Mistaken Views of Emmet Hughes
BOWIE, ROBERT R.
WRITERS and WRITING Mistaken Views of Emmet Hughes America the Vincible. By Emmet John Hughes. Doubleday. 306 pp. $3.95. Reviewed by Robert R. Bowie Center for International Affairs, Harvard...
...The failure to do so is accounted for by illusions underlying our policy...
...The United States must engage the Soviet Union in "decisive," bilateral negotiations...
...He dissects ideas about "peace," "sincerity" of opponents...
...Few foresaw in 1945 how rapidly the international scene would be reshaped by military technology, the collapse of colonial empires, the rise of new nations, Soviet growth and Communist control of Eastern Europe and China...
...Factually, this seems somewhat strained in view of the many negotiations with the Soviet Union over Austria, Germany, European security, arms control, exchanges, etc., and with the Chinese Communists over Korea, prisoners and renunciation of force...
...Urging maturity, it manifests impatience for final solutions...
...Its subject is a central one: the influence of illusions and misconceptions on United States foreign policy...
...All would agree the United States entered the postwar period woefully unprepared for its role...
...But for my taste, the writing seems cluttered...
...Surely no one can seriously question that this process has been halting and much slower than the times demand, and Hughes points out many of these lags and myopias...
...Asserting that in this period the nation has failed to attain any of its purposes, Hughes traces the failures primarily to a wide variety of misconceptions...
...His other major recommendation is better grounded...
...But by-mixing the illusions which have in large measure now been transcended into one hodgepodge with those which still persist, Hughes muddles his analysis and fails to focus attention on the most urgent needs...
...His proposals for a more realistic policy underscore this theme...
...The basic theme of the book can be stated simply...
...In the name of "realism," it embraces wishful thinking and half-truths of its own...
...That threat continues as part of the reality we face in the newer form of "coexistence...
...the implication is that all still hold sway...
...He demolishes myths such as (1) that freedom is bound to defeat tyranny, (2) that economic progress will produce political stability in the new nations, and (3) that all nations have equal weight in international affairs...
...It is wishful thinking to confuse the hope for change with current reality...
...In his view there is no choice but negotiation or war...
...The Marshall Plan, the Truman Doctrine, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the decision to fight in Korea, the reshaping of attitudes to Germany and Japan, the evolving concern for the newer nations and their development—and many more measures—were more than specific reactions...
...Yet the book suffers from some of the very faults it attacks...
...He recognizes the crucial importance of the newer nations in Asia and Africa and urges more adequate assistance in the economic sphere and in creating effective political structures...
...Misconceptions common at the start of the period are lumped together with those still current...
...Hughes insists that "the challenge is to our civilization . . . [to] our definition of man," which he says fixes the nation's purposes in foreign affairs...
...He ignores the many statements, interviews and actions by the Soviet leaders which force the opposite conclusion...
...On the basis of a common interest in disarmament, the two countries should agree, he says, on mutual withdrawal from Europe...
...But the analysis seems to me to lack one virtue essential for understanding the period and its lessons: a sense of historical perspective...
...the remainder contains the author's policy proposals...
...Demanding clear purposes, it fails to define such purposes in practical terms...
...This program, he asserts, would benefit Europe and the satellites, and is attainable...
...The 15 years since 1945 are the record of the effort by the nation and its leaders to comprehend this dynamic world, America's role in it and how to play it...
...The author is infatuated by such verbal calisthenics as: "There operates in diplomacy, unfortunately, a rigorous kind of mathematic law by which the multiplication of mistakes reaches the sum, after a time, of a sufficient subtraction of sense to achieve such a division from reality that, for some while, no new efforts can add up to a solution of the problem...
...Yet at key points...
...Denouncing fuzzy thinking, the analysis is too often cloudy or contradictory...
...He is certainly right in insisting on the misreading of conditions as a major source of confusion and failure in foreign policy...
...One constant theme is the necessity to separate politics (the metier of the nation) from morality (embodied in our civilization...
...Only time will tell whether the trend toward regionalism and federation among the newer states will prove as strong as he visualizes...
...actions have been "indispensable" but they have been "unavailing...
...And the period 1945-59 is strewn with examples of difficulties traceable largely to this defect...
...They were also stages in the gradual broadening of understanding and grasp of realities...
...He adduces no evidence that the Soviet leaders would consider loosening their grip on Eastern Europe...
...If so, these purposes surely become infused with profound moral purpose...
...The analysis starts from solid ground...
...Its author, Emmet Hughes, has had an extensive and varied experience in the field...
...It is true that former Secretary of State John Foster Dulles did not favor negotiations by heads of state as a general method, but this skepticism is shared by others as dissimilar from him as George Kennan and Harold Nicolson...
...For 15 years our concern has been focused almost solely on the Sino-Soviet threat...
...Where that purpose is not directly at stake, as in some forms of arms control, agreement may be feasible...
...He criticizes various conceptions about diplomacy, and the relation of force and morals to foreign policy...
...According to the jacket, the style of this book has been described by others as "eloquent" and "unmatched" by any other similar book since World War II...
...They have not, to any degree, moved us nearer world order, made peace less precarious or lessened Soviet might...
...faced the momentous task of radically readjusting its conceptions of the world and the nature of foreign affairs, and formulating purposes and policies suited to actual conditions...
...But impatience to compromise where this is not the case may only play into the enemy's hands...
...For 20 years he has been following foreign affairs professionally, as press attache, correspondent, foreign news editor for Time-Life, and speech-writer for President Eisenhower in 1952-53 and 1956...
...There is little attention given to how far each is still an operative factor in the actual making and conduct of foreign policy today...
...gratitude" by foreign nations, "liberation" of the satellites, the call for "leadership," "law" and other concepts which he feels have corrupted public debate...
...But we are beginning to see more clearly the other half of our role: the constructive task of building a viable world order among the non-Communist nations...
...When events shattered these illusions, the U.S...
...In the period 1945-59, many U.S...
...The outcome of the struggle may well turn on whether the free countries dedicate their energies to this affirmative purpose without ceasing to perform the negative task as well...
...the tinsel diverts attention from the thought...
...Like costume jewelry, this can be good fun if not carried to excess...
...steadily avoided negotiations with the Soviet Union and (by implication) thereby lost opportunities for resolving problems...
...While he senses the end of an era, it is curious that he seems to miss the feature which marks the turning point...
...Distinctive the style surely is, but to me it is annoying and distracting...
...Hughes' discussion of these and similar notions makes many valid points and sensible comments which would probably find general acceptance...
...In grappling with this task, it was severely handicapped by outmoded or invalid ideas carried over from its own special history and by the unprecedented pace of world change...
...Its plans and policies were founded largely on false hopes for Soviet peacetime cooperation and for a stable world order based mainly on the new international agencies...
...Of course, one can accept that as a fact, and still object to excessive moralizing or failure to recognize the mixed morality of human (and national) actions...
...There may be signs that time may modify Soviet purposes and conduct, but if so, those changes still lie in the future...
...This, of course, is not self-evident...
...Nor does he seriously consider the impact on the Western position of launching such a proposal...
...But that view seems to me to underrate the capacity shown by both the public and its leaders for growing awareness of conditions and responsiveness to needs...
...He obviously writes out of genuine concern...
...Hughes also repeatedly asserts that the U.S...
...Reviewed by Robert R. Bowie Center for International Affairs, Harvard University THIS COULD HAVE been an important book...
...The analysis is also blurred or confusing on certain other points...
...Three-quarters of the book dissects these misconceptions...
...What Hughes appears to mean is that the United States did not propose compromises the Soviets would accept...
...Many unsolved problems may have to be lived with for an extended time before they are ripe for settlement, especially where the opponent has expansionist purposes...
Vol. 43 • February 1960 • No. 5
