Henry Kissinger: The Mike Wallace Interview July 13 1958
Texas UT:
Dr. Henry Kissinger, Associate Director of the Center for International Affairs at Harvard University, talks to Wallace about the
United States' foreign and military policies, limited nuclear war, the
Soviet Union, Algeria, the Middle East, and Republicans, including
Richard Nixon.
Transcript
THE MIKE WALLACE INTERVIEW
Guest: Henry Kissinger
7/13/58
WALLACE: This is Professor Henry Kissinger, a military and political analyst with a revolutionary concept of nuclear war and a constructive concept
for peace. He's a man whose ideas have prompted the highest officials
of our government to re-evaluate our defense policies. We'll get his
criticisms of our current strategies in war and peace in just a moment.
(OPENING CREDITS)
WALLACE: Good evening, I'm Mike Wallace. Tonight we'll tackle the immediate issue that will decide the
fate of our freedom, certainly, and possibly even of our survival.
We'll discuss the conflict between the United States and the Soviet
Union, and the chances of war. Our guest, Professor Henry Kissinger,
Associate Director of the Center for International Affairs at Harvard
University, and the man whose recent proposals substantially influenced
President Eisenhower's plan for military reorganization.
Dr. Kissinger, last year your attack on our foreign and military policies
was apparently found so disturbing that the New York Times carried this
front-page story: they said, "For the first time since President
Eisenhower took office, officials at the highest government levels are
displaying interest in the theory of the 'little', or 'limited', war.
The theory of massive retaliation is being re-examined." That was a
year ago. What has come of the re-examination?
KISSINGER: I think the theory has been re-examined; the practice has not been.
WALLACE: The theory has been found wanting, then?
KISSINGER: The theory has been found wanting, but I don't think we have made the
effort, or spent the money, or made the sacrifices necessary for... to
get a capability for limited war.
WALLACE: Well now, in order to better understand your proposal for limited war, perhaps it would be
well for you to define what you understand to be our current United
States' military policy. What is our military policy?
KISSINGER: Well, our current military policy is based on the doctrine of massive
retaliation: that we threaten an all-out attack on the Soviet Union in
case the Soviet Union engages in aggression anywhere. This means that,
against almost any form of attack, we base our policy on the threat
that will involve the destruction of all mankind; and this is too
risky, and I think too expensive.
WALLACE: You obviously think it's wrong, dangerous to our security. I wonder if you would expand on
that. Just because of, what you say, the risk and just because of the
expense, it is not worthwhile?
KISSINGER: No, it is... what it will mean is that in every crisis, an American president will have to
make the choice whether a given objective is worth the destruction of
American cities. The American president will have to decide whether
Beirut, or whatever the issue may be, is worth about 30,000,000
American lives. In practice, I'm afraid the American president will
have to decide that it is not worth it, and it will therefore encourage
the piecemeal taking-over of the world by Soviet aggression.
WALLACE: Because you believe the Soviets understand our unwillingness or
inability, certainly our unwillingness, to wage an all-out war?
KISSINGER: The Soviets will understand our increasing unwillingness to engage in
this kind of war, and therefore their task will be to present us with
the challenge which doesn't ever seem worth taking the final jump, but
which the accumulation of which is going to lead to the destruction of
the free world.
WALLACE: In place of that policy, what do you believe our military and political policies should be?
KISSINGER: Well, the first thing I'd like to say is that military policy can't be
a substitute for other measures. It can only be the screen behind which
other measures are possible. Now with this qualification, I think that
we must have a military capability that permits us to react to Soviet
threats at the same level of intensity at which they present it, so
that we don't always have to choose between the destruction of the
United States and the defense of the countries that may be threatened;
but rather that we can defend the areas which are threatened at the
place where the threat occurs.
WALLACE: How is that actually translated into... if I may, into more simple language? Is this... are
you simply talking now about a policy which includes limited war?
KISSINGER: ...It's a policy that... yes, that we are ready to engage in limited
war, that we have troop transports, air transport that gets... enables
us to get into position quickly, and that we have the forces to engage
in limited war, which we do not now have.
WALLACE: Can you give me an example of how this might actually work out?
KISSINGER: Well, at the moment we have thirteen divisions. It is clear that with
thirteen divisions we are incapable of resisting Soviet attacks when
the Soviet Union has 175 divisions. If we had more divisions, and if we
had air transport, then in case of a Soviet attack, say on Iraq, we
could air-lift a few divisions into the area and, together with local
forces, attempt a defense.
WALLACE: Uh-hum. President Eisenhower... You advise limited war, or you suggest the use of limited
war, limited nuclear war, indeed. President Eisenhower said about two
years ago, he said, "War in our time has become an anachronism.
Whatever the case in the past, war in the future," he said, "can serve
no useful purpose.
A war which became general, as any limited action might," he said, "could only result in the virtual destruction
of mankind." Now that's the rub, it would seem: that any limited
nuclear war might boil over into a total war; and so the question we
must put to ourselves is, dare we take the chance?
KISSINGER: Well, let me answer this question in two parts. You say I advise a
policy of limited nuclear war. I do not advise that we initiate war.
The question of war will arise only if the Soviet Union attacks; then,
if the Soviet Union attacks, and in fact, we are very much more afraid
of total war than they are, they will gradually blackmail the
free-world into surrender. Everything that I say is based on the
assumption that we are as willing to run risks as the Soviet Union. If
this is not the case, we are lost; and I think we ought to face that
fact.
WALLACE: Uh-hum. Let's look at some of the measures... let's look at some of the measures which you propose for keeping a
limited war limited. You say, for instance, that in the midst of a
limited war, each side could be required to list its strategic air
bases, which would then he immune from attack. All cities within 500
miles of the battle zone would be immune from nuclear attack if they
were declared open and certified so to be.
It could be proposed that no weapon larger than 500 kilotons will be employed
unless the enemy uses it first, and so forth. Now, two nations, which
up until now have been unable to agree on armament control during
peacetime, according to Dr. Kissinger, are expected to engage in fairly
complex Marquis of Queensberry rules in the midst of a nuclear war.
It... it doesn't sound sensible, sir.
KISSINGER: I know it doesn't sound sensible, and nor does the destructiveness of modern
weapons sound very sensible. What is required here is a completely new
order of thinking. I hold no particular brief with the specific
limitations, which I recommended. What I am saying is this: both sides,
if they know one thing, they know that an all-out war will mean the
destruction of civilization, of their own as well as of the other.
They also know they will therefore have an interest in keeping any war that
does break out to the smallest possible proportions. If they're looking
for an excuse to expand it, they will expand it; I am assuming they're
looking for an excuse to limit it. What we have to do is to bend our
ingenuity into finding... toward finding means to limit any war that
might break out, either through accident or through design.
Whether these particular limitations are absolutely the right ones, I wouldn't
maintain; but the great difficulty has been the traditional military
thinkers, trained with conventional strategy, have simply dismissed all
new forms of thought, and have not addressed themselves to what seems
to me to be a very real and serious problem.
WALLACE: Then you think American strategy should be re-evaluated to restore war as a usable instrument of policy.
KISSINGER: American strategy has to face the fact that it may be confronted with
war, and that if Soviet aggression confronts us with war, and we are
unwilling to resist, it will mean the end of our freedom. We will...
this is it boils down, then, to a value choice. In these terms, yes, I
think war must be made a usable instrument of policy.
WALLACE: Let me throw another argument at you, if I may, Dr. Kissinger. I'd like
to quote from a study that has been released just a few hours ago
called Foreign Policy in the Free Society, written by Walter Millis and
Father John Courtney Murray. In it, analyst Walter Millis writes as
follows: he says, "The concept of limited war presents a simple fallacy
in logic.
We can resort to limited war," he says, "only when the objective is not vital to either side; in which case, we would be
unlikely to resort to war in any event. This happened in Indo-China,
Suez, and Hungary." He's obviously talking about the United States when
he says 'we.' What about that?
KISSINGER: I... I'm a great admirer of Mr. Millis’s; I cannot agree with him there. Every one of
these instances were instances where the Western position was eroded.
If it is really true that we can never engage in limited war, while the
Soviet Union can engage in limited war, I can only repeat that our
expulsion, the collapse of the free world, is inevitable. Moreover, to
say that limited war is a logical fallacy doesn't mean very much if you
look at the period from 1945 to 1958, which has had the Berlin
blockade, the Korean war, Indo-China, Suez, Hungary, constant threats
of nuclear attacks on other countries. The fact cannot be explained
away on simply logical grounds.
WALLACE: Tell me this, sir. Suppose the communists were to march into West Berlin next week, would
you, personally, and do you think the majority of the American people
would want to take a chance on protecting West Berlin with a limited
nuclear war?
KISSINGER: I am not saying that every Soviet attack must be answered with nuclear war. In an attack on West Berlin,
I would certainly react in some manner, and in some manner that
involves the use of force. Er... If we do not, no one will ever believe
in our protection again, or in our word again. Whether the American
people would support this or not would depend to some extent on their
leadership. If you had taken a public-opinion poll on, say, June 20th,
1950, whether the American people would support the defense of Korea,
you might have gotten an entirely different answer than the one you had
a week later when the President decided that it was essential to our
interests to defend it.
WALLACE: Then I take it what you envision is, if the Government were to follow your point of view, they
should announce publicly that from now on the possibility of limited
nuclear war should be seriously considered by all Americans and by all
of our potential enemies.
KISSINGER: I would announce that our primary purpose is to avoid war; but if we are forced into war through
Soviet aggression, we would attempt to keep it to the smallest
proportions necessary, that we would not use more force than was
absolutely necessary to defend the safety of the free world, but that
we would use the amount of force that was necessary to defend the free
world.
WALLACE: As long as we're in the realm of speculation here, let's speculate a little further. What do you think the reaction
of the Soviet government would be to an announcement of that kind?
KISSINGER: Well, they would be very likely to deny that a war can be limited
because atomic blackmail is one of their most effective means of
expansion. If they can create the impression that any resistance to
Soviet aggression inevitably leads to the destruction of the country
concerned, then many countries will prefer surrender to defending
themselves. If they were faced with the real situation, however, all
past experience indicates that this is not a regime that gambles
everything on one throw of the dice.
WALLACE: In the field of foreign policy and military affairs, Dr. Kissinger, you're acknowledged
to be one of the most penetrating minds in the country. Last year, as
I've mentioned, you published a military analysis, which rocked
Washington. Yet, you devoted it almost exclusively to framing a war
policy rather than a peace policy. Could this be indicative of what is
happening to our thinking here in America? Isn't this indeed what many
of our allies criticize us for?
KISSINGER: Well, I... I would reject this description of my book. I did not frame a war policy; I
framed a policy which I think is the only one that is going to preserve
the peace. I am afraid that weakness is certainly going to lead us into
a position where finally we will be forced to engage in very extreme
measures to defend ourselves. I would therefore reject the description
of my recommendations as a war policy. Our problems abroad are more
complicated than this because on the one hand we are accused of an
over-emphasis on military factors; on the other hand, the fact of the
matter is that we are not strong enough to defend most of our allies.
And one of... I would at least suggest that one of the difficulties is
that our allies are both worried about our general political posture,
and at the same time feel that we are not capable of protecting them if
a showdown comes.
WALLACE: Uh-hum. What policies...? Let's move from war policies to positive peace policies. What policies do you
believe generally that we should adopt to help keep the peace, and at
the same time contain communism?
KISSINGER: Well, I hate again to differ with you but I cannot accept the distinction between war and
peace policies. Defense policies are essential to maintain the peace.
Er... They are not, however, going to solve the political problems of
the world. They are only going to give us a shield behind which we can
engage in constructive measures. What is essential right now is that we
identify ourselves with the tremendous revolution, which is sweeping
across the world, that we have some image for the construction of the
free world which is based on other motives than simply defending the
world against communism. We must make clear what we are for rather than
what we are against. If we were clearer about the kind of world we want
to bring about, if we could project this concern to other people, then
we wouldn't always seem so intransigently militant, then we would be
identified with positive measures rather than with simply military
alliances.
WALLACE: Well, let's talk about some specifics. How do you regard our conduct in regard to the Algerian situation of the
past few years?
KISSINGER: I think the Algerian situation is an extremely complicated and difficult one. In general, we should stand
for the freedom of people. In general, we should oppose colonial
regimes. On the other hand, we should come up with ideas which...
Independent Algeria cannot survive as a purely independent state. The
great paradox of this period is that on the one hand you have a drive
toward more and more sovereign states; on the other hand, there is no
such thing as a purely independent state any more. The thing that has
always attracted me, therefore, would be that we would advocate a North
African federation, which would be tied together economically and for
other development projects, and that Algeria would find its place as
part of that rather than as a purely independent state.
WALLACE: Do you look to the inclusion of Nasser and his peoples in this North African federation?
KISSINGER: Well, initially I would group... I would recommend grouping Tunisia,
Algeria, and Morocco. There might be another grouping of powers in the
Middle East which includes Egypt and some of the states which have had
a somewhat different history than the... than Algeria.
WALLACE: Would you say that our posture vis-à-vis Egypt has been a realistic
one? Do you not agree that the peoples of Africa would seem to respond
to Nasser, and that we seem to support governments in the Middle East
which do not always have the support of their actual inhabitants, and
that perhaps Nasser has more support than some of the other governments
from the people themselves?
KISSINGER: Well, our policy vis-à-vis Nasser has suffered from indecisiveness. We have neither been
conciliatory enough when we were conciliatory, nor intransigent enough
when we were intransigent. We're not friendly enough to make him a
friend, and we were not hostile enough really to bring him down, with
the result that we have suffered from the worst of both worlds.
WALLACE: What you're saying is we have no policy.
KISSINGER: That we've been governed by events rather than attempt to shape them. I
would think, however, that Ibn Saud does not represent the force with
which we should be identified in the Middle East.
WALLACE: Let me come back again to the study called Foreign Policy in the Free
Society. In it, philosopher Scott Buchanan says, "Our problem here in
the United States is to exist as a capitalist society in, possibly, a
completely socialist, revolutionary world." Now it would seem, to a
certain extent anyway, that that's the way the world is going. Is it
possible that we cannot exist in such a world?
KISSINGER: Well, you know, you could argue that the identification of 'socialist' and
'revolutionary' is not a very good identification. You could well argue
that a capitalist society, or, what is more interesting to me, a free
society, is a more revolutionary phenomenon than nineteenth-century
socialism; and this illustrates precisely one of our problems. I think
we should go on the spiritual offensive in the world. We should
identify ourselves with the revolution. We should say that freedom, if
it is liberated, can achieve many of these things.
WALLACE: Well, what is keeping us from going on the spiritual offensive, as you see it?
KISSINGER: Er... Because we've suddenly been projected into a situation for which
very little in our history has prepared us and because, I'm afraid,
many of the leadership groups that are engaged in foreign policy have
had a set of experience... which make... experiences which make it
rather difficult for them to come to grips with a really revolutionary
situation.
WALLACE: Well, now, in that regard, earlier this week, you told our reporter that as far as current leaders are
concerned, you said, "We have an administration of old men, happy with
the life they have led." And you considered this dangerous. Uh... You
smile now. What did you mean, and why is it dangerous, and why are you
smiling?
KISSINGER: Well, I made this statement. I think that the groups I was referring to are very well meaning, very sincere, very
patriotic people. The difficulty they have is that they think that the
world in which they grew up is the 'normal' world. Er... Their tendency
is, when a crisis arises, to try to smooth it over, and then to wait
and then to expect that the 'normal' forces would re-assert themselves.
Therefore they conduct policy a little bit like... er... maybe
small-town bankers, who think one can always draw interest on a good
situation. They conduct very often our policy as if Adenauer would live
forever, despite the fact that he's 82 years old. When there's no
crisis it's always very difficult to get agreement on a constructive
step; conversely, it often requires a crisis to make us engage in any
action.
WALLACE: Do you see any political leaders in the United States who, you believe, have a clear grasp of America's current place
in history?
KISSINGER: I think one of the very worrisome features of the situation is that I don't find any great moral dynamism
on either side.
WALLACE: When you say 'on either side,' you mean either on the democratic or on...
KISSINGER: Er... Either in the Democratic or in the Republican Party.
WALLACE: Well how... how do you account for that, Dr. Kissinger?
KISSINGER: (CLEARS THROAT) I think we've been assuming for too long that all we
had to do... First of all, we are a nation of specialists. We tend to
think that a problem is either economic or political or military. Many
of your questions earlier in the program seem to me to indicate this
when you said, "This is a policy of war, and that is a policy of
peace."
It is hard for us to understand that we have to be able to do military, political, economic and psychological things all
simultaneously. Then, we have been rather satisfied with the situation
in our country as it is and with the world in which we have lived. Our
response to the world has usually been to an overpowering threat from
abroad.
Therefore, even when we have engaged in constructive steps like the Marshall Plan, the Greek-Turkish aid program, which were
very great efforts, nevertheless we've always justified them on the
basis of a communist threat, very rarely on the basis of things we
wanted to do because of our intrinsic dynamism. I believe, for example,
that we reacted very wrongly to the riots in Latin America. Rather than
saying, "These are communist-inspired, and we must react to... we must
keep Latin America from going Communist," we should have said, "This
recalls us to our duty; these are things we want to do because of the
values we stand for, not because we want to beat the communists."
WALLACE: But the question... the question is, why are we as unaware, why are we
as unavailing? Is it because we have been projected into world
leadership in too much of a hurry, unprepared for it? Is that one of
the reasons?
KISSINGER: It... This is... one of our very basic reasons is that we've been projected too much in a hurry. And it also
must be said in fairness that we have done rather well considering all
the challenges that have been thrown at us. It is too bad that 'rather
well' isn't good enough. Another problem is that the people who emerge
in leadership positions in this country usually come from a lifetime of
experience, which doesn't prepare them for the conduct of foreign
policy; they may come from business or from law, or even from the
universities.
WALLACE: We're certainly not in the case of John Foster Dulles. How would you evaluate the overall impact of Mr. Dulles
on the world position of the United States?
KISSINGER: I think that Mr. Dulles is a very skillful tactician, that he shows
extraordinary ingenuity in escaping from specific crisis situations.
Unhappily, the real problem in the world at the moment is to prevent
the crises from arising; it is to project an image of American concern
and of American purpose. This... he is much less successful in doing.
He often gives the impression of being so infatuated with the mechanics
of foreign policy and with the negotiation aspect of foreign policy
that he has not succeeded in projecting the deeper things we stand for,
and often has created great distrust abroad.
WALLACE: Who, if any, are the men in public life whom you admire, you personally admire
and look to for leadership for the United States, Dr. Kissinger?
KISSINGER: Well, I must say first of all that I'm here as a non-partisan, that I'm an independent.
WALLACE: Understood.
KISSINGER: I... I don't stand for either party in this. This depends. I've
respected Mr. Stevenson in many of his utterances, respected Mr.
Acheson in many of his utterances, although I've disagreed with him
very much on other things. Er... It's very difficult for a party out of
power to prove what it can do.
WALLACE: But there's no... There is no Republican who comes readily to your mind, in whom you have
that... that confidence that that man has an understanding, the
understanding that we need to lead us at this time?
KISSINGER: I hate to engage in personalities. I think that Mr. Nixon in his public
utterances recently has shown awareness of the situation, but... I’d
rather not deal in personalities, if you ask me...
WALLACE: Of course... Yes. Of course, we're going to have to. We're going to have
to deal in personalities because personalities are leaders, and
personalities are the people who eventually have to enunciate the
issues. I'm sorry, sir, but our time has run out, and I'm very grateful
to you for coming here from Cambridge to spend this half-hour with us,
Dr. Kissinger.
Our survival and freedom, a thorny undertaking at best, has become even more difficult to hold onto in the nuclear
age. For this reason, we run the danger of seeking easy answers or of
despairing that there are any answers at all. Dr. Kissinger has
suggested a tough, challenging answer, part of the answer, in limited
war. But as he himself has put it, "History will not excuse the
inadequacy of our response because of the enormity of the challenge."
Next week is the last program on our scheduled Survival and Freedom series,
and on it we shall come to grips with what's been said on this entire
series by such guests as Reinhold Niebuhr, Justice Douglas, Aldous
Huxley, Adlai Stevenson, Pat Weaver, Cyrus Eaton, and Henry Kissinger.
Our guest next week, you see him behind me, will be Dr. Robert
Hutchins, a stormy petrel on the American scene, formerly Dean of the
Yale Law School and President of the University of Chicago, now
President of the Fund for the Republic. That's Robert Hutchins next
week. Till then, Mike Wallace. Good night.
Guest: Henry Kissinger
7/13/58
WALLACE: This is Professor Henry Kissinger, a military and political analyst with a revolutionary concept of nuclear war and a constructive concept
for peace. He's a man whose ideas have prompted the highest officials
of our government to re-evaluate our defense policies. We'll get his
criticisms of our current strategies in war and peace in just a moment.
(OPENING CREDITS)
WALLACE: Good evening, I'm Mike Wallace. Tonight we'll tackle the immediate issue that will decide the
fate of our freedom, certainly, and possibly even of our survival.
We'll discuss the conflict between the United States and the Soviet
Union, and the chances of war. Our guest, Professor Henry Kissinger,
Associate Director of the Center for International Affairs at Harvard
University, and the man whose recent proposals substantially influenced
President Eisenhower's plan for military reorganization.
Dr. Kissinger, last year your attack on our foreign and military policies
was apparently found so disturbing that the New York Times carried this
front-page story: they said, "For the first time since President
Eisenhower took office, officials at the highest government levels are
displaying interest in the theory of the 'little', or 'limited', war.
The theory of massive retaliation is being re-examined." That was a
year ago. What has come of the re-examination?
KISSINGER: I think the theory has been re-examined; the practice has not been.
WALLACE: The theory has been found wanting, then?
KISSINGER: The theory has been found wanting, but I don't think we have made the
effort, or spent the money, or made the sacrifices necessary for... to
get a capability for limited war.
WALLACE: Well now, in order to better understand your proposal for limited war, perhaps it would be
well for you to define what you understand to be our current United
States' military policy. What is our military policy?
KISSINGER: Well, our current military policy is based on the doctrine of massive
retaliation: that we threaten an all-out attack on the Soviet Union in
case the Soviet Union engages in aggression anywhere. This means that,
against almost any form of attack, we base our policy on the threat
that will involve the destruction of all mankind; and this is too
risky, and I think too expensive.
WALLACE: You obviously think it's wrong, dangerous to our security. I wonder if you would expand on
that. Just because of, what you say, the risk and just because of the
expense, it is not worthwhile?
KISSINGER: No, it is... what it will mean is that in every crisis, an American president will have to
make the choice whether a given objective is worth the destruction of
American cities. The American president will have to decide whether
Beirut, or whatever the issue may be, is worth about 30,000,000
American lives. In practice, I'm afraid the American president will
have to decide that it is not worth it, and it will therefore encourage
the piecemeal taking-over of the world by Soviet aggression.
WALLACE: Because you believe the Soviets understand our unwillingness or
inability, certainly our unwillingness, to wage an all-out war?
KISSINGER: The Soviets will understand our increasing unwillingness to engage in
this kind of war, and therefore their task will be to present us with
the challenge which doesn't ever seem worth taking the final jump, but
which the accumulation of which is going to lead to the destruction of
the free world.
WALLACE: In place of that policy, what do you believe our military and political policies should be?
KISSINGER: Well, the first thing I'd like to say is that military policy can't be
a substitute for other measures. It can only be the screen behind which
other measures are possible. Now with this qualification, I think that
we must have a military capability that permits us to react to Soviet
threats at the same level of intensity at which they present it, so
that we don't always have to choose between the destruction of the
United States and the defense of the countries that may be threatened;
but rather that we can defend the areas which are threatened at the
place where the threat occurs.
WALLACE: How is that actually translated into... if I may, into more simple language? Is this... are
you simply talking now about a policy which includes limited war?
KISSINGER: ...It's a policy that... yes, that we are ready to engage in limited
war, that we have troop transports, air transport that gets... enables
us to get into position quickly, and that we have the forces to engage
in limited war, which we do not now have.
WALLACE: Can you give me an example of how this might actually work out?
KISSINGER: Well, at the moment we have thirteen divisions. It is clear that with
thirteen divisions we are incapable of resisting Soviet attacks when
the Soviet Union has 175 divisions. If we had more divisions, and if we
had air transport, then in case of a Soviet attack, say on Iraq, we
could air-lift a few divisions into the area and, together with local
forces, attempt a defense.
WALLACE: Uh-hum. President Eisenhower... You advise limited war, or you suggest the use of limited
war, limited nuclear war, indeed. President Eisenhower said about two
years ago, he said, "War in our time has become an anachronism.
Whatever the case in the past, war in the future," he said, "can serve
no useful purpose.
A war which became general, as any limited action might," he said, "could only result in the virtual destruction
of mankind." Now that's the rub, it would seem: that any limited
nuclear war might boil over into a total war; and so the question we
must put to ourselves is, dare we take the chance?
KISSINGER: Well, let me answer this question in two parts. You say I advise a
policy of limited nuclear war. I do not advise that we initiate war.
The question of war will arise only if the Soviet Union attacks; then,
if the Soviet Union attacks, and in fact, we are very much more afraid
of total war than they are, they will gradually blackmail the
free-world into surrender. Everything that I say is based on the
assumption that we are as willing to run risks as the Soviet Union. If
this is not the case, we are lost; and I think we ought to face that
fact.
WALLACE: Uh-hum. Let's look at some of the measures... let's look at some of the measures which you propose for keeping a
limited war limited. You say, for instance, that in the midst of a
limited war, each side could be required to list its strategic air
bases, which would then he immune from attack. All cities within 500
miles of the battle zone would be immune from nuclear attack if they
were declared open and certified so to be.
It could be proposed that no weapon larger than 500 kilotons will be employed
unless the enemy uses it first, and so forth. Now, two nations, which
up until now have been unable to agree on armament control during
peacetime, according to Dr. Kissinger, are expected to engage in fairly
complex Marquis of Queensberry rules in the midst of a nuclear war.
It... it doesn't sound sensible, sir.
KISSINGER: I know it doesn't sound sensible, and nor does the destructiveness of modern
weapons sound very sensible. What is required here is a completely new
order of thinking. I hold no particular brief with the specific
limitations, which I recommended. What I am saying is this: both sides,
if they know one thing, they know that an all-out war will mean the
destruction of civilization, of their own as well as of the other.
They also know they will therefore have an interest in keeping any war that
does break out to the smallest possible proportions. If they're looking
for an excuse to expand it, they will expand it; I am assuming they're
looking for an excuse to limit it. What we have to do is to bend our
ingenuity into finding... toward finding means to limit any war that
might break out, either through accident or through design.
Whether these particular limitations are absolutely the right ones, I wouldn't
maintain; but the great difficulty has been the traditional military
thinkers, trained with conventional strategy, have simply dismissed all
new forms of thought, and have not addressed themselves to what seems
to me to be a very real and serious problem.
WALLACE: Then you think American strategy should be re-evaluated to restore war as a usable instrument of policy.
KISSINGER: American strategy has to face the fact that it may be confronted with
war, and that if Soviet aggression confronts us with war, and we are
unwilling to resist, it will mean the end of our freedom. We will...
this is it boils down, then, to a value choice. In these terms, yes, I
think war must be made a usable instrument of policy.
WALLACE: Let me throw another argument at you, if I may, Dr. Kissinger. I'd like
to quote from a study that has been released just a few hours ago
called Foreign Policy in the Free Society, written by Walter Millis and
Father John Courtney Murray. In it, analyst Walter Millis writes as
follows: he says, "The concept of limited war presents a simple fallacy
in logic.
We can resort to limited war," he says, "only when the objective is not vital to either side; in which case, we would be
unlikely to resort to war in any event. This happened in Indo-China,
Suez, and Hungary." He's obviously talking about the United States when
he says 'we.' What about that?
KISSINGER: I... I'm a great admirer of Mr. Millis’s; I cannot agree with him there. Every one of
these instances were instances where the Western position was eroded.
If it is really true that we can never engage in limited war, while the
Soviet Union can engage in limited war, I can only repeat that our
expulsion, the collapse of the free world, is inevitable. Moreover, to
say that limited war is a logical fallacy doesn't mean very much if you
look at the period from 1945 to 1958, which has had the Berlin
blockade, the Korean war, Indo-China, Suez, Hungary, constant threats
of nuclear attacks on other countries. The fact cannot be explained
away on simply logical grounds.
WALLACE: Tell me this, sir. Suppose the communists were to march into West Berlin next week, would
you, personally, and do you think the majority of the American people
would want to take a chance on protecting West Berlin with a limited
nuclear war?
KISSINGER: I am not saying that every Soviet attack must be answered with nuclear war. In an attack on West Berlin,
I would certainly react in some manner, and in some manner that
involves the use of force. Er... If we do not, no one will ever believe
in our protection again, or in our word again. Whether the American
people would support this or not would depend to some extent on their
leadership. If you had taken a public-opinion poll on, say, June 20th,
1950, whether the American people would support the defense of Korea,
you might have gotten an entirely different answer than the one you had
a week later when the President decided that it was essential to our
interests to defend it.
WALLACE: Then I take it what you envision is, if the Government were to follow your point of view, they
should announce publicly that from now on the possibility of limited
nuclear war should be seriously considered by all Americans and by all
of our potential enemies.
KISSINGER: I would announce that our primary purpose is to avoid war; but if we are forced into war through
Soviet aggression, we would attempt to keep it to the smallest
proportions necessary, that we would not use more force than was
absolutely necessary to defend the safety of the free world, but that
we would use the amount of force that was necessary to defend the free
world.
WALLACE: As long as we're in the realm of speculation here, let's speculate a little further. What do you think the reaction
of the Soviet government would be to an announcement of that kind?
KISSINGER: Well, they would be very likely to deny that a war can be limited
because atomic blackmail is one of their most effective means of
expansion. If they can create the impression that any resistance to
Soviet aggression inevitably leads to the destruction of the country
concerned, then many countries will prefer surrender to defending
themselves. If they were faced with the real situation, however, all
past experience indicates that this is not a regime that gambles
everything on one throw of the dice.
WALLACE: In the field of foreign policy and military affairs, Dr. Kissinger, you're acknowledged
to be one of the most penetrating minds in the country. Last year, as
I've mentioned, you published a military analysis, which rocked
Washington. Yet, you devoted it almost exclusively to framing a war
policy rather than a peace policy. Could this be indicative of what is
happening to our thinking here in America? Isn't this indeed what many
of our allies criticize us for?
KISSINGER: Well, I... I would reject this description of my book. I did not frame a war policy; I
framed a policy which I think is the only one that is going to preserve
the peace. I am afraid that weakness is certainly going to lead us into
a position where finally we will be forced to engage in very extreme
measures to defend ourselves. I would therefore reject the description
of my recommendations as a war policy. Our problems abroad are more
complicated than this because on the one hand we are accused of an
over-emphasis on military factors; on the other hand, the fact of the
matter is that we are not strong enough to defend most of our allies.
And one of... I would at least suggest that one of the difficulties is
that our allies are both worried about our general political posture,
and at the same time feel that we are not capable of protecting them if
a showdown comes.
WALLACE: Uh-hum. What policies...? Let's move from war policies to positive peace policies. What policies do you
believe generally that we should adopt to help keep the peace, and at
the same time contain communism?
KISSINGER: Well, I hate again to differ with you but I cannot accept the distinction between war and
peace policies. Defense policies are essential to maintain the peace.
Er... They are not, however, going to solve the political problems of
the world. They are only going to give us a shield behind which we can
engage in constructive measures. What is essential right now is that we
identify ourselves with the tremendous revolution, which is sweeping
across the world, that we have some image for the construction of the
free world which is based on other motives than simply defending the
world against communism. We must make clear what we are for rather than
what we are against. If we were clearer about the kind of world we want
to bring about, if we could project this concern to other people, then
we wouldn't always seem so intransigently militant, then we would be
identified with positive measures rather than with simply military
alliances.
WALLACE: Well, let's talk about some specifics. How do you regard our conduct in regard to the Algerian situation of the
past few years?
KISSINGER: I think the Algerian situation is an extremely complicated and difficult one. In general, we should stand
for the freedom of people. In general, we should oppose colonial
regimes. On the other hand, we should come up with ideas which...
Independent Algeria cannot survive as a purely independent state. The
great paradox of this period is that on the one hand you have a drive
toward more and more sovereign states; on the other hand, there is no
such thing as a purely independent state any more. The thing that has
always attracted me, therefore, would be that we would advocate a North
African federation, which would be tied together economically and for
other development projects, and that Algeria would find its place as
part of that rather than as a purely independent state.
WALLACE: Do you look to the inclusion of Nasser and his peoples in this North African federation?
KISSINGER: Well, initially I would group... I would recommend grouping Tunisia,
Algeria, and Morocco. There might be another grouping of powers in the
Middle East which includes Egypt and some of the states which have had
a somewhat different history than the... than Algeria.
WALLACE: Would you say that our posture vis-à-vis Egypt has been a realistic
one? Do you not agree that the peoples of Africa would seem to respond
to Nasser, and that we seem to support governments in the Middle East
which do not always have the support of their actual inhabitants, and
that perhaps Nasser has more support than some of the other governments
from the people themselves?
KISSINGER: Well, our policy vis-à-vis Nasser has suffered from indecisiveness. We have neither been
conciliatory enough when we were conciliatory, nor intransigent enough
when we were intransigent. We're not friendly enough to make him a
friend, and we were not hostile enough really to bring him down, with
the result that we have suffered from the worst of both worlds.
WALLACE: What you're saying is we have no policy.
KISSINGER: That we've been governed by events rather than attempt to shape them. I
would think, however, that Ibn Saud does not represent the force with
which we should be identified in the Middle East.
WALLACE: Let me come back again to the study called Foreign Policy in the Free
Society. In it, philosopher Scott Buchanan says, "Our problem here in
the United States is to exist as a capitalist society in, possibly, a
completely socialist, revolutionary world." Now it would seem, to a
certain extent anyway, that that's the way the world is going. Is it
possible that we cannot exist in such a world?
KISSINGER: Well, you know, you could argue that the identification of 'socialist' and
'revolutionary' is not a very good identification. You could well argue
that a capitalist society, or, what is more interesting to me, a free
society, is a more revolutionary phenomenon than nineteenth-century
socialism; and this illustrates precisely one of our problems. I think
we should go on the spiritual offensive in the world. We should
identify ourselves with the revolution. We should say that freedom, if
it is liberated, can achieve many of these things.
WALLACE: Well, what is keeping us from going on the spiritual offensive, as you see it?
KISSINGER: Er... Because we've suddenly been projected into a situation for which
very little in our history has prepared us and because, I'm afraid,
many of the leadership groups that are engaged in foreign policy have
had a set of experience... which make... experiences which make it
rather difficult for them to come to grips with a really revolutionary
situation.
WALLACE: Well, now, in that regard, earlier this week, you told our reporter that as far as current leaders are
concerned, you said, "We have an administration of old men, happy with
the life they have led." And you considered this dangerous. Uh... You
smile now. What did you mean, and why is it dangerous, and why are you
smiling?
KISSINGER: Well, I made this statement. I think that the groups I was referring to are very well meaning, very sincere, very
patriotic people. The difficulty they have is that they think that the
world in which they grew up is the 'normal' world. Er... Their tendency
is, when a crisis arises, to try to smooth it over, and then to wait
and then to expect that the 'normal' forces would re-assert themselves.
Therefore they conduct policy a little bit like... er... maybe
small-town bankers, who think one can always draw interest on a good
situation. They conduct very often our policy as if Adenauer would live
forever, despite the fact that he's 82 years old. When there's no
crisis it's always very difficult to get agreement on a constructive
step; conversely, it often requires a crisis to make us engage in any
action.
WALLACE: Do you see any political leaders in the United States who, you believe, have a clear grasp of America's current place
in history?
KISSINGER: I think one of the very worrisome features of the situation is that I don't find any great moral dynamism
on either side.
WALLACE: When you say 'on either side,' you mean either on the democratic or on...
KISSINGER: Er... Either in the Democratic or in the Republican Party.
WALLACE: Well how... how do you account for that, Dr. Kissinger?
KISSINGER: (CLEARS THROAT) I think we've been assuming for too long that all we
had to do... First of all, we are a nation of specialists. We tend to
think that a problem is either economic or political or military. Many
of your questions earlier in the program seem to me to indicate this
when you said, "This is a policy of war, and that is a policy of
peace."
It is hard for us to understand that we have to be able to do military, political, economic and psychological things all
simultaneously. Then, we have been rather satisfied with the situation
in our country as it is and with the world in which we have lived. Our
response to the world has usually been to an overpowering threat from
abroad.
Therefore, even when we have engaged in constructive steps like the Marshall Plan, the Greek-Turkish aid program, which were
very great efforts, nevertheless we've always justified them on the
basis of a communist threat, very rarely on the basis of things we
wanted to do because of our intrinsic dynamism. I believe, for example,
that we reacted very wrongly to the riots in Latin America. Rather than
saying, "These are communist-inspired, and we must react to... we must
keep Latin America from going Communist," we should have said, "This
recalls us to our duty; these are things we want to do because of the
values we stand for, not because we want to beat the communists."
WALLACE: But the question... the question is, why are we as unaware, why are we
as unavailing? Is it because we have been projected into world
leadership in too much of a hurry, unprepared for it? Is that one of
the reasons?
KISSINGER: It... This is... one of our very basic reasons is that we've been projected too much in a hurry. And it also
must be said in fairness that we have done rather well considering all
the challenges that have been thrown at us. It is too bad that 'rather
well' isn't good enough. Another problem is that the people who emerge
in leadership positions in this country usually come from a lifetime of
experience, which doesn't prepare them for the conduct of foreign
policy; they may come from business or from law, or even from the
universities.
WALLACE: We're certainly not in the case of John Foster Dulles. How would you evaluate the overall impact of Mr. Dulles
on the world position of the United States?
KISSINGER: I think that Mr. Dulles is a very skillful tactician, that he shows
extraordinary ingenuity in escaping from specific crisis situations.
Unhappily, the real problem in the world at the moment is to prevent
the crises from arising; it is to project an image of American concern
and of American purpose. This... he is much less successful in doing.
He often gives the impression of being so infatuated with the mechanics
of foreign policy and with the negotiation aspect of foreign policy
that he has not succeeded in projecting the deeper things we stand for,
and often has created great distrust abroad.
WALLACE: Who, if any, are the men in public life whom you admire, you personally admire
and look to for leadership for the United States, Dr. Kissinger?
KISSINGER: Well, I must say first of all that I'm here as a non-partisan, that I'm an independent.
WALLACE: Understood.
KISSINGER: I... I don't stand for either party in this. This depends. I've
respected Mr. Stevenson in many of his utterances, respected Mr.
Acheson in many of his utterances, although I've disagreed with him
very much on other things. Er... It's very difficult for a party out of
power to prove what it can do.
WALLACE: But there's no... There is no Republican who comes readily to your mind, in whom you have
that... that confidence that that man has an understanding, the
understanding that we need to lead us at this time?
KISSINGER: I hate to engage in personalities. I think that Mr. Nixon in his public
utterances recently has shown awareness of the situation, but... I’d
rather not deal in personalities, if you ask me...
WALLACE: Of course... Yes. Of course, we're going to have to. We're going to have
to deal in personalities because personalities are leaders, and
personalities are the people who eventually have to enunciate the
issues. I'm sorry, sir, but our time has run out, and I'm very grateful
to you for coming here from Cambridge to spend this half-hour with us,
Dr. Kissinger.
Our survival and freedom, a thorny undertaking at best, has become even more difficult to hold onto in the nuclear
age. For this reason, we run the danger of seeking easy answers or of
despairing that there are any answers at all. Dr. Kissinger has
suggested a tough, challenging answer, part of the answer, in limited
war. But as he himself has put it, "History will not excuse the
inadequacy of our response because of the enormity of the challenge."
Next week is the last program on our scheduled Survival and Freedom series,
and on it we shall come to grips with what's been said on this entire
series by such guests as Reinhold Niebuhr, Justice Douglas, Aldous
Huxley, Adlai Stevenson, Pat Weaver, Cyrus Eaton, and Henry Kissinger.
Our guest next week, you see him behind me, will be Dr. Robert
Hutchins, a stormy petrel on the American scene, formerly Dean of the
Yale Law School and President of the University of Chicago, now
President of the Fund for the Republic. That's Robert Hutchins next
week. Till then, Mike Wallace. Good night.
Comment
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