The New Realism

The hurly-burly atmosphere of Honolulu may not have seemed the most appropriate setting for a clearheaded, thoroughgoing analysis of U.S. policy in Asia. Yet, for all the haste and hoopla with which it was mounted, last week's conference between the leaders of the U.S. and South Viet Nam did in fact put the nation's goals-and the war itself-in clearer perspective.

The Viet Nam war is neither popular nor unpopular with most Americans. It is simply confusing. Nobody is better aware of that than Lyndon Johnson. Though the pollsters tell him that a substantial majority of Americans approve of his policies, he knows that he can rely only on a thin crust of active support; and a vocal opposition is constantly gnawing away at that crust. In large measure, the fault is his own, for he has never definitively explained the reasons, risks and alternatives involved in the American commitment to Viet Nam's struggle for independence.

The Honolulu conference was a good start toward changing that. Its three kinetic days held out hope that Johnson may succeed in mobilizing the good will of the American people behind a program of social reconstruction for the people of Viet Nam-and at the same time drive home the realization that neither military victory nor nation-building will be achieved quickly.

Two Fronts. In Washington, where Johnson's peace offensive helped to blunt the urgent demands of the war, the Administration's present attitude is known as "the new realism." It has crystallized as a blend of idealism and self-interest based on the acknowledgment that the military war cannot be won in a vacuum, that it will only be successful to the extent that it helps liberate the Vietnamese from poverty, ignorance and exploitation. As the President said in welcoming Saigon's leaders to Honolulu: "We are here to talk especially of the works of peace. We will leave here determined not only to achieve victory over aggression, but also to win victory over hunger, disease and despair."

The U.S., he emphasized, would in no way relax its military effort. On the contrary, Johnson pointed out, "the war we are helping them fight must be won on two fronts." And the second front, he added, "cannot wait until the guns grow silent and terrorism stops."

"Blind & Deaf." Much has been made of the disagreements between Washington and Saigon, particularly over the bombing of Haiphong and recognition of Viet Cong representatives at any future peace conference. Actually, the differences matter little. Lyndon Johnson has ruled out the first-for the time being, at least-and Hanoi has made the second academic. More important is the fact that the leaders of the two governments met face to face for the first time and came to understand their mutual aims. Most U.S. officials were convinced that while past Vietnamese leaders might have given short shrift to the social and political transformation of their country, Premier Nguyen Cao Ky fully understands the necessity for such a program. "We are dedicated to the eradication of social injustice among our people," said Ky. "We must bring about a true social revolution."

For those who question the feasibility of fighting a war and building a nation at the same time, Johnson had singularly acerbic words. "They belong to a group," he said, "that has always been blind to experience and deaf to hope."

Elephant & Mouse. It is no secret that the President puts Senator J. William Fulbright in this category, and true to form, the Arkansas Democrat attacked the Honolulu meeting as "a further obstacle to a negotiated settlement" because it so firmly committed Washington to support of the present regime in Saigon. Fulbright's views were echoed by several anti-Administration witnesses before his Senate Foreign Relations Committee-most notably George F. Kennan, former U.S. Ambassador to Moscow and a leading exponent of the "containment" policy that was designed to defend Europe against Soviet expansionism in the late 1940s.

Kennan's ideas have changed a bit since then. "I find myself a sort of neo-isolationist," he confessed. "I think we would do better if we would show ourselves a little more relaxed and less terrified of what happens in the smaller countries of Asia and Africa, and not jump around like an elephant frightened by a mouse every time these things occur." While he did not advocate that the U.S. "turn tail and flee from the scene," he agreed with an earlier witness, retired Lieut. General James Gavin, that it should hole up in selected enclaves and strike a strictly defensive stance. Kennan left no doubt (see box) that he was unhappy about "this unpromising involvement in a remote and secondary theater," an attitude that evokes distant echoes of Neville Chamberlain's dismissal of Hitler's plans to rape Czechoslovakia as "a quarrel in a far-away country between people of whom we know nothing."

New Testing Ground. Indeed, the testimony before Fulbright's committee pointed up a curious fact. Many liberal interventionists who were so ready to fight for Europe before World War II have become virtual isolationists today. Their rallying cry is that th.e U.S., though many times more powerful now than it was then, should never commit its manpower in Asia, and has no sound reason to do so. American troops have thus far proved that the U.S. can fight and fight well in Asia. As for the reasons for doing so, the President says in effect that Kennan's containment policy is as valid for Asia today as it was for Europe 20 years ago-perhaps more so, given the special virulence of the Asian strain of Communism.

"Were the Communist aggressors to win in Viet Nam," said Johnson, "they would know they can accomplish through so-called wars of national liberation what they could not accomplish through naked aggression in Korea, or insurgency in the Philippines, Greece and Malaya, or the threat of aggression in Turkey, or in a free election booth anywhere in the world."

Dual Goals. Where Moscow once was the menace and Europe the cockpit, the primary expansionist threat is now posed by Red China, and the testing ground is Viet Nam. Discussing what Viet Nam means to Peking's policymakers, M. A. Halpern, a Sinologist at Harvard's Center of International Affairs, last week told a University of Chicago conference: "Viet Nam is now at the center of China's policy of struggling against the U.S.; close to the center of its differences with the Soviet Union on strategy and tactics of national liberation wars; necessary for the maintenance of a coalition of Asian Communist parties; directly connected with China's drive for power in Asia; and a very important factor in China's efforts to swing the Third World in the direction it wants." Viet Nam is, in short, the test of Peking's credibility.

President Johnson has grasped this.

As a result, U.S. policy will increasingly look to dual goals. For the short term, the Administration will do everything in its power to help a beleaguered nation build the sort of society it wants, free from external interference. For the long term, it will pursue a strategy that is frankly rooted in self-interest. That aim is to blunt the growing threat of Communist China.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.