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Chapter 18 |
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International politics is a struggle for power and this struggle has led to attempts to bring order to the international system. After World War I, nations sought international order through collective security in the form of the League of Nations, but American isolationism and other factors rendered the League largely ineffective. Collective security was resurrected after World War II with the creation of the United Nations in 1945, headed by a five-nation Security Council (US, UK, France, China, and the USSR--now Russia), each holding a mutual veto and charged with maintaining international peace and security.
The period from 1946 to 1991 was characterized by a bipolar conflict of superpowers -- the U.S. vs. USSR -- in which the UN was largely overshadowed. Disappointment with the UN gave rise to reliance on regional security, notably the creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) -- a military alliance of the U.S., Canada, and European democracies. For its part, the USSR countered with the Warsaw Pact, composed of the USSR and East European communist regimes. After the fall of communism in the USSR, the Warsaw Pact disintegrated. NATO, on the other hand, has sought to expand into the newly democratic nations of Eastern Europe. In 2002 a NATO-Russian Council was created to allay Russian fears of the growing NATO presence in Europe. The UN has enjoyed resurgence in importance since the end of the Cold War, although it must rely on the United States to take the lead in enforcing its resolutions.
The Legacy of the Cold War
The Cold War arose out of distrust between the U.S. and USSR, former allies in WWII, after Stalin used the Red Army to create a buffer zone of communist states in Eastern Europe in violation of wartime agreements to allow free elections. The USSR also failed to cooperate in a unified allied occupation of Germany, and Germany was divided and in 1948 Stalin unsuccessfully attempted to oust the U.S., Britain, and France from Berlin. The Soviet threat to create puppet regimes in Greece and Turkey in 1947 led to the Truman Doctrine, which promised Americans would "support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." This notion was expanded in what State Department Russian expert George F. Kennan articulated as a policy of containment -- a policy of preventing the Soviet Union from expanding its boundaries anywhere in the world. At the same time, the Marshall Plan (named for Secretary of State George C. Marshall) poured massive financial aid into Western Europe to rebuild the economies of the western democracies and thereby make them more resistant to communism. The subsequent formation of NATO then provided military support to contain the USSR.
The Cold War was marked by many confrontations, but the three most significant were:
1. The Korean War. 1950-1953. Communist North Korea invaded South Korea with the support of the USSR, on the heels of Communist takeover in mainland China in 1949. With the USSR boycotting the meeting, the U.S. secured a UN resolution to repel the invasion. The United States, under General Douglas MacArthur, was initially successful, but as MacArthur moved toward the Chinese border, Red China attacked with its million-man army, pushing American forces southward and a military stalemate ensued. When MacArthur urged use of nuclear weapons, Truman fired MacArthur for insubordination. Dwight Eisenhower, military leader of WWII Allied forces and successful Republican presidential candidate in 1952, was elected partly on the promise to "go to Korea" to end the unpopular war, which had cost 38,000 American lives. Eisenhower accepted a peace settlement dividing Korea into a communist North Korea and a capitalist South Korea, as before the war.
2. The Cuban Missile Crisis. 1962. Following the abortive “Bay of Pigs" invasion of Cuba by CIA-backed Cuban exiles using American military equipment, the USSR moved to protect Cuba and achieve parity in the world nuclear standoff by sending nuclear missiles to Cuba. Kennedy rejected military advice calling for a massive air strike, fearing setting off World War III, and instead responded with a naval blockade of Cuba. The tense nuclear standoff ended when the Soviet leader, Nikita Khruschev, ordered his ships not to break the blockade. Secretly, the US also agreed to withdraw nuclear missiles from Turkey in exchange for the Soviets removing them from Cuba.
3. The Vietnam War. Communist forces under Ho Chi Minh defeated the French at the battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1956, and in the Geneva Accords which followed, the former French colony was divided into communist North Vietnam and capitalist South Vietnam. South Vietnam communists did not accept this accord, however, and threatened the South Vietnamese government in 1960. Their guerilla forces, known as the Vietcong, became increasingly active and successful in the early 1960s. Kennedy sent 12,000 military advisers to aid the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN). By 1964, units of the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) had begun to provide military support for Vietcong guerilla forces in the South. In 1965, President Lyndon Johnson sent U.S. combat troops into South Vietnam and ordered a gradual increase in air strikes against North Vietnam; these U.S. forces would grow to over half a million. Nonetheless, the Vietcong grew in strength and in their 1968 Tet offensive they were able to blast their way into the American embassy in Saigon. Although American forces were victorious in purely military terms, it became increasingly clear that Johnson's promises of an early end to the war were belied by the facts. As the war dragged on and American casualties mounted, the war became increasingly unpopular in the United States. The fact that Vietnam was the first "television war," in which the gruesome realities of war were immediately brought into living rooms from coast to coast, was a factor in this unpopularity. By 1968 President Johnson felt obliged to end the seemingly ineffective bombing of North Vietnam, seek peace talks with the North Vietnamese, and announce to the American people that he would not seek the presidency in the 1968 elections. The subsequent election of Richard Nixon as president and appointment of Henry Kissinger as national security advisor, took place as Nixon promised to end the war in Vietnam “honorably.” The failure of the Paris Peace Talks led eventually to Nixon’s massive bombing of Hanoi in 1972. The North Vietnamese then agreed to terms of peace, which involved American withdrawal from Vietnam but promises of military support for South Vietnam. After Nixon's resignation in 1974, Hanoi renewed military pressure on South Vietnam. Congress refused President Gerald Ford's call for emergency military aid to South Vietnam, which fell to the North Vietnamese in April, 1975.
In the aftermath of the humiliation of the Vietnam War, a new isolationism permeated American politics. American military interventions became less popular as Soviet expansionism became more aggressive. There was little response to this Soviet expansion of political and military presence until the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, when President Jimmy Carter authorized CIA-funded military support for Afghan rebels fighting Soviet occupation. For the USSR, the nine-year war in Afghanistan was a major drain on human and economic resources; this is sometimes called “Russia’s Vietnam.” At the same time, support for rebuilding Western military forces and reasserting international leadership on behalf of democratic values was building. By the time President Reagan arrived in Washington in 1981, the defense buildup had already begun
The U.S. and NATO buildup extended through 1985, and the race for sophisticated and expensive technological defense systems exerted a heavy toll on the weak economy of the Soviet Union. These events set the stage for the end to the Cold War. In this context, when in 1985 the new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev came to power, he called for perestroika (restructuring) and glasnost (openness). His apparent liberalization of communism encouraged rebellion in Eastern Europe as Gorbachev withdrew Soviet forces and tolerated the destruction of the Berlin Wall. Inside the USSR, democratic forces led by Boris Yeltsin pressed for acceleration of reforms. Hardliners in the Communist Party, the army, and the KGB attempted a coup in 1991 but were defeated. The USSR officially ceased to exist on December 31, 1991, replaced by the Russian Republic. Post-Communist Russia has remained a source of concern, particularly on issues surrounding Russia's stockpile of nuclear weapons and its efforts to suppress political separatists in the Muslim republic of Chechnya.
Nuclear Threats
The nuclear weapons of the Soviet Union and US threatened the well being of the whole world during the Cold War. During the Cold War, it was thought that the danger of a nuclear world would be mitigated by deterrence: because each side had a second-strike capability, each would be afraid to carry out a first nuclear strike. This mutual assured destruction form of deterrence, acronym MAD, was sometimes called the "balance of terror."
Partly because new satellite spy technology made enforcement plausible, interest in arms limitations agreements grew in the 1960s. The Strategic Arms Limitations Talks (SALT I) that were concluded in 1972 limited anti-ballistic missiles (ABMs) to a specific number. The SALT II treaty in 1979 set limits on other types of nuclear weapons, but President Carter withdrew the treaty from consideration by the U.S. Senate after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Both Presidents Carter and Reagan did however agree to abide by SALT II as long as the Soviets did.
In 1991, the Strategic Arms Reductions Talks (START I) led to an agreement to actually reduce strategic nuclear arms. In 1993, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the START II agreement with Russia promised to reduce overall strategic nuclear warheads to 3,500, and to eliminate multi-warhead land-based nuclear missiles. The Treaty of Moscow has become the capstone of strategic nuclear arms reduction. Signed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President George W. Bush in 2002, the treaty calls for an overall limit of nuclear warheads at 1700-2200 by 2012.
In 1963 the US and USSR signed the Limited Test Ban Treaty which prohibited nuclear testing in the atmosphere, under water or in outer space. A later treaty in 1974 limited the size of weapons that could be tested to 150 kilotons. In 1992 Russia offered to end all nuclear testing, but the US under President Bush refused to go along. In 1996, however, President Clinton signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty that would prohibit all nuclear testing; the Senate refused to ratify it. The Nonproliferation Treaty of 1968 prohibited nuclear weapons technology transfer, but it has been largely ineffective as new nations have gone on to acquire nuclear technology: India, Pakistan, China, and North Korea. North Korea has demanded extensive U.S. aid to dismantle its nuclear facilities.
"Nondeterrable" nuclear threats remain in the form of possible missile attacks by a terrorist nation, possible dissident forces within the Russian military, or accidental missile launch. Biological and chemical weapons also pose a threat of mass destruction. In response to such missile threats there has been talk of building an ballistic missile defense, but no such system yet exists. President George W. Bush announced in 2002 that the U.S. was withdrawing from provisions of the SALT I Treaty of 1972 that prohibited the development, testing, or deployment of new ballistic missile defense systems.
When To Use Military Force?
The most difficult decision faced by modern American presidents is when to send US military forces into combat. The American public is willing to support the president as long as he explains that the goal is worth dying for. Prime among these is the concept that the target of military commitment should be a vital national interest. The United States should commit forces only after military objectives have been clearly defined and limited to what is believed to be achievable on a known timetable. There should be a plan for exit as well as entrance. The commitment of forces should be massive and overwhelming to achieve decisive victory with minimum casualties. The commitment of forces should be a last resort, following economic and diplomatic efforts, and should follow mobilization of the support of allies and the American people.
Political leaders, unlike military leaders, often see war as a continuation of politics by other means. Therefore, the military may be sent to protect interests that are important but not vital. A diplomat often can achieve results with the implication of a military threat. American military forces must be prepared to carry out a variety of missions in addition to conventional war:
The war on terrorism creates new conditions for using military force. American forces are prepared to use direct attacks on terrorist forces to capture or kill them, protect against attacks on nations that harbor terrorists or support terrorists, and to launch pre-emptive strikes on regimes that threaten to use weapons of mass destruction.
The War on Terrorism
Terrorism is a political act and the unpredictable nature of terrorism creates public fear and can undermine public confidence – terrorists hope that this climate of fear will lead to submission to the terrorists’ demands. Prior to the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington DC on September 11, 2001, most Americans thought of terrorism as foreign. After the attacks President George W. Bush outlined a broad “response to terrorism” to be fought both at home and abroad. The response had diplomatic, military, financial, investigative, and humanitarian components. It required new legislation, a new Department of Homeland Security in the federal government, and a military response focused upon Al Qaeda bases in Afghanistan and called Operation “Enduring Freedom.” In the wake of the national tragedy, Americans strongly supported these efforts.
After the end of the Gulf War in 1991 Saddam Hussein in Iraq agreed to destroy all of his chemical and biological weapons. United Nations inspectors were used to verify compliance. In 1998 Hussein ordered the inspectors to leave and his regime had regularly violated UN resolutions. As the US began a military buildup in the area, Hussein allowed inspectors to return, however on March 19, 2003, after giving Hussein 48 hours warning to leave, the US and Great Britain launched air strikes designed to remove him from power in what is known as Operation Iraqi Freedom.
President Bush has used several different lines of reasoning to justify the attack on Iraq, including the buildup of weapons of mass destruction. However, the US failed to convince the UN Security Council to support the military attack. While the American public initially supported the invasion, European public opinion was strongly against the war.
While the war strategy was similar to that of the Gulf War, the US Secretary of Defense wanted to use less US military personnel. The initial invasion moved very quickly and Baghdad fell in 21 days. The subsequent occupation and attempts to construct a democratic government have not gone as well. US casualties have risen rapidly with a growing insurgency. Officially, the US turned over sovereignty to an interim Iraqi government on June 30, 2004, but there are no plans to withdraw American troops from Iraq.
Military Force Levels
American military force levels are driven by the size of the threat the nation faces. For fifty years, the threat of the Soviet Union was the determining factor in American troop strength. The end of the Cold War has led to dramatic reductions in military force levels. Comparing 1990 levels with 2004, active duty military personnel were reduced from 2.1 million to 1.6 million. This initial plan envisioned regional aggressors as the most likely threat. After the Gulf War, force levels were directed against "Iraqi-equivalent" regional threats and planning was based on the successful defeat of Iraq. Fears also arose that another regional threat might develop and so it was determined that forces needed to be ready to deal with two simultaneous threats.
Many experts believe that American force levels are insufficient to deal with two threats at the same time. They point to the reduction in combat units and the limited transport and support services. Plus, deployments for humanitarian and peacekeeping missions detracts from troop readiness.
In the early Cold War years defense spending claimed as much as 58 percent of all federal expenditures or 10.5 percent of GDP. By 1965 this amount had begun to shrink, although it rose for a short period during the Vietnam War. With the end of the Cold War, military spending was cut. Because the economy has grown steadily, military cuts are even more dramatic when considered as a percent of GDP. In 2000, defense outlays were under 3 percent of GDP, compared to 6.5 percent of GDP at the height of the Reagan buildup in the 1980s and 10 percent during the Cold War. The War on Terrorism raised defense spending in 2003 to about 3.5 percent of the GDP.
Chapter Objectives
After mastering the concepts in this chapter, you will be able to
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