Meeting Moscow's 'Limited Coexistence'

...These questions continue to be discussed daily in Western chancelleries by both journalists and scholars...

...The new Kremlin outlook, with its emphasis on nationalism, anti-intellectualism and anti-Semitism, Zbigniew Brzezinski, Professor of Government at Columbia University, is the author of Alternative to Partition, which was recently highly recommended by Walter Ulbricht (Neues Deutschland, October 25, 1968) as a book that "Marxists . . . should read very carefully...

...at the same time, the Soviet vested interest in the status quo, enhanced by steady bureaucratization and a better appreciation of the dangers of nuclear weapons, makes the Soviet Union unwilling to run major risks on behalf of militant causes...

...they fear more imaginative relations...

...The following analysis is a highly condensed effort to advance some tentative answers...

...East-West stability will not be built by itself...

...First, of course, the propositions...

...4. The impact on the West of recent developments in the East poses the danger that rigidity there, and even reconsolidation of the Soviet position in Eastern Europe, will not lead to greater unity in the West but rather the opposite...

...The gap between the political system and Soviet society augurs ill for the stable evolution of the system...

...One is its new theory of intervention, designed to justify a policy that aims at reconsolidating the Soviet bloc, more or less to the degree that existed in the early 1960s...

...bears striking resemblance to some prewar fascist tendencies in Europe...

...As the world becomes more stable and organic, the ideological civil war that today divides us on the East-West front will gradually begin to fade...

...Ideological conservatism, reflecting the institutional vested interest of a doctrinaire ruling bureaucracy, conditions in the Soviet leaders an almost automatic sympathy for radical revolutionary movements and a desire to assist them, particularly if they have an anti-U.S...

...In the light of these six propositions, I think it is possible to formulate five general policy recommendations...

...Its felt weakness stimulates among the Soviet leaders a competitive desire to match and eventually to surpass the United States in power and influence...

...Consequently, it has decided to opt for a policy of "limited coexistence," in which greater emphasis is put on hostility and ideological rigidity vis-a-vis the West...

...Limited coexistence does not exclude specific arrangements with the West, particularly in such ideologically neutral areas as arms control, but it does mean much less fraternization...

...Because of the internal tensions and contradictions, significant shifts in the composition of the leadership are to be expected...

...2. Shortly after the fall of Khrushchev, the Soviet leadership gradually began reassessing the value of detente and "peaceful coexistence...

...The ruling elite's overriding interest in stability has led it to disregard the views of international Communism concerning Czechoslovakia, even though it must have known in advance that its invasion would not meet with much support in the international Communist community...

...The important point to realize here is that the division of Europe is inherently unstable, making any attempt to create detente on the basis of accepting this division self-defeating...

...5. We should continue our efforts to promote arms control, and the Europeans must realize that there is a general global interest in U.S.-Soviet accommodation on that issue...

...3. The only way to seek enduring peace in Europe is to promote the gradual erosion of the partition of Europe...

...In this connection, it has developed two new ideological concepts...

...actions, and of threatening directly the security of the United States and its allies...

...its available strength makes the USSR an impressive rival, capable of at least indirectly assisting its far-flung friends, of abetting anti-U.S...

...Clearly, to the present leaders Soviet supremacy in the bloc is more important than ideological unity in the international movement...

...5. Disillusionment with the prospect for gradual hberalization of the East European states and of the Soviet regime—the probable product of the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia—could have a further unsettling consequence...

...The second formulation is the Kremlin's new concept of "peaceful counterrevolution," of which I am allegedly the principal author...

...A European-American common market in science and technology might be one effective approach, as was suggested by Vice President Humphrey during the recent Presidential campaign...

...Similar internal changes are taking place in East Germany and in Poland...

...Cumulatively, they suggest the ominous conclusion that the highest stage of Communism is . . . fascism: the appearance in power of an intensely chauvinist, first-generation, lower middle-class political elite...

...The ideal Western policy from the Soviet standpoint would combine verbal hostility, based on a reinforced nato, with political passivity on the East-West front...

...The West should now advance proposals for an East-West security conference on Europe, as well as other cooperative ventures, thereby making it more difficult for the rigid Communists to undertake unilateral actions...

...They will do so in the context of the new doctrine of "limited coexistence," however, in the effort to perpetuate their hold on Eastern Europe, minimize ideological and social contacts, yet not exclude specific arrangements with the United States in areas where the Soviets have a particular interest...

...It is striking that people who advocate peaceful engagement have been attacked most strongly by Soviet spokesmen, even after the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia...

...Our chances of accommodation with both increase with our willingness to accommodate separately with each...

...The leadership, increasingly mediocre in quality, confronts an alienated intellectual community, a bored youth, and restless national minorities...

...In the final analysis, it is also a sign of fear and an admission of the fundamental weakness of today's Communist systems, not only in Eastern Europe but within the Soviet Union itself...

...Accordingly, until such time as workable arms control arrangements are mutually agreed upon, it will remain necessary for the United States to seek to maintain what might be called "asymmetrical ambiguity" in the nuclear relationship)—i.e., a qualitative advantage in deliverable weapons, but no longer a clearly calculable superiority in survivability—and to develop new weapons systems, so that Soviet leaders will not be tempted to take calculated gambles based on what may erroneously appear to be a measurable equilibrium...

...In conclusion, I would emphasize that the above views and recommendations have to be seen in a broad perspective...

...It takes the somewhat schematic form of six general analytical propositions and five broad policy recommendations...

...Such concepts as superiority or parity are essentially meaningless, and they confuse public discussion...

...It could lead increasingly to revolutionary tendencies in the Eastern European states, as well as in the Soviet Union itself...

...For neither the United States nor the Soviet Union is powerful enough to impose its hegemony successfully, and efforts to do so prompt resistance, new instabilities, and eventually new confrontations...

...Eventually, the Communist leaders will realize that the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe can exclude themselves from such a community only at major costs to their own modernization and development...

...3. The Kremlin places a high priority on preserving the division of Europe...

...It cannot watch with apathy a return of Stalinism to Eastern Europe, because world peace eventually becomes affected...

...Precisely because they fear an overall confrontation with the United States, the present Soviet leaders will no doubt intensify their feelers toward the new Nixon administration...

...2. It is important to deter the Soviet Union from further use of force in Europe...

...While there is not much that the West can do about the existing spheres of preponderance, it cannot afford to be indifferent to their respective internal political content...

...The Western European nations, uncertain of American committment and involvement, instead of rallying together, may move toward neutrality, seeking security in independently arrived at arrangements with the Soviet Union...

...This negative outcome is all the more likely if the Soviet Union succeeds in drawing the new American administration into purely bilateral arrangements, which would implicitly convey American indifference to recent developments in Europe...

...It is likely that the Soviets will exploit the hiatus in U.S...

...it is ideologically too rigid not to be a revolutionary force, but the ruling Communist bureaucracy is so status quo-minded that the Soviet Union cannot be a truly militant power...

...orientation...

...What conclusions should we draw from it, either concerning the Soviet system or East-West relations...

...Thus we should maintain a generally positive attitude toward East-West relations...

...The consequence of these mixed motives and interests is an uneasy pattern of both rivalry and accommodation with the United States...

...Unlike the United States, where similar phenomena are vented and diffused by open discussion, in the USSR political suppression contributes to accumulated tensions and a widening gulf between society and politics...

...More specifically, since China is a nuclear power, it might be well—and appealing to China's pride—to propose U.S.-Chinese arms control talks and a Washington-Peking hot line...

...This requires not only revitalizing nato, giving the Europeans a greater voice through a European caucus, and possibly the appointment of a European as nato commander, but also movement in the fields of education, technology and science...

...This condition is likely to be aggravated by the Soviet development of long-range intervention forces, whose availability in the years to come may tempt Moscow into undertakings it heretofore had no choice but to eschew...

...4. It is desirable for the United States to try to improve relations with China...

...The rejection of closer East-West contacts is inherently related to the conservatism of the current Soviet leaders, and is a doctrinal component of the new strategy of limited coexistence...

...At the same time, we should not have excessive expectations that arms control will be easy to arrange...

...1. It is essential to create new momentum in Western unity...

...The rigid and hostile Communists prefer a rigid and hostile policy from the West...

...1. The Soviet Union is beginning to undergo an internal political crisis...

...6. The USSR is too weak to be a global partner of the United States and too strong not to be a rival...

...Czechoslovakia has shown the success of the policy of peaceful engagement...

...It has now concluded that peaceful coexistence—which meant that the Soviet Union exploited political openings in the West, and the United States, France and even West Germany probed for similar openings in the East?is more dangerous to it than to the West...

...It is a mistake for America to appear to be an implicit partner of the Soviet Union in the isolation of China...

...Depending on the specific circumstances and regional conditions, it makes possible some cooperation and some conflict, in the context of broader competition for influence, prestige and power...

...Should this happen, Moscow would then be able to resume its more activist policy of fragmentation in the West...

...Precisely because of this, the Soviets were properly reminded by nato recently that use of force across national frontiers in Europe could bring about unpredictable and uncontrollable consequences...

...Admittedly, this represents a major change in my own view...

...The goals of the 1950s and even of the 1960s in the area of Atlantic unity no longer suffice to mobilize Western European public opinion...

...But my present feeling is that the United States should respond favorably to any indications of Chinese interest in broadening contacts, such as hinted by the late November Peking overture to reopen the Warsaw talks...

...What was lacking was Western will to try to deter Soviet invasion, and imagination to try to deflect it by timely political initiatives...

...The inclination to rely on revolutionary change within the Communist states could affect the American attitude toward them, reawakening some of the more rigidly anti-Communist sentiments of the 1950s...

...Greater international polarization and perhaps even a greater threat to international peace would follow...

...it will only develop if the world becomes a more organic and interrelated community...

...policy leadership between now and January by pressuring the Rumanian leadership to fall back into line...

...Given the new Soviet rigidity in Europe though, it may be useful to remind the Soviet Union of its stake in improved relations with the West...

...This means that in the forseeable future there is potential danger to the independence of both Yugoslavia and Rumania, but especially the latter...

...Disaffected youth, intellectuals, and eventually workers, losing faith in gradual hberalization, could opt for violence, especially if at some point paralysis in the Soviet leadership were to produce what might appear to be an opportunity...

...In the Soviet view, peaceful counterrevolution—i.e., the transformation of Communist totalitarianism into social democracy—is the ultimate objective of peaceful engagement and cultural bridge-building, and therefore must be resisted at all costs...

...One should have no illusions that a new American stance toward China will itself immediately bring about a positive response...

...As a result, the ruling elite attaches the highest value to internal political stability...

...It will not preclude some limited arrangements, but it does pose the major danger that both sides will be compelled, by the dynamic of events, into an accentuated arms race...

...until now, I felt it was desirable to continue the isolation of China for the sake of improved relations with the Soviet Union...

...The younger Western European generation must be given new objectives on which to focus its energies and idealism...

...Irrespective of the rate of progress, or the absence of progress, in East-West relations, it is essential for the United States to pursue its efforts to build a community of advanced nations which includes itself, Western Europe and Japan...

...Competition will remain the central characteristic of the U.S.-Soviet relationship in the foreseeable future...