War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with Eugene Rostow, 1986

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Transcript

WAR AND PEACE IN THE NUCLEAR AGE - TAPES E08009-E08012 EUGENE ROSTOW

Soviet Expansionism

Interviewer:

MR. ROSTOW, IN HIS CAMPAIGN AND EARLY ON IN 1977, JIMMY CARTER SEEMED

TO BE SAYING THAT THE PROBLEM WAS WITH US. THE PROBLEM WAS A

MILITARISTIC APPROACH TO FOREIGN AFFAIRS OR OUR CONFRONTATIONAL

ATTITUDE TO THE SOVIETS. DID THE COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER AGREE

WITH THAT ASSESSMENT OR WAS THE PROBLEM MORE WITH THE SOVIETS?

Rostow:

No. The Committee... the Committee on the Present Danger took the view

that President Carter's approach, especially as outlined in his early

speeches and in his early actions, where he said we were excessively

preoccupied with the Soviet Union and had to -- and the foreign policy

was a much bigger world than that we felt that the the... most

important factor in world politics today was and had been for a

considerable period of time, Soviet expansion. The process of Soviet

expansion that began during the war and continued after the war at an

accelerating pace. Now that expansion was fuel by the aggressive use of

force in various forms... and was backed by an enormous and very

rapidly growing military establishment... including a nuclear

establishment that was gaining on our own at an alarming pace. So we

were concerned to restore the damage to the bipartisan foreign policy

we pursued since the time of Truman, and that damage had, of course,

been occasioned by the Vietnam war, and the dreadful controversies that

surrounded that tragedy... which split the parties and split especially

my party, the Democratic Party.

Interviewer:

HOW DID THE COMMITTEE VIEW SOVIET INTENTIONS? THERE SEEMED TO BE TWO

CONFLICTING IDEAS. ONE IS THAT THEY WERE DRIVEN BY -- TO EXPANSION BY A

GRAND STRATEGY, AND THE OTHER MARSHALL SHULMAN, WHO WAS ADVISING VANCE,

FELT THAT THEY WERE SIMPLY OPPORTUNISTIC. IF THERE WAS A POWER VACUUM,

THEY'D FILL IT.

Rostow:

Well they're both. But of course the Soviets, -- The Soviet policy was

driven both by opportunism and by strategy. The Soviets are very

careful, thoughtful, intellectual people and very highly trained. And

they've long since recovered from the weaknesses in the Russian

military establishment described by Solzhenitsyn in his book, August

1914. And they know what they're after and they -- what they're after

is an accumulation of power... so great as to make any... resistance

futile. And that means accumu... taking charge of the of central Europe

which they did immediately after the war and which we have accepted

more less -- not quite but almost. And then seeking to gain control

over western Europe on the one side, and over China, Japan on the

other, so that they would confront us with an array of power which

would be simply too great for our comfort.. far too great for us to

handle. It... it deals with the most basic question of world politics

always, which is the balance of power. No country can be free if it's

pr... adversaries or potential adversaries become too strong.

Interviewer:

DID YOU FEEL THE SOVIETS HAD A BLUEPRINT FOR WORLD DOMINATION?

Rostow:

Blueprint? Well they read all the relevant books, they had the

strategic thought and they understood perfectly what everybody else

understood... that no one should be allowed to con... to control um the

entire land mass of Eurasia. We'd fought two wars to prevent -- in this

century, to prevent Germany from conquering Russia, and we'd helped in

the formation of NATO to prevent Russia from conquering Germany and

Western Europe. The reasoning behind this was expressed perfectly by

Thomas Jefferson a long time ago when Napoleon went into Russia. He

became very alarmed. And he said that it was very much against... our

interest to have any one monarchy controlling all of Europe. And he

said, "Why, under such circumstances, Britain would be but a breakfast

for Napoleon." So this isn't a new idea. We didn't invent it. It's the

oldest idea in the study of politics... domestic as well as foreign.

Interviewer:

BUT, I'M TRYING TO GET A GRIP ON JUST WHAT ONE MEANS BY THE GRAND

STRATEGY. IS IT BLUEPRINT FOR WORLD DOMINATION?

Rostow:

Well, you see it means much more than that. It means uh... a system of

states in which the Soviet Union occupies a... predominant influence.

But... it's not a... not a question of sending legions out to govern

everybody, but it's a -- there's always that implicit in the

circumstance. But uh... it's a... it's an alternative world order idea,

I think. A system of world order in which the Soviet Union is the

center and in which um, no one has an... enough power to contest it --

no coalition can oppose it. If you look at the statistics the

demography and the population and the resources any any single power

which controlled all of Russia and all of Western Europe would simply

be too strong for our comfort. We could no -- we're in the position of

that Great Britain was in for four centuries. That is, Great Britain

was always weaker than it's main adversary or a combination of

adversaries and had to form coalitions of like-minded states to oppose

them. And that's what Great Britain was for four very successful

centuries... the arbiter of the balance of power of Europe. And that's

the position we're in today. We're not in a position to conquer all of

Eurasia... or to come under the control of the Soviet Union. But we are

in a position to form coalitions both in the Atlantic and the Pacific

to maintain our independence. And that's what we've been doing...and

trying to do throughout this century. We don't -- we haven't understood

it very well. That's not the way we're trained in college to think in

those terms. But that's what we've been doing by instinct. Because

everyone understands the necessity of preventing an adversary from

becoming too strong. You never had to explain to an American why we

teamed up with Stalin against Hitler. That was self-evident. And its

obvious now... people expected there to be an outcry about our

relationship with China. There wasn't at all every American understood

it perfectly. We needed to have a good relation with China as a counter

weight to Soviet power. So that's... those are the ideas the committee

has been promoting. And attempting, as I say, to try to restore the

bipartisan consensus in American thinking about foreign policy... that

was destroyed or weakened anyway, by Vietnam.

Interviewer:

I'D APPRECIATE IT IF YOU DIDN'T TALK ABOUT TODAY. PUT YOURSELF BACK IN

1976 OR '77. DID YOU SEE EVIDENCE DURING THOSE YEARS IN THE LATE

SEVENTIES OF THE SOVIET EXPANSIONISM AT WORK?

Rostow:

Well, of course. The Soviets the Soviet pressure... was on at all

times. You see, the nuclear weapon... well, let me start over. I forgot

to restate your question.

Interviewer:

I WANTED TO GET INTO THE AFRICA, ETHIOPIA, ANGOLIA, THE SOUTH YEMEN.

WHAT WAS GOING ON THERE?

Rostow:

Well, in the late seventies, the pressure of Soviet expansion in the

late seventies was manifest in two ways, really. First increasingly

daring and adventurous campaigns in Africa and Asia and the Middle East

which were based on a perception of American weakness. They... they

felt that Carter was very weak and that the United States would not

respond, and therefore they took risks which they hadn't taken before.

Most notably, of course, the use of Soviet troops in Afghanistan. And

very large groups of Cuban troops and Soviet advisers in the African

campaigns... they were conducting at the time. The other category of

pressures that we faced was in the field of nuclear weapons and the

nuclear arms negotiations. The Soviets at that time, and still take the

view that if they can build a first strike nuclear capability

especially based on their ground based ballistic missiles that that

will be in itself a paralyzing political force which will... force a

breakup of the American alliance systems and the withdrawal of the

United States to neutrality and isolation. And the reason for that is

that the threat of a nuclear first strike capability is nearly

paralyzing No one wants to test out to discover in fact through an

experiment whether all those calculations are correct. And therefore,

you see throughout sot...in the seventies and you see it today

tremendous, what Helmut Schmidt calls the subliminal influence... of

the nuclear balance... on political attitudes. The impulse for

isolationism in the United States was very strong in the seventies and

it's gotten ever since. And it especially af --in the immediate

aftermath of Vietnam, "Pull back. Get out of our lives." This is both

in the Pacific and the Atlantic and "Hunker down in the United States."

And "We have enough weapons to keep them off Long Island, or Puget

Sound and that's all right. The rest of the world doesn't really

matter." Well of course, the rest of the world does matter immensely.

It's indispensable to achieving a balance of power. And the irony of it

all is that you need exactly the same nuclear power to keep them off

Long Island or the Puget Sound as you would to keep them out of Berlin

or Tokyo. It doesn't make any difference because after all, the Soviet

Union is not building these weapons to use them. They're just as much

afraid of a nuclear war or a nuclear accidents as anybody else. They're

building them as a political force... designed to coerce us. And there

having that influence. And that became very, very clear during the SALT

II negotiations, when Vance made his proposals for reductions in 1977.

Gromyko turned them down in public with the utmost brutality and we

immediately withdrew those proposals and substituted others, more to

the Soviets liking.

Arms Control Negotiations

Interviewer:

IF THE SOVIETS ARE INHERENTLY EXPANSIONISTIC, WHAT FOLLOWS FROM THAT?

DOES THAT MEAN THAT YOU CAN NEGOTIATE WITH THEM OR CAN YOU TRUST THEM?

WHAT ARE THEIR GOALS IN ARMS TALKS?

Rostow:

In arms talks, there's only one issue. And it's been true from the

beginning. What they're seeking in the arms talks, apart from stopping

us from lines of development that they think are very promising... is

to get us to acknowledge their right... to nuclear superiority. If you

look at the situation -- the nuclear situation, we'll say in 1962 when

there was the Cuban missile crisis, we had enormous nuclear superiority

in the capacity to retaliate anytime we wanted. And the result was that

we could threaten them to invade Cuba with conventional forces. The

Cuban missile crisis, which is very interesting and important episode

in the history of the Cold War, was not a nuclear crisis. We were

planning to use conventional forces in Cuba. Kennedy assembled them in

Florida, a quarter of a million troops, without any particular attempts

at secrecy, and the Soviets backed down because it was clear once

they'd established that Kennedy was serious, that there was nothing

they could do to prevent a landing at Cuba and that they couldn't use

the nuclear weapons against us because we had so many more we could use

against them in that event. So that's the key thing. You build an

enormous nuclear -- or they think you -- they build an enormous nuclear

superiority in order to prevent us from using conventional force in the

defense of our interests... anywhere. And that's what they were trying

to do through the nuclear arms talks... To get us to acknowledge their

right to what they called equality and equal security. We were after

equality -- deterrent equality, so that each side could retaliate

against a nuclear attack or a... an attack on its vital interests. But

nobody would have a first strike capacity. And they were trying to

build a first strike capacity by saying, "Look, well you must accept

the principle of equality and equal security, which means, we have a

right to a nuclear force equal to the sum of the American, the British,

the French, the Chinese, the Israeli and so on." Which is a recipe for

-- not for security but for dominance.

Interviewer:

WHAT SHOULD OUR GOALS IN BUILDING UP A STRATEGIC ARSENAL, GIVEN THE

VIEW THAT YOU HAVE OF THE SOVIETS? DOES THAT MEAN THAT WE HAVE TO SEEK

SUPERIORITY?

Rostow:

No. We have to seek always to maintain a retaliatory capacity, so that

we can neutralize their nuclear weapons, and achieve a nuclear

stalemate and be free to use conventional force if necessary to defend

our interests. Uh...

Interviewer:

DO YOU THINK THAT SENATOR JACKSON WAS INTERESTED IN SUPERIORITY OR

JUST-

Rostow:

No, no. I know I know his views very, very well. I... was close to him

for a long time... and he was in entire agreement with this approach to

our own -- building our own nuclear arsenal and negotiating with the

Soviet Union. You see, United States, after the Cuban Missile Crisis,

was very much moved to come forward with arms control negotiations...

because we were so impressed with the risks of nuclear uncertainty --

nuclear anxiety during the Cuban Missile Crisis. And the... in any

event the United States has always been interested in arms control

agreements. We started in 1783 in the... negotiations with the British

for a peace treaty. We proposed the demilitarization of the Great Lakes

and of the border with Canada. So that this is part in... part in

parcel of our culture... an interest -- as... like the Constitution...

an interest in convenience, an interest in treaties, and the role of

law in the social process. So there's nothing new about that. But it...

after the Cuban Missile Crisis, we began to press arms control

approaches, hoping to stabilize the tensions between us and the Soviet

Union. But of course, we wanted to neutralize the nuclear weapons, and

minimize the risk of nuclear war. And the Soviets, it became clear very

soon, wanted treaties that would allow them to build up their nuclear

arsenal and especially their ground based ballistic missiles, which is

exactly what they did. And of course one of the great mistakes that was

made by the Nixon administration in the SALT I negotiations was to

allow a loophole which permitted the Soviet Union to transform their

holdings in ICBMs -- the intercontinental ballistic missiles, from a

position of near equality with the United States in 1972 to the present

posture or the posture in the... in the '70s when Carter was

President... of being more than three to one, perhaps four to one ahead

of us in the number of warheads on those weapons. Which has transformed

the whole political situation.

[END OF TAPE E08009]

Interviewer:

YOU SAY THAT THE COMMITTEE BELIEVE IN NEGOTIATIONS. WERE YOU HAPPY WITH

THE END PRODUCT OF THE SALT II NEGOTIATIONS?

Rostow:

The Committee on the Present Danger opposed the end product of the

negotiations for SALT II. And testified in favor of sending the draft

treaty back for amendment on four or five key points. I've forgotten

what they all were. One of them was that we include what were then

called the gray area weapons, the intermediate range weapons which are

now called the INF weapons, because they reinforced the threat. They

were designed to separate Europe and Japan from the United States...

and China and other countries within range by dramatizing a threat from

these intermediate range weapons at a time when the American nuclear

response was coming under greater and greater question, because of the

change in the nuclear balance between the Soviet Union and the United

States in the intercontinental weapons. It was a kind of a whipsaw

thing. And it created great alarm, both in Europe and in Japan and in

other countries as well, and so the first thing the committee

recommended was that the SALT II Treaty be sent back from the Senate to

the President with a request that this problem be taken care of. And of

course, that's happened now... with the INF element in the nuclear arms

negotiations. The other was, that we said the draft treaty, which the

President had sent over and signed in Vienna, was based on the wrong

principle of accounting. That is, it counted launchers rather than

warheads and their destructive capacity. Well that was a practical way

of dealing with nuclear -- counting nuclear weapons in 1972 and because

we were so far ahead by any standard. But in 1979, it didn't make sense

because the Soviets were very close to us in overall nuclear strength

and ahead of us in some categories of nuclear strength. And ah, a

launcher isn't a weapon. Nobody's ever been killed by a launcher. The

launcher can send off ten or three or four or whatever it may be

warheads. And some warheads were worse than others, so that we said

that the treaty was built on the wrong principles and will only permit

the Soviet Union to increase its rapidly growing force of ICBMs. And

there were several other objections. I've forgotten now what they were.

But we prepared a very careful -- we prepared a long series of analytic

statements criticizing the draft as the negotiations developed. We

remained in touch with the government and with the key people in

congress and so there our views where... were available to the

government at all times. And then when the treaty was sent over, we

testified... before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and Arms

Services Committee, both I think... on the substance of it. So that --

no, we took a critical position and recommended that the treaty not be

ratified.

Interviewer:

SENATOR JACKSON, ON A FEW DAYS BEFORE PRESIDENT CARTER WENT TO VIENNA,

SPOKE TO THE COALITION FOR DEMOCRATIC MAJORITY AND CALLED IT

APPEASEMENT... RESURRECTED THE IMAGE OF NEVILLE CHAMBERLAIN IN 1938.

DOES THAT -- WAS HE BEING TOO HARSH?

Rostow:

No it wasn't too harsh at all. It was an acceptance of Soviet nuclear

superiority which would in the not very long run have condemned us to a

position of neutrality. It would've broken up our alliance system and

reduced us to neutrality a... in the United States which would have

meant impotence in a world of much larger powers.

International Nuclear Strategy

Interviewer:

IN 1977, YOU WERE CONCERNED ABOUT THE WINDOW OF VULNERABILITY, THAT THE

SOVIET BUILDUP MIGHT GIVE THEM FIRST STRIKE CAPABILITY. OTHERS SAY,

"HEY, LISTEN--THAT'S WHY YOU HAVE A TRIAD. WHAT'S WRONG WITH STANDING

ON THE OTHER TWO LEGS OF THE TRIAD?" WON'T THEY BE A DETERRENT?

Rostow:

The window of... vulnerability argument deals with, of course, the

Soviet lead in ground based ballistic missiles which are the most

accurate, the most destructive, ah... of nuclear weapons -- the

swiftest, and the ones for which there is as yet no real defense. Of

course one must and should rely on the other two legs of the triad for

what they can do. In the '70s, the submarines were decidedly

less--submarine based weapons were decidedly less accurate than the...

than the ground based weapons. That may change in the near future, and

various people think it will change, but at that time it had not

changed and the submarine based were a good retaliatory weapon but not

at all accurate enough to be a first strike weapon. And the bombers, of

course, were very doubtful. They were perhaps retaliatory weapons, but

the Soviets had a very strong air defense system which we did not have.

And it was highly questionable then how effective they could be under

circumstances of war. So that while it was -- still plenty of

uncertainty, about the possibility of retaliation in the event of a

nuclear Soviet first strike attack that uncertainty was diminishing

very rapidly and that was what was meant by the window of

vulnerability. And it is that -- a fact. That's what the Scowcroft

commission concluded and it is a... central problem for all our nuclear

planning. So that especially when you look at -- it becomes very

obvious, I think, if you look at the nuclear problem. Not as a problem

of actual warfare, but as a problem of political warfare. That is the

translation" of these forces into a political perceptions and then

political decisions. And that, I think, is the key to understanding the

nature of the role of nuclear weapons. I'm not saying that a nuclear

war is impossible. Obviously a nuclear war is possible. Human beings

handle these weapons, and human beings can become very excited and very

alarmed. But I think the risk of nuclear war between the major

industrial powers at least is... has been greatly reduced over time.

But not the political influence of nuclear weapons.

Interviewer:

PERCEPTION OF POWER MATTER?

Rostow:

Perceptions of power matter immensely. Yes. It's always been true. The

Chinese of course had the classical warfare in which the two generals

would sit on a hill having -- drinking tea. The troops would be

deployed and maneuvered below them and one would then turn to the other

and said, "Well, you've won." Well, it was a very civilized way to

conduct warfare.

Interviewer:

DO YOU THINK THE SOVIETS WERE IN ETHIOPIA BECAUSE THEY FELT WE WERE

GETTING STRONGER IN TERMS OF NUCLEAR ARSENAL, THAT WE GET ETHIOPIA --

AS IF IT'S A TWENTIETH CENTURY EQUIVALENT OF NINETEENTH CENTURY

WARFARE, THAT YOU DON'T HAVE TO FIGHT?

Rostow:

Well it was nineteenth century warfare you fought.

Interviewer:

BUT TODAY YOU DON'T HAVE TO FIGHT - YOU KNOW, "I'M BIGGER THAN YOU WITH

MY NUKES, SO, I WANT ETHIOPIA, YOU DON'T CHALLENGE ME."

Rostow:

Well, that of course is the effect of the nuclear balance on warfare

was most dramatically illustrated not by Ethiopia so much where there

was a lot of fighting but by the Cuban Missile Crisis... where there

was no fighting at all. You can say in retrospect that Kennedy settled

for too little in the nuclear missile crisis, but that's the only

example we have of the visible impact of perceptions of nuclear

strength on political decisions. The Soviets retreated. The Soviets

moved forward in the '70s in the Third World on a very large scale

culminating, of course, with the use of their own troops in Afghanistan

which was a remarkable development in the Cold War. Not only because

their nuclear strength was improving, but because they perceived

weakness in the American government, especially in the aftermath of

Vietnam.

Interviewer:

WHY DO YOU THINK THEY WENT INTO AFGHANISTAN? SOME PEOPLE SAY THAT THEY

FELT THAT SALT WOULD NOT BE RATIFIED AND SO THEY WENT AHEAD AND TOOK AN

ACTION THAT WOULD KILL THE POSSIBILITY OF IT BEING RATIFIED BUT THEY

DIDN'T CARE. WHY DID THEY DO IT?

Rostow:

Afghanistan did not kill the possibility of SALT being ratified. SALT

was dead before Afghanistan. Both the Democratic and the Republican

leaders knew that and the count was clear-cut and there were

consultations that made it very obvious. We tried to convey that

message, we on the Committee on the Present Danger, to the government

and the answer that Cy Vance gave me was, "Well, reasonable men can

differ about nose counting in the Senate." And of course that's

perfectly true. But we were very confident of our nose count and it was

correct. No. Afghanistan...has been part of Soviet strategic planning

for more than a century, and... in the conflict between Russia and the

British Empire in the 19th century, there were several wars over

Afghanistan... because Afghanistan is route of access to the... to the

southern -- both to southern part of Iran and of course, to what is now

Pakistan. And the Soviet interest in the in the sub-continent of Asia

is just as intense and just as real as its interest in Japan or in

Western Europe. And for the same reasons because they understand the

geography of power. And in terms of the geography of power, the

sub-continent is enormously important and was becoming more and more

important in the '70s and is more and more important today because the

rapid industrial development of India and of Pakistan both, but

especially of India, and its enormous mass, the population, and the

geography of it. So that an American student of strategy years ago said

that the West should never allow the Russians south of the line between

Kabul and Tehran. It's most interesting in perception in view of

current events. And and of course the Soviets push south. It's not a

sentimental interest in warm water ports. It's a fact of life about the

geography of power. And this -- there's nothing new about that

interest. And they were taking advantage of the weakness of the Carter

government to make a swift, bold move into Afghanistan. They had built

their road on which they're depending... in Afghanistan as part of an

aid program for Afghanistan and we helped build that road. And Senator

Jackson came out of a trip to Russia in... I don't when... the late

'60s, I suppose... came out from Russia through Afghanistan and when he

got out he met the press and he said..."They're going to attack

Afghanistan. That road is a military road."

Interviewer:

IT WAS BUILT FOR TANKS.

Rostow:

It was built for tanks. So this was not a matter they decided on the

spur of the moment. This was long standing plans going way back into

the nineteen century. Part of their conflict with Great Britain about

imperial power, and they took advantage of the occasion...

Interviewer:

WHAT IF SALT HAD BEEN RATIFIED? DO YOU THINK THEY WOULD HAVE DONE IT?

Rostow:

Certainly they would have done it?... Yes. The Soviet Union would have

moved in Afghanistan whether SALT were ratified or not. SALT I was

ratified. And that led to the worst decade of the Cold War so far as

Soviet expansion was concerned. The the Soviets moved in the Middle

East and in the 1973 war, backing the Arab attack on Israel which was

an attack on NATO, not an attack on Israel alone. And of course, they

moved ahead in Indochina... inflicting humiliating defeat on us.

Without an regard to SALT I. And there were many other episodes of

course in that period. In the Middle East, in Africa, in and in

Southern Asia. So that no, the ratification of SALT I had no affect on

their expansionist policy, nor would the ratification of SALT II have

any effect.

Interviewer:

SOME OF THE COMMITTEE'S WRITINGS SUGGEST THAT THE VIOLENCE IN IRAN HAD

BEEN INSPIRED BY THE SOVIETS FROM THE BEGINNING.

Rostow:

Which violence is this?

Interviewer:

IN IRAN. ALL THE ANTI-AMERICAN HOSTILITY AND THE UPROOTING. DO YOU SEE

THIS AS AN INDIGENOUS IRANIAN PROBLEM OR SOMETHING THAT THE SOVIETS

STIRRED UP?

Rostow:

Both. The Soviets -- there is of course an enormous revulsion

throughout the Muslim world against Western civilization, against the

treatment of women, against pornographic movies, against... um,

co-education in the schools, against all sorts of symbolic and actual

changes... in the in the traditional culture. And that's felt

everywhere and was felt very strongly in Iran. Primarily because the

government of the Shah was pressing so hard for modernization and

westernization... of the country. It was a culture shock. And it did

have deep roots. And it's everywhere. But the Soviet Union certainly

did its best to stir it up. As has been the case all over the place and

to take advantage of it and exploit it.

Carter Administration on Arms Control

Interviewer:

WAS WARNKE A GOOD CHOICE AS AN ARMS NEGOTIATOR?

Rostow:

Well, I opposed his confirmation. I... know him and I like him and we

work together in the...in the Johnson administration, but no, I didn't

think he was a good choice at all.

Interviewer:

WHY?

Rostow:

Because he changed his mind, the position he'd taken in a long series

of articles for purposes of the job.

Interviewer:

HE CHANGED HIS VIEW OF THE GOALS OF--

Rostow:

That's right.

Interviewer:

FROM WHAT TO WHAT?

Rostow:

Well, from a much uh. . .

Interviewer:

HE SOFTENED UP TO PLEASE CARTER?

Rostow:

I sup... I suppose you could say that Paul Warnke softened up to please

Carter, but he -- the views expressed in many of his earlier articles

were simply thrown away... in order to carry out the policy of the

Carter administration. And I thought that was a very bad sign. He

announced that in his in... before his confirmation hearings so that

the battle over his confirmation became a... pretty dramatic test.

Interviewer:

WHAT WAS THE CHIEF DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HOW PAUL WARNKE AND HOW THE

COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER WOULD APPROACH THE NEGOTIATIONS?

Rostow:

I think Paul Warnke saw arms control treaties as an end in themselves.

And we saw them only as a means to an end. I think Paul Warnke was not

allowed in this...Cy Vance said it over and over again, and I think

President Carter really believed it -- that there was some positive

fallout from reaching an arms control agreement with the Soviet Union

in the general realm on peaceful behavior. International behavior. And

that it would modify or soften their expansionist policies. There was

no excuse in my judgment for saying -- for r...having such an

opinion... in the '70s against the background of the experience we'd

gone through after the signing negotiation and signing of SALT I. The

two SALT I agreements were duly signed in 1972 and President Nixon

proclaimed that d鴥nte reigned in the world and that we'd

substituted... cooperation for confrontation and then we endured the

worst decade of the Cold War -- in the Middle East, in the Far East and

in Africa, and other places as well. So that um, the notion that

signing an arms control agreement with the Soviet Union would lead to a

mellowing of Soviet international behavior really was untenable. It

could not be made against the background of experience. But the Carter

administration still clung to that view and articulated it very

clearly. After all, the President said that arms control was the

centerpiece of our relationship with the Soviet Union and the

centerpiece of American Foreign Policy. Well that was a... an

abandonment of the real issue which was Soviet expansion and its effect

on the balance of power.

[END OF TAPE E08010]

Interviewer:

WHAT'S MORE IMPORTANT? THWARTING SOVIET EXPANSION OR AN ARMS AGREEMENT?

AND SHOULD THEY BE DEALT WITH SEPARATELY OR SHOULD THEY BE LINKED?

Rostow:

Well, the problem of making an arms control agreement cannot be

considered except in the context of Soviet expansion. They're linked,

in fact, and they have to be linked therefore, in our thinking about

them. The there was no way to escape the connection, because after all,

nuclear weapons, both for us and for the Soviet Union, have to do with

possible use in warfare or possible use in political campaigns backed

by the threat of force. And the Soviet Union is interested in the

nuclear weapon as the ultimate sanction behind its program of

expansion... based on the use of force. And we're interested in the

nuclear weapon as the ultimate guarantee of our possibility of

defending our national interests defined as the -- our interest in the

independence of Europe, Japan and other great centers of power or

strategically important...places and countries around the world. Now

there's no way to escape that linkage. And many people said, "Oh. Talk

about linkage... is to put an impossible obstacle in the path of peace,

as if an arms control agreement were the equivalent of peace." Which,

as we learned in the 1970s is not the case. But, nonetheless, that was

made. And I would never say that we should approach the problem of

making or not making an arms control agreement as if it were a favor

we're doing to anyone. Even though the arms control agreement is in our

national security interest, or it's not. If it is in our national

security interest, we should make it. That is to say, if it would

reduce the risk of nuclear war, if it would produce more stability and

more predictability in international relations and minimize the effect

of uncertainty about the nuclear weapon and the nuclear dimension of

international conflict. Those are all very worthwhile objectives. And I

was in favor indeed of the Beirut plan which President Truman offered

in 1946 in which the Soviet Union turned down. I regard that Soviet

rejection as one of the tragic turning points in the history of the

Cold War. Because the Baruch plan would have put all of nuclear

technology under the control of an international agency. And the

Soviets rejected it and substituted -- put forward an offer which

they've repeated recently to abolish all nuclear weapons on the basis

of national decisions and national -- without national safeguards and

so on. So that um, no. I think a nuclear arms control treaty is either

worthwhile or not worthwhile from the point of view the American

national interest. And we should only make it if it is and we should

give up the notion that making arms control agreements will somehow

lead to a mellowing of Soviet foreign policy and in the end towards

Soviet cooperation with the other major powers in the interest of

maintaining the peace. It's too late for -- to entertain any such

illusions.

Interviewer:

WERE YOU AGAINST THE SALT II TREATY BECAUSE IT LEFT THE SOVIETS

SUPERIOR IN--

Rostow:

Yes. It left the Soviets superior and would have prevented us from

catching up. It would have prevented us from trying to restore the

balance through its restrictions, And that was true then and we made

that objection in a... in a reasoned way both in our published

statements and in our testimony before the Senate.

Interviewer:

BUT WASN'T THE MX A WAY TO DO TWO THINGS? ONE, TO GET RID OF THE WINDOW

OF VULNERABILITY BY A LESS VULNERABLE BASING MODE AND TWO, TO HAVE AN

ACCURATE COUNTERFORCE WEAPON?

Rostow:

Oh, I thought the MX was indispensable. Indeed. The MX, however,

brought out one of the great weaknesses of the approach of the SALT II

Treaty. Which was to count launchers and to put --try to put warhead

limits on the launchers, I was very much and I think all of us in the

committee were very much in favor of smaller weapons and mobile

weapons. In other words, if you limited throw weight, you gave

inducement to build small weapons and many of them. And if you limited

the number of launchers, you gave the engineers inducements to build

huge weapons with lots of warheads on them. And I ... I think really

the only way out of the nuclear problem in the end is to have small

mobile weapons. You -- which you can't trace very well and you can't

verify very well but each side would know the other side had a lot of

them. And it would have a paralyzing effect. At least, that seems

possible to me and more attractive by a long shot than building the

colossal weapons. Because the smaller ones would basically be

retaliatory weapons.

Interviewer:

SO THE MX IS A FIRST STRIKE WEAPON. ISN'T THAT A DESTABILIZING WEAPON?

WHY WERE YOU IN FAVOR OF IT?

Rostow:

Well, the distinction in my experience and my study between first

strike and non-first strike weapons is entirely a question of number in

relation to the other side's arsenal. That is, if you have one side has

one weapon and the other side has none, then that one weapon is a first

strike weapon whether it's a bomb like the bombs we dropped in Japan or

a missile. The of course the MX is a... is a formidable ah...and would

be an accurate weapon and a very destructive weapon like some of the

Soviet heavy missiles, But it's only a first strike weapon if you build

it in sufficient numbers -- to do -- to make a first strike weapon. And

that depends also on whether it can be defended. Whether it's in it's

vulnerable to attack as compared we'll say to a submarine based weapon.

So that I was in favor of MX and the committee was in favor of MX and

strongly in favor of Midgetman -- even more strongly in favor of

Midgetman than of MX, because we needed it to restore the balance

between the Soviet nuclear arsenal and our own and to minimize the

chance that they would be perceived as having and would have indeed, a

preemptive nuclear -- a first strike capability, which could be a... an

enormously destructive political force.

Interviewer:

DO YOU THINK WE NEED MORE FIGHTING STRATEGY? WERE YOU PLEASED WHEN

PRESIDENT CARTER SIGNED PD-59?

Rostow:

I've forgotten whether I was pleased or not. What is PD-59?

Interviewer:

WELL IT'S SORT OF A CONTINUATION OF THE SCHLESINGER DOCTRINE,

COUNTERFORCE CAPABILITY, CAPABILITY FOR SURVIVABILITY OF COMMAND AND

CONTROL AND YOU KNOW, YOU CAN CALL IT A WAR FIGHTING STRATEGY AS

OPPOSED TO JUST A DETERRENT. IF THE DETERRENCE FAILS, IT ASSUMES YOU

CAN FIGHT A COUNTERFORCE WAR.

Rostow:

Well, you can't have -- the distinction between war fighting and

deterrence doesn't exist to my mind. I don't think a military force

would deter unless it were perceived as a force capable of fighting if

it had to fight. Military ban doesn't defer...uh, deter unless it's

backed by fighting units that would come into play if anybody fooled

with the band after all. No. I did welcome PD-59 and I... and I thought

all that was indispensable and anything to get away from the mad

doctrine, as rapidly as our -- the accuracy of our weapons permitted us

to have a counterforce capability. And to mount a counterforce

strategy. That's what's deterrent. Deterrence as I say, is the... is

the fear of somebody else's capacity to inflict pain.

Interviewer:

THERE WAS A BATTLE BETWEEN VANCE AND BRZEZINSKI ON WHETHER TO TILT

TOWARDS CHINA, WHETHER TO EMPHASIZE THE SECURITY ASPECTS OF THE NEW

RELATIONSHIP. CARTER SEEMED TO BE INFLUENCED BY BRZEZINSKI IN THIS, AND

TO TILT A LITTLE BIT TOWARDS CHINA IN TERMS OF DUAL USE TECHNOLOGY AND

SO ON. ARMS SALES BY THE ALLIES. DID YOU APPROVE OF THAT?

Rostow:

Yes. I did. It was the whole point of -- the whole point of our

relationship with China as it started in the time of Nixon was that

that relationship would be a counterweight to Soviet expansionist

pressure. After all, the communica... the Shanghai communiqu頯f 1972

was a most interesting document. It recited in one part Chinese views

of various problems, in another part it recited American views on

various problems and there was only one joint section. And that joint

section said that both China and the United States were opposed to any

hegemonial power in Asia. And later the Japanese signed onto to that

proposition, despite vehement Soviet objections. So that's what the new

relationship was all about and the notion that it could develop and

fulfill itself without a security dimension I think is as...

self-deceptive. After all, the key decision that Nixon made, and one of

the most important in modern history, is his nuclear gam... nuclear

threat to the Soviet Union to protect China.

Interviewer:

DID YOU REGARD BRZEZINSKI AS AN ALLY?

Rostow:

Well certainly as a friend. I didn't we didn't... didn't we talked

frequently and always very comfortably and it was not a question of

being allied or not. He was representing the President of course and

we... rep... were presenting the views that we'd worked out in our

criticisms -- analyses of Carter's policies. And those conversations

were perfectly civil and frequent and thoughtful and comfortable but we

didn't regard him as an ally. No. He wasn't. He was... he wasn't an

ally of ours. He was just a, a person who's views we respected who

happened to be in the government at that time.

Interviewer:

BUT WOULD YOU HAVE FELT COMFORTABLE WITH HIM AS A MEMBER OF THE

COMMITTEE ON THE PRESENT DANGER BEFORE HE WAS IN OFFICE?

Rostow:

Oh surely. We invited him to be. But he was already ah... involved with

the Carter administration. You see. We didn't --we tried to -- began to

form the committee in '76, planned it in '75 and '76 and we didn't

announce its existence until after the election of '76. Because we

didn't want to get involved in the election. We thought if we'd make an

-- made an earlier announcement, that people would have considered a...

asked themselves whether we were for one candidate or the other.

Interviewer:

DID YOU INVITE BRZEZINSKI TO JOIN THE COMMITTEE?

Rostow:

Yes. The Committee on the Present Danger invited Brzezinski to join,

but he -- by the time we issued those invitations he was already so

deeply involved with Governor Carter as a candidate that he felt that

it would be inappropriate to do so.

Interviewer:

MARCH '77. SCOOP JACKSON WAS AFRAID OF THE HEAVIES. YOU WERE AFRAID OF

THE SOVIET HEAVY MISSILES. CARTER DIDN'T LIKE ANY NUCLEAR WEAPONS. ONE

TENDS TO THINK OF THE COMMITTEE AND CARTER AS ADVERSARIES OR SCOOP AND

CARTER AS ADVERSARIES, BUT WASN'T CARTER CARRYING YOUR INTEREST? WASN'T

THERE A MOMENT IN MARCH OF '77 WHEN THERE WAS A CONFLUENCE OF INTEREST

IN THE PROPOSAL THAT SECRETARY VANCE CARRIED TO MOSCOW?

Rostow:

Certainly Secretary Vance's proposal in um, March of '77 seemed to us

very helpful. As I recall it, we had some difficulties with some

aspects of it, but it was a very, we thought, a very promising

beginning for the negotiations and it would have made an immense

difference if the Soviets had ac... accepted it or been willing to

negotiate on that basis...to the Soviet advantage in ground based

ballistic missiles. But of course, Gromyko turned it down with a great

deal of heat... in ah, public in Moscow and the Carter administration

immediately retreated. Because the Carter administration I'm afraid

felt it was more important to make an agreement with the Soviet Union

on this subject than um, to go along without one.

Interviewer:

WAS IT A PROCEDURAL THING? THEY DIDN'T LET THE SOVIETS KNOW IN ADVANCE.

THE SOVIETS SORT OF NEED TIME TO PREPARE.

Rostow:

No. The Soviet Union -- the whole notion that the Soviet Union are a

group of very sensitive babies and we have to coddle along and treat

with great care, procedurally, is absurd. The Soviet Union is led by

men -- I suppose we have to say men and not men and not men and women,

because they're no --there haven't been any women in positions of

importance for a long time -- the Soviet Union is a government led by

men of great ability and experience and training... officials who stay

in place for a long time and they're experts in the field and they're

not affected by the tone in which they're treated or procedural slights

and all that sort of thing. When... when Soviet officials get angry in

public or in private it's entirely calculated. They don't get angry in

the ordinary sense. Because they're...they're functioning under much

stricter rules of discipline. And dealing with them is very bracing and

very interesting and they're -- as I say absolutely first class at

their work. But the notion that they'd be that the policy toward the

heavy missiles, the SS -- the SS-18s and -19s would have been affected

by any procedural lapses in the handling is absurd. It represents a

failure to respect really, the Soviet government and its policies.

Interviewer:

SOME PEOPLE SAY --

Rostow:

Condescending, I think is the right word.

Interviewer:

WHY DID THEY REJECT IT THEN? WHY DID THEY REJECT THE PROPOSAL, THE

SOVIETS? WHY DID THE SOVIETS --

Rostow:

The Soviets rejected the proposal because they opposed to any in their

advantage in these heavy weapons. That's -- that was their primary aim

in all these negotiations and in building up their nuclear arsenal and

it still is. As far as I can see. We'll have to see what the latest

round of proposals means. But that's been their objective. They spent

an enormous amount of money, trying to achieve it. They transformed the

nuclear balance between 1972 and the present and they were not going to

give it up. The Soviets say they believe that the correlation of

forces, as they call it, will determine the future of world politics

and I rather suspect they believe it. They've sacrificed the standard

of living of their people for three generations to that idea.

Interviewer:

IT SEEMS TO ME THAT THE POLICIES THAT CARTER HAD ADVOCATED BY THE TIME

HE LEFT OFFICE WERE NOT MUCH DIFFERENT FROM WHAT RONALD REAGAN WOULD

HAVE DONE. DO YOU FEEL, DO YOU TAKE SOME RESPONSIBILITY FOR THIS

SWITCH? ARE YOU STILL PRETTY CLOSE TO YOUR VIEWS?

Rostow:

Certainly President Carter's view of the Soviet Union and his the

actualities of his policy changed radically during his period in

office. The... the -- he signed PD-59, he struggled for an increase in

the defense budget and he undertook confrontational approaches to the

Soviet Union, or what were considered confrontational approaches,

although I thought some of them were rather absurd and self-defeating.

Like not going to the Olympics. Um. That didn't affect policy very

much. Um. Yes. He was certainly moving in response to his experience

and moving quite sharply. But I always had the impression with him --

perhaps it was the shadow of his previous being that he was reluctant a

reluctant convert and not a very zealous promoter of action.

[END OF TAPE E08011]

Committee on the Present Danger and their Views on the Soviet Union

Interviewer:

THERE ARE PEOPLE THAT SAY THE RUSSIANS ARE JUST LIKE US AND THEY, YOU

KNOW --

Rostow:

They are like us but they happen to be at war, that's all. They think

-- the government is at least.

Interviewer:

YOU'VE BEEN ACCUSED IN HELPING IN THE DETERIORATION OF US-SOVIET

RELATIONS BECAUSE OF ALL THE HARSH RHETORIC ABOUT THE SOVIET UNION. IS

THAT A FAIR, ACCURATE -

Rostow:

The uh... You say I've been accused of contributing to the

deterioration of Soviet-American relations...I beg your pardon.

Interviewer:

NOT YOU PERSONALLY, BUT --

Rostow:

The Committee on the Present Danger was formed in the late '70s... in

the aftermath of Vietnam to try to overcome the weakening of the

bipartisan consensus about foreign policy that had lasted between the

time of Truman and the Vietnam War. Our first effort was within the...

Democratic Party. The coalition for a democratic majority. Many of the

people who are... most active in the Committee on the Present Danger

were active in the foreign policy committee of the coalition for a

democratic majority. We found that we weren't getting anywhere and that

we wanted to have a bipartisan approach -- that it was that while the

problem within the democratic party was very severe after Vietnam, the

urn, the only approach that would work we thought or had a chance of

working was a bipartisan approach. And so we formed the committee as a

bipartisan committee designed to restore un... the momentum of American

foreign policy that had been lost because of the Vietnam experience and

the Korean experience before that. More and more people were flirting

with the notion that the security of the United States could be assured

by isolationist policies and it... policies of neutrality rather than

by the policies of coalition building that had begun with Truman had

been carried out through the Eisenhower period. Now the central

feature, which made such policies necessary, the central fact which

made such policies necessary, was in our view, the Soviet policy of

expansion. And so, it was extremely important, indispensable that we

explain to the American people uh...as clearly as we could the um,

nature of those policies. Now of course, there's a very strong desire

within the American body politic to say, "Oh, the Russians are all

right. They're just like us. They love their children and their

grandchildren," and all of which is perfectly true. And we were allies

together in the war against Hitler and we ought to be able to get along

with them if we'd only understand them and be more sympathetic and

treat them kindly and reassure them uh. All they want is a place in the

sun. And I think Secretary McNamara once said that. That their only

interest is recognition as a great power and legitimacy and status and

so on. Well I don't think anybody can take such positions anymore with

any respect for the experience we've gone through. Now, people have

accused us of course, of being responsible for the deterioration of...

Soviet-American relations in the late '70s. I don't think they've ever

deteriorated. I think they're exactly the same as they were in 1947.

The Soviets are pushing outward. The... the Americans reluctantly --the

Americans and many other countries reluctantly and half-heartedly often

have been trying to restrain that outward push and bring it within

tolerable limits. When you say that this is what the Russians are

doing, people say you're accusing them, or engaging in harsh rhetoric

or... doing other things that might cause them to be offended. Well the

Soviets are not in the least offended by harsh rhetoric. They use harsh

rhetoric about us...all the time. I'm very much against using harsh

rhetoric of our own because we have to conduct foreign policy and

the... ways that are compatible with our own nature. But I think it's

indispensable, if you're in the government or if you're an intellectual

addressing the public, to call things by their right names and to not

to say that the Soviets are suffering from inferiority complexes.

They're not. Or that they weren't sufficiently cuddled by their

mothers. They were. The...the Soviets -- that isn't what the Soviets

are suffering from. And the troubles between us are not caused by

misunderstandings. No two governments have ever understood each other

better, which is not to say, we understand each other very well. No...

no one understands a foreign culture deeply, really. Uh, but we're in

constant communication and its perfectly easy communication.

Soviet-American diplomacy is not a horrifying experience. Quite the

contrary. I suppose a few people of um, eaten more and drunk more in

the course of trying to serve the nation than I have with Russians and

it's a bracing and stimulating experience. But it's... it's not a

question -- the problems between us are not problems of

misunderstanding. And they're not problems of procedure. They arise

from the fact that the Soviet Union is expanding in order to acquire

power which is in itself inherently disturbing and threatening to us.

And that's a policy that they pursue, and it isn't affected by

rhetoric. It's affected by opportunity and by strength. They tried in

Cuba in 1962 and it didn't work. Well they're still at it... in Cuba

from Cuba and in the whole of South America.

Interviewer:

PEOPLE SAY THERE'S EVIDENCE OF EXPANSION IN THIS PERIOD, BUT, YOU KNOW,

SO THEY GOT ETHIOPIA, THEY LOST EGYPT. I MEAN, IT ISN'T...

Rostow:

That's right. Well the basic change --uh, the basic setback for them

was in China. And Egypt as well. Th... the... this isn't a monolithic.

This isn't a straight line process. The important thing to remember

about the Soviet Union is that they take -- in Russia before the Soviet

Union -- always took very long views. A French foreign minister once

told me Russian policy -- if they run into an obstacle, they try to go

around it. If they can't go around it, they go somewhere else. But the

important thing is to take -- keep on going like a glacier. We used to

think that if they were stopped in one or two places, they would get

the message and they would turn. Of course, all our policy, until now,

is based on George Kennan's famous article in 1947. And George Kennan,

who was a great expert on the Soviet Union and on Russia promised us

that if there were containment of Soviet expansion for ten or fifteen

years, Soviet policy would mellow under the benign influence of Russian

high culture, and they would become cooperative members of the family

of nations. But it hasn't happened that way. But we still are waiting

for that mellowing to take place. It's like "Waiting for Godot" in

Samuel Beckett's famous play, uh. Each time there's a new leader, we

say, "Oh, this may be the man who's going to lead us out of the

wilderness and we can go hand in hand into the sunset. He likes

bourbon, his wife dresses well he likes jazz. He's a modern man. He's

much younger." But it doesn't happen that way. Alas.

Interviewer:

SOUTH YEMEN. I MEAN REALLY. THEY GET SOUTH YEMEN, WHO CARES?

Rostow:

Well, a lot of people care. South... Saudi Arabia cares. We didn't do

very much about South Yemen, although I think, as I recall that

President Carter got excited about South Yemen. South Yemen is part of

the approaches to the straits there and the entrance into the Persian

Gulf. So therefore, it's important to the oil traffic. Therefore it's

important to the control of Iran. The world is round and it's very hard

to imagine any part of the world which can be excluded in advance as

outside the parameters of our possible interests in the context of

Soviet programs of expansion, Afghanistan and the Yemen are about as

remote as you can you can imagine... as places. Very picturesque, no

doubt and very wonderful for tourism, but Afghanistan has always been

of great strategic importance to the control of both of the Middle East

and of the sub-continent of Asia. And it will remain so. There's no way

of changing those facts of geography.

[END OF TAPE E08012 AND TRANSCRIPT]

Transcript

Transcript

Series: War and Peace in the Nuclear Age

Raw Footage: Interview with Eugene Rostow, 1986

Contributing Organization: WGBH (Boston, Massachusetts)

AAPB ID: cpb-aacip/15-wm13n20w24

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Description

Credits: Interviewee2: Rostow, Eugene V. (Eugene Victor), 1913-2002
Publisher: WGBH Educational Foundation

AAPB Contributor Holdings: WGBH
Identifier: e91a5126a4646941f1be8c0b283b79c594adf1a7 (ArtesiaDAM UOI_ID)
Format: video/quicktime
Color: Color
Duration: 00:00:00

Citations: Chicago: “War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with Eugene Rostow, 1986,” 1986-03-20, WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed October 2, 2024, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-wm13n20w24.; MLA: “War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with Eugene Rostow, 1986.” 1986-03-20. WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. October 2, 2024. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-wm13n20w24>.; APA: War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with Eugene Rostow, 1986. Boston, MA: WGBH, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-15-wm13n20w24