3. The Rich Men's Club

The US-designed global system required that order must reign within the rich men's club as well. Its lesser members are to pursue their "regional interests" within the "overall framework of order" managed by the United States, the only power with "global interests and responsibilities," Kissinger informed Europe in 1973 ("the Year of Europe"). In the early postwar years, a European third force could not be tolerated. The formation of NATO was in large part motivated by the need "to integrate Western Europe and England into an orbit amenable to American leadership," Leffler observes: "Neither an integrated Europe nor a united Germany nor an independent Japan must be permitted to emerge as a third force or a neutral bloc." Neutralism would be "a shortcut to suicide," Secretary of State Dean Acheson stated. The same was true outside the core industrial societies. While recognizing that the Russians were not responsible for conflicts in the Third World, Acheson warned in 1952 that the Russians might exploit such conflicts in an effort to "force the maximum number of non-Communist countries to pursue a neutral policy and to deny their resources to the principal Western powers" -- that is, to deny them on the terms the West demanded. General Omar Bradley also warned of "the suicide of neutralism," with Japan in mind.¹⁸

Western planners "did not expect and were not worried about Soviet aggression," Leffler writes, summarizing a well-established scholarly consensus: "The Truman administration supported the Atlantic alliance primarily because it was indispensable to the promotion of European stability through German integration." This was the basic motivation for the North Atlantic treaty signed in Washington in April 1949, which led to the establishment of NATO, and in response, the Warsaw Pact. Preparing for the April meeting, US policymakers "became convinced that the Soviets might really be interested in striking a deal, unifying Germany, and ending the division of Europe." This was regarded not as an opportunity, but as a threat to the "primary national security goal": "to harness Germany's economic and military potential for the Atlantic community" -- and to block "the suicide of neutralism."¹⁹

Note that "national security" is used here in its technical sense, unrelated to the security of the nation, which could only be endangered by these conscious steps toward superpower confrontation. Similarly, the phrase "Atlantic community" refers to its ruling elements, not its populations, whose interests are readily sacrificed if power and profits so dictate; by shifting production overseas to labor that is kept docile and cheap by state violence, for example.

"The real issue," the CIA concluded in 1949, "is not the settlement of Germany," which, it was believed -- and feared -- might be reached by an accord with the Kremlin. Rather, it is "the long-term control of German power." This "great workshop" must be controlled by the US and its clients, with no participation from the Soviet Union, despite the well-understood security interests of the country that had just been virtually destroyed by Germany for the second time in 30 years, and had borne the brunt of the war against the Nazis; and in violation of the wartime agreements on the Soviet role in Germany, which the US had already violated by March 1946, Leffler observes. The withdrawal of Soviet troops from Germany might be a desirable goal, Acheson held, but "the withdrawal of American and British troops from Germany would be too high a price." The "trend of our thinking," George Kennan recognized, "means...that we do not really want to see Germany reunified at this time, and that there are no conditions on which we would really find such a solution satisfactory." Unification of Germany might be a long-term desideratum, but "only if the circumstances are right," the State Department emphasized. US troops would therefore remain in Germany even if the Soviets proposed a mutual withdrawal; Germany would be integrated as a subsidiary part of the US-dominated global economy; and the Russians would have no significant voice in the outcome, would not receive reparations, and would not influence German industrial (or military) development.²⁰

That outcome would serve two crucial goals: weakening the Soviet rival, and reinforcing US dominance over its allies. Moves to end the Cold War, in contrast, would serve neither of these goals, and hence were never a serious option.

A third reason for opposing unification, Leffler observes, was concern over the "appeal of the left," reinforced by "the more vigorous recovery and political activism in the Soviet zone," including the space allowed for works councils with some managerial authority in denazified enterprises, and trade union organization. Washington feared that a unified labor movement and other popular organizations might interfere with US plans to restore traditional business rule. The British Foreign Office also feared "economic and ideological infiltration" from the East, which it perceived as "something very like aggression"; political successes by the wrong people are commonly described as "aggression" in the internal record. In a united Germany, the British Foreign Office warned, "the balance of advantage seems to lie with the Russians," who could exercise "the stronger pull." Division of Germany was therefore to be preferred, with the Soviet Union excluded from any voice over the heartland of German industry in the wealthy Ruhr/Rhine industrial complex.²¹

For many reasons, confrontation seemed preferable to accommodation. Whether that might have been possible is a matter for speculation. Throughout, a major concern was integration of the core industrial societies in a world order dominated by the US state-corporate nexus.

A decade later, Europe had substantially recovered, thanks in large measure to the policies of "international military Keynesianism" undertaken by Washington from shortly before the Korean war -- which served as a pretext on the assumption, too convenient to require evidence, that the Russians were setting forth on world conquest. As recovery proceeded, fears of European independence and neutralist tendencies increased. Kennedy's Ambassador to London, David Bruce, saw "dangers" if Europe "struck off on its own, seeking to play a role independent of the US"; like others, he wanted "partnership -- with the United States in a superior position," Frank Costigliola comments. Kennedy's "Grand Design" was an effort to manage the allies, but with mixed results. France was a particular annoyance. Kennedy feared that President Charles de Gaulle might make a deal with the Russians that "would be acceptable to the Germans," and was "extremely concerned" about intelligence reports suggesting a Franco-Russian deal to shut the US out of Europe, close associates recalled. Another concern was the gold drain, taken to be French-inspired. A still further irritant was de Gaulle's position on Indochina. His advocacy of diplomacy and neutralization was completely unacceptable to the Kennedy Administration, which was committed to military victory and, at the time, was struggling to undermine and deflect Vietnamese initiatives on all sides to settle that conflict without a major international war. In Indochina, as in Europe and throughout the Third World, neutralism was anathema to US planners, "a shortcut to suicide."²²

¹⁸ Kissinger, American Foreign Policy; Leffler, Preponderance, 17, 449, 463.

¹⁹ Ibid., 282f.

²⁰ Ibid., 284, 156. Acheson, Kennan, cited by Gaddis, Strategies, 76.

²¹ Leffler, Preponderance, 117, 119. DD, ch. 11. On "aggression," see FRS, 114f.

²² Costigliola, in Paterson, Kennedy's Quest, quoting Theodore Sorenson; also George Ball. Wachtel, Money Mandarins, 64f. On Kennedy and Vietnam, see RC. On the impact of "international military Keynesianism" after the failure of the aid programs, see particularly Borden, Pacific Alliance; DD, ch. 1, for other sources and comment.