Panaceas for the Cold War:

...It is scarcely necessary to criticize in detail a proposal which is so obviously Utopian...

...Cousins is preoccupied with the fact that mankind now possesses, for the first time in history, the means to destroy itself...

...His detailed plan follows that of Grenville Clark and Louis B. Sohn in their book World Peace Through World Law...

...The constantly invoked analogy with the 1787 Philadelphia Convention is misleading...

...he demands the abandonment of the one-power, onevote principle in favor of greater (though by no means proportionate) voting power for populous countries...

...President) is evidently based upon the example of the French Directory of 1795...

...Streit restates and updates his plan for Atlantic Union, originally proposed in 1939...

...It will, above all, promote our self-fulfillment as individuals and thereby appeal not only to the negative motive of fear of Communism but the positive one of a "freer, fuller, better individual life and greater civilization...

...Cousins recognizes himself that his plan requires a drastic alteration in human nature (that last refuge of all Utopian reformers) when he calls for an end to the habit of violence, as revealed in even such relatively innocent pastimes as hunting and prize fighting, and an end to the present "disconnectedness between man and man," as revealed for example in the impersonal relationship between patient and medical specialist...

...The ordinary American citizen did not lose his share of sovereignty when the Federal Union was set up in 1789...

...Democrats and Republicans, Canadian and British Conservatives, French Gaullists, Radicals and Popular Republicans, Italian and German Christian Democrats and various national brands of Socialists—not to speak of Communists, Portuguese clerical fascists and Turkish champions of military dictatorship...

...The value of Streit's specific scheme collapses the moment one ask such questions...

...This projected convention should agree to set up a new union government with control over foreign, military and economic affairs...

...he simply transferred part of it from his immediate state to the new union...

...The establishment of Atlantic Union would, similarly, constitute a transfer, not loss, of sovereignty by American citizens...

...How can we make sure that this does not happen...

...The whole scheme constitutes an obviously unworkable mixture of the parliamentary and the presidential system, compounded by all the evils of a plural executive...

...He presents Atlantic Union as the deus ex machina which will extricate us from all of our difficulties: It will provide perfect security, save $10 billion in defense costs which can be diverted to other purposes, strike fear into Communists and induce Communism, to wither away, maximize prosperity and even promote the cultural flowering of Atlantic civilization...

...and (3) the setting up of an Executive Council, to control both the UN army and the UN inspectorate, an Executive Council responsible to the UN General Assembly...

...Or can one conceive of Executive Board candidates campaigning throughout the heterogeneous area which is bounded by Honolulu in the west, Ankara in the east, Oslo in the north and Lisbon in the south...

...He views the tragic course of world history since 1939 as one continuous proof that his original proposal was right, and believes that future evils can be prevented only by establishing union now...

...Cousins pleads for the establishment of world government through reform of the United Nations...

...Streit brings up to date, in the face of the Communist peril, a proposal originally advanced to cope with the fascist danger of two decades ago...

...The 13 colonies were united by a common language, a common governmental tradition and the recent memory of a common struggle for independence—all factors lacking in the NATO alliance...

...Our entire heritage of economic progress, a civilized social life, political liberty and a rich culture is threatened with obliteration if one man unleashes World War III...

...They consider a world holocaust inevitable unless far-reaching political changes are achieved in the immediate future...

...2) the establishment, in the newly created political climate, of a general system of disarmament with foolproof inspection...

...Streit provides a specific constitutional blueprint patterned largely upon the U.S...

...Both writers, too, challenge the complacency of the American people in the face of possible annihilation of the human race...

...Thus, Streit argues, national sovereignty is bad not only because it is "bad" but because it is "Communist" as well...

...He emphasizes that "the law of the vital fraction is the dominant law of life," that human life is the result of an incredibly complicated balance of factors, and that another war with its uncontrolled increase in radioactivity—to give only one example— would so upset the balance as to compromise all future life on this planet...

...It cannot be said that Streit meets other objections as squarely as he does the sovereignty issue...

...He readily admits this fact—for the difference between a mere league and a real union lies precisely in the surrender of some measure of national sovereignty—but attempts to prove that national sovereignty has become an undesirable fetish in the Western world...

...Constitution, though its five-man Executive Board (the equivalent of the U.S...

...He gives an exceptionally lucid description of the forms of destruction developed by modern science: nuclear warfare (permitting not only mass destruction but threatening, through radiation, the genetic inheritance of man), chemical warfare (including nerve gases which can disintegrate the human personality), and biological warfare (which can wipe out whole populations through clouds of invisible and odorless aerosol...

...It is Utopian, too, to conceive of common political parties being formed or elections fought within the entire Atlantic area...

...It assumes a degree of human rationality and mutual trust for which recent experience gives absolutely no warrant...

...The new book by Clarence Streit, Freedom's Frontier, aims at ending the cold war not through world government, but through a federal union of the 15 powers of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization whose collective strength and prestige will, in his view, cause Communism to wither away...

...The completely impractical character of the book is further revealed by what one can only describe as Streit's propheticmessianic tone...

...Cousins gives a very simple answer: by abolishing the sovereign state, with its will and ability to make war, in favor of world government...

...Both Cousins and Streit must be given credit for introducing a note of urgency into the too often complacent and threadbare character of American political discussion...

...Their books could prove harmful only insofar as they encourage the mistaken belief that there is some simple method for ending the cold war and having mankind live happily ever after, instead of seeing the present struggle as a semi-permanent one in which America must make far greater efforts merely to keep even with an implacable, ruthless antagonist...

...He optimistically believes that a transformed human nature—brought about through methods which are never described—will be dominated by intelligence and good will, and that all obstacles to a freely negotiated world government, including Nikita Khrushchev's frequently asserted belief that the whole world must become Communist, will vanish as by a magic wand...

...It ignores all the difficulties which have hitherto prevented the achievement of even a small part of what the author proposes — e.g., an effective international disarmament inspectorate...

...Streit is absolutely right in insisting upon the necessity of the closer integration of the NATO community...

...Cousins' soberly realistic emphasis upon the danger of modern weaponry pinpoints the necessity of securing disarmament agreement with the Russians in any area where agreement may be possible (atomic tests, for example...

...Such a government should be set up through a world constitutional convention which would aim at: (1) the immediate creation of a UN world army of about one million men, whose existence would end the present atmosphere of general insecurity...

...The Executive Board would delegate most of its powers to a premier "who shall exercise it with the help of a Cabinet of his choice until he loses the confidence of House or Senate...

...True sovereignty," Streit shows, resides in democratic theory, not in any government but in the collectivity of the citizenry which delegates it to various levels of government...

...Both sincerely believe that each alone possesses the key to this most desirable end...

...Can one imagine, moreover, stable parliamentary coalitions being formed out of a potpourri of U.S...

...It would, in fact, lead to a clear gain for everybody since sovereignty would be reallocated in accordance with objective needs rather than obsolete national traditions...

...It is surely expecting too much that they should cooperate successfully in a fantastically complicated federal structure...

...Reviewed by Klaus Epstein Associate professor of history, Brown University Norman Cousins and Clarence K. Streit, though differing on many important questions, are agreed on one major point: The cold war must be stopped before it turns into a nuclear catastrophe...

...Cousins recognizes the need for changes in the pattern of UN representation if the world body's powers are to be enlarged...

...Streit spends much time answering the argument that his proposal involves the surrender of American national sovereignty...

...The author calls for an immediate "Atlantic Convention" (as was approved, though in a very non-committal manner, by Congress in 1960 with the support of both John F. Kennedy and Richard Nixon) patterned upon the Philadelphia Convention of 1787...

...The Utopian character of the authors' specific proposals should not blind us to the realistic core of some of their fundamental thoughts...

...Streit seriously underestimates the difficulty of establishing effective self-government even on a national level (about a third of the NATO powers have not done so yet, or too recently to warrant confidence in the future...

...The basic obstacle to be overcome is "the failure of people everywhere to think through the implications of a new age that has made the world a geographic unit without also making it a governed unit" Cousins is convinced that if people would only clearly see the stark facts of modern warfare they would share his demand for immediate world government...

...Following Elliot Goodman's valuable book, The Soviet Design for a World State, he tells us that the Communists attach the greatest value to national sovereignty for their own sinister ends...