaundiced, attitude.

From the perspective of 1983, it is evident that events did not always correspond to my expectations and that my judgment was faulty in certain particulars. For example, I did not anticipate that Soviet influence in the Middle East would decline precipitously after Anwar Sadat emerged as the successor to the deceased Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser. Nor did I foresee that Soviet policy in South America would be severely set back in 1973 by the overthrow of the Allende regime in Chile. I was wrong in suggesting that a generational change in the Soviet Union might be in the offing; nothing of the sort occurred. Instead, Leonid Brezhnev systematically eliminated his younger rivals and replaced them in high government and party office by his aging contemporaries. The survival and dominance of this generation, even after Brezhnev’s death in November 1982, is one of the more remarkable phenomena in the evolution of the Soviet political system.

I believe that I was more nearly correct in estimating the general thrust of Soviet foreign policy; the constancy of the basic determinants of the Soviet worldview; the recurring obstacles in the way of a permanent improvement in Soviet-American relations; and, perhaps especially, the growing importance of military power and power of the military in shaping the foreign policies of the superpowers.

In the light of subsequent developments, my critical attitude toward the initial stages of the Ostpolitik introduced by the West German Social Democratic leadership (which had recently been elected to govern the Federal Republic in coalition with the liberal Free Democratic party) may seem excessively harsh. Early misgivings shared by Henry Kissinger (as recorded by the former secretary of state in his memoirs) and by West German conservatives (who had just been ousted from office and, in addition to genuine convictions, also had political motives for opposing a drastic re-orientation of foreign policy) dissipated rather quickly. By mid-1972, the Eastern treaties and agreements, regulating relations with the Soviet Union, the German Democratic Republic, and the People’s Republic of Poland, won approval in the Bundestag. In addition, an agreement among the United States, Great Britain, France, and the USSR that reduced tensions concerning the status of West Berlin entered into force.

Apprehensions about the conceptual flaws and practical conduct of the Ostpolitik, which lingered under the chancellorship of Willy Brandt, gradually subsided after he was relieved of his office in 1974 and was replaced by his party colleague Helmut Schmidt. In the second half of the 1970s, a consensus emerged in the Federal Republic that the Ostpolitik was beneficial to West German interests and that, at any rate, there was no viable alternative to it. Changes in the international and national political climate in the early 1980s contributed to the replacement of the social-liberal coalition in October 1982 (after thirteen years in office) by a conservative-liberal combination. The new government has not renounced the Ostpolitik nor even shown an inclination to alter its substance appreciably.

My initial negative stance vis-a-vis the Ostpolitik did not prejudice me against evaluating this policy objectively as it developed. During the past half-dozen years, I have devoted a great deal of time to an exploration of the many facets of the Ostpolitik and, in the process, have come to appreciate that its introduction was inevitable and its continuation unavoidable. I am not certain if the benefits that may accrue to the Federal Republic will outweigh the liabilities it stands to incur from the Ostpolitik in the long term.

Soviet Foreign Policy in Transition February 1971

SOVIET ATTITUDES TOWARD THE UNITED STATES

Observers as widely different as the late John Foster Dulles, secretary of state under President Eisenhower, and Michel Tatu, the eminent French journalist and editorial writer of Le Monde, have commented on an outstanding anomaly in the hostile relationship which has persisted between the Soviet Union and the United States throughout the entire postwar period. In their view, the conventional causes that have traditionally led to hostility between states--for example, territorial ambitions, ethnic grievances, and economic rivalry for markets and raw material resources--have been absent from the Soviet-American relationship. If this is so, the two countries should have been able to compose their differences, live at peace with each other, and exert their combined influences to promote peace on a global scale. Yet this has patently not been the case. The two countries have been antagonistic to each other and have exerted their efforts at cross-purposes, either to gain influence at the other’s expense or to deny any advantage to the other in a given area. What is at the root of this rivalry? Tatu, writing in the Times of London early in January 1971 under the title “The U.S.: Russia’s Artificial Enemy,” asserts that the origin of the Soviet-American antagonism was “in a sense accidental.” Two factors contributed to it: the emergence of these countries as the only great powers in the world following the defeat of Nazi Germany, and the militancy of the communist ideology which made it “natural for the Soviet leaders to designate as the supreme enemy the chief capitalist power, whose methods and achievements were the most evident symbol of the social regime which must be overthrown.”

Tatu’s characterization of the casual origin of the rivalry is suspect. But it is difficult to refute the validity of his observation that the preeminence of the two countries on the world scene has contributed greatly to their antagonistic postures. The question is, Would this antagonism express itself in the same way as it has, were it not for the deep-seated ideological component underlying it? The answer is probably no.

Honest men can differ in their appraisal of the importance that ideology plays in determining the conflict, and it is not my intent here to resolve these differences. Suffice it to say that even the pragmatic Tatu admits that although “Soviet diplomacy is no longer inspired by revolutionary ideology, if it ever was, and the repertoire of leftist slogans has lost its persuasive force inside the country, … these slogans and ideology [nevertheless] continue to furnish the Soviet leaders with their sole credentials.” I would put it somewhat differently and suggest that, at the very minimum, the Soviet leadership has to cling to the established Marxist-Leninist ideology to preserve the ego-identity of the regime. Without such identification, the whole raison d’etre of the Soviet system would vanish. In the terminology of modern political science, we might say that the ideology is essential for system maintenance, and that maintenance is the most modest goal the Soviet leaders could conceivably pursue.

The position of the United States as the foremost adversary of Soviet Russia is thus ideologically defined, and this imparts a fixed permanence to the adversary relationship. Within this framework, relations between the two countries can either improve or deteriorate, but they cannot be truly friendly in our nonideological sense of the concept of friendship.

Regardless of what their actual policies of the moment may be, the Soviet leaders always regard the United States as the leading imperialist power in the world, whose very existence thwarts the ultimate fulfillment of communist goals. The United States epitomizes capitalism, just as the Soviet Union epitomizes socialism. As a capitalist power, America is by definition imperialistic in seeking to expand its influence primarily by economic means, in order to secure its own economic survival. The intrinsic nature of the capitalist system also makes it warlike. The Soviet-American competition reflects a permanent incompatibility between two antithetical social systems whose fundamental differences cannot be reconciled.

It is in this context that the evolution of Soviet-American relations must be examined, and it is in this sense that they must be distinguished from the Sino-Soviet conflict. This conflict now appears quite acute, and it has both ideological and conventional components (such as clashing national interests and a disputed frontier). Nevertheless, it continues to be interpreted and thus acted upon by the Soviet leaders as if it were a temporary aberration in what is otherwise, for the long historic pull, a sound, close, fraternal alliance.

To the ideological chasm that separates the United States and the Soviet Union, and the antithetical character of their respective social, economic, and political systems (which are the main determinants of their antagonistic relationship), a third basic factor of relatively recent origin must be added: their preeminence as powers in possession of an abundant arsenal of nuclear weapons. I say preeminence because they have lost the exclusiveness they once briefly shared as the only nuclear powers in the world. Their obvious superiority over all other nations--in terms of their present stock of weapons, delivery capabilities, resources, and technological know-how--still endows them with unmatched attributes.

The advent of nuclear arms technology has aggravated the Soviet-American relationship. It has for the first time raised the specter of a direct armed confrontation between them, They have become mortally vulnerable to each other’s armed thrusts. By the same token, the mutuality of the threat of annihilation has forced a certain caution on them and tamed them in the practical manifestations of their conflict, lest it escalate to an irretrievable point, The impracticality of getting at each other directly has placed a greater premium on the conduct of their struggle by indirect and peaceful means.

In 1956, the Soviet leadership explicitly acknowledged that nuclear weapons sufficiency had a qualitative impact on the conduct of international relations. It was now futile to hope to win a final victory over capitalism by force of arms. It therefore became necessary to abandon this tenet of Leninism and to emphasize an equally valid doctrinal tenet, which advocates operating in the framework of peaceful coexistence between antagonistic social systems. Many observers, particularly the Chinese Communists, felt that by making such an acknowledgment the Soviet leaders were in fact writing off any notion of a final, incisive victory over capitalism. They felt the -Soviets were willing to settle for something far less satisfactory--a permanent accommodation with the dread enemy. In the eyes of the Chinese Communists, the Soviet leaders had lost their nerve, and that, of course, was tantamount to forswearing their revolutionary heritage and kowtowing to the United States.

The thesis advanced by the Chinese Communists that ultimate victory is inconceivable without an armed clash may have some validity. But it may also be true that a general armed clash between nuclear powers can no longer be contemplated. It would lead to the mutual devastation of the contestants and not to the victory of one over the other. What this adds up to is that, either way, the Communists might as well abandon any realistic expectation of global hegemony. So far, we have had no reliable indication that they have accepted this premise and acted upon it.

The possibility of a special relationship between the United States and Soviet Russia, leading to some sort of nuclear condominium over the world, has been hinted at from time to time. Although both sides occasionally may have been tempted to enter into this type of relationship, the fact is that they have not done so. The chances for its consummation--if such ever existed--are diminishing rapidly with the proliferation of nuclear weapons technology and manufacture, at least among a select number of countries, including Communist China.

Instead of leading to a special arrangement, the Soviet-American relationship has tended to oscillate, sometimes quite wildly and at short intervals, between confrontation and negotiation. It has never gone to the limit of confrontation, that is, direct armed clash. The Soviet leaders have been especially careful to operate with a wide margin of safety. At worst, they have engaged the United States military by proxy, supplying arms to our foes and arming the foes of our friends. At best, they have shunned a military showdown, even of limited scope, if it threatened to involve us or our allies. Conversely, the prospect of negotiations has never been fully realized, and nothing like an entente cordiale has been approached. Neither side has yet been able to break through the barrier of distrust which has been erected between them. This barrier is frequently reinforced by perceptions of each other that are filtered through their respective prisms, tinted with a deeply ingrained ideological bias. There is no evidence that the impetus for breaking through this barrier has been very strong on either side.

Contemporary Soviet-American relations conform to the seesawing pattern of improvement/deterioration and hope/disappointment that has been discernible since the death of Stalin in 1953. Few will recall that in 1956 the Soviet Union, under the management of the flamboyant Nikita S. Khrushchev, proferred a treaty of friendship to the United States, which President Eisenhower politely but firmly rejected as devoid of meaningful substance.[¹]

President Nixon, on taking office, proclaimed the end of the period of confrontation and the onset of the era of negotiations with the Soviet Union. He was cautious in predicting rapid progress, yet optimistic about the prospect of real achievements. In a press conference on February 6, 1969 (shortly after his inauguration), the president said that he took a “dim view of what some have called instant summitry.” Neveriheless, he believed that “a well-prepared summit meeting [with the Russians] would be in our interest and in their interest,” and it would be his intention “to see if such a meeting could take place.” He also moved to submit the nuclear nonproliferation treaty signed in 1968 for ratification.[²] In answer to a journalist who perceived this as a change of heart (during the presidential campaign in fall 1968 Mr. Nixon opposed ratification because of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia), the president explained that the situation “has changed in the sense tbat the number of Soviet forces in Czechoslovakia has been substantially reduced, … and that the passage of time [less than six months had elapsed] tends somewhat to reduce the pent-up feelings that were then present with regard to the Soviet Union’s action.”

The president clearly signaled to the Soviet leadership that, despite the moral repugnance of their violation of Czechoslovakia’s integrity, the way was open to comprehensive explorations of an improvement in the relations between Russia and America.

A few days later, the New York Times reported that “President Nixon and the Soviet leadership have opened a broad dialogue on foreign policy problems that could lead to an eventual visit to Moscow by Mr. Nixon.”

The Soviet response to the president’s initiative was highly encouraging. On July 10, 1969, Andrei A. Gromyko, the Soviet foreign minister, delivered perhaps the most significant and wide-ranging policy review of his long and illustrious career. He told the Supreme Soviet of the USSR (Russia’s federal parliament) that

the U.S. president’s statements in favor of a well-prepared Soviet-American summit meeting have, of course, not gone unnoticed in the Soviet Union. We do not cherish illusions that the number of those against establishing good relations between the two countries will rapidly decline in the United States. Over there the mechanism motivated by the forces that do not disguise their hostility toward our social system continues to work full blast. But even these elements must understand that averting a clash between the world’s two largest powers and bringing about normal or, still better, good relations between them is in the interests of both countries.

Gromyko further averred that

we are for developing good relations with the United States and would like these relations to be turned into friendly ones, since we are convinced that this would be in line with the interests of both the Soviet and American peoples. It is clear that our two countries are divided by deep class differences. But the Soviet Union has always proceeded from the premise that in questions concerning the maintenance of peace, the USSR and the United States can find a common language … We have noticed President Nixon’s statement that, in his opi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 On the Brink of Detente
• 2 Problems and Prospects of Troop Reductions in Central Europe
• 3 Beneficiary of Detente
• 4 Resurgent Confrontation Between East and West
• 5 A Look into the 1980s