janc@uofm-cv.UUCP (Jan Wolter) (03/25/84)
[A discussion of Soviet-American Relations and the causes of war]
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** The following is based on a talk by Dr Henry J. Heimlich, **
** liberally mixed with my own opinions. **
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In considering the problems of Soviet American relations, we must start with
the fundamental question,
Why are we engaged in an arms race with the Soviets which
seems to be inevitable leading to worldwide disaster?
Curiously enough, it is rare to hear anyone raise this question, and rarer
still for anyone to attempt to answer it. Most of the anti-nuclear protest
here and in Europe is aimed directly at getting rid of the nuclear weapons.
The the weapons are not the problem. The problem is the mutual hostility
and distrust between the two most powerful nations in the world. Why?
Is it because our forms of government are mutually incompatible? Hardly. We
get on reasonably well with China and Yugoslavia, and seem to be good friends
with several governments that make the Soviets look like saints. Historical
antagonism? No, the Russians were our allies in both world wars.
Heimlich believes that the reason we are at war with the Soviets, is the same
reason that we went to war with the Germans and the Japanese, that is, for
economic reasons. Japan was a tiny nation with a large and growing population.
To live, Japan needed foreign trade. They needed to be able to import food
and raw materials, and they needed foreign markets to sell their products in.
However, the Europeans had shut them out of the mainland oriental markets and
the Americans had shut them out of the Philippines. They had formed exclusive
trade agreements, and enforced them with a naval presence. So, in desperation,
the Japanese tried taking territory by military means.
Similarly, Germany was virtually cut off from foreign trade before world war
one by the European economic community. They too tried military means. When
they failed, the Allies placed them in an economic straight-jacket worse than
before, and, sure-enough, the explosion was worse than before. Americans tend
to put the blame for world war two wholely on the charismatic maniac Hitler,
but there were no charismatic maniacs leading world war one Germany, or world
war two Japan.
Both nations found themselves under externally applied economic pressures such
that a war of conquest seemed the only viable alternative. After world war
two, in a flash of genius, American undertook to rebuild the economies of
Japan, Italy, and Germany. The Marshall Plan was a resounding success.
Whatever you think of those nations today, we are not likely to go to war
with them.
Let us return then to Soviet-American relations. Though the Soviets were our
allies in the second world war, we were suspicious of them. General Patton
advocated attacking the Russians as soon as the Germans were finished off,
while the military was still mobilized. Instead, we undertook a deliberate
policy of isolation to halt the spread of the Red Plague. This was done in
hopes that the Soviet government would quietly collapse, and, as the dust
settled, the liberated Russian peasants would come and ask us to help them
build a United States of Russia, so they could be free to celebrate the 4th
of July with everyone else.
Astounding though it seems, no one considered that we were placing the
Soviet Union in the same sort of position the Germans and Japanese had been
in, and no one noted that they were reacting the same way. The economic
pressure we applied, did not cause the system to collapse. Instead, it
warped into the only form of political structure which can withstand such
conditions--a military dictatorship. The presence of nuclear weapons and
a reasonably sane leadership on each side, has up to now, prevented actual
war from breaking out between the Soviets and Americans, but the stress has
polarized the globe, causing numerous minor wars and placing many third
world countries in untenable positions.
Yet the economic warfare continues. We severely limit trade with the Soviet
Union, and demand from our allies to do the same. We to blockade moves by
the Soviet to increase trade with Europe (e.g. the oil pipeline fiasco).
Those trade agreements we make with the Soviets, we use to jerk them around
like a dog on a leash (with grain yet). It's no wonder they're hostile.
What we need to do, is to allow real, free trade with the Soviets. The
American corporations are ready and waiting for the opportunity. The Soviets
need our trade, but we need the Soviets too. The markets we have are either
saturated with consumer goods, or are unable to pay for them. Our economy is
stagnant, caught between unemployment and inflation. The Soviet Union is
rich in resources, and can pay for what it buys. It is desperately in need
of the technology we don't know what to do with. The Soviet Union and the
United States are potentially the greatest trading partners in the history
of the world.
Certainly they will use some of their new found wealth to improve their
weapons systems. But they have weapons enough to kill us all several times
over already. Who gives a damn if they can kill us a few more times. If it
really bugs you, we can use some of our new found wealth to improve ours too
(surely you didn't think only the Soviets would be wealthier--you know our
American corporations). Even if there are more and better bombs in the short
term, the chances for peace would be infinitely better. Name any time in
history where good trading partners have gone to war with each other.
Maybe I'm wrong, maybe it won't work. What will be the ill effects? Do you
think we can start a war by trading with the Soviets? How many people will
be killed if it misfires? Certainly it's a much safer bet that continuing
with the present insane policy of economic harassment. Maybe the world isn't
ready for "Do onto others as you would have others do on to you," but surely
we are able to "Do good for others for your own benefit."
America is capable of making this decision. We proved it with the Marshall
plan. We'll have to strip the above of some of the harsher criticism of past
American policy to make it palatable, but it is a viable platform. Moreover,
this is the time to do it. The Soviet Union is undergoing a change in
leadership. When the new leaders appear they will very likely be willing to
forget past American policys if we do not continue in the same course. We
can hope that they will not, like the present leaders, be committed to an
anti-American stance. It is not certain how much longer it will be before
we are irrevocably committed to destruction. Let's do something now.
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The above is based on a talk by Dr Henry J. Heimlich, but is liberally
salted with my own opinions. Dr Heimlich is the inventor of the "Heimlich
Maneuver," (a procedure to help people choking on food particles) and of a
variety of important surgical procedures. He is said to be responsible for
saving more lives than any other man living. I was very impressed by his
views, and would like to hear opinions on the above. Do you agree with the
economic reasons for world war two? Is the above program viable? Would
such a program have effects on the third world nations? Did I spell
Heimlich right? (I heard this on the radio) Thank you.
Jan Wolter (uofm-cv!janc)
University of Michigandew@ihlts.UUCP (dewysama) (03/29/84)
[]
Concerning the political relations between the US and the USSR,
Marx some time ago pointed out that all such matters are
fundamentally economics, so there is nothing surprising in
Heimlich rediscovering this view.
It seems to me that much of Nixon's foreign policy was based
on increasing trade with the USSR, but as it is written
*it takes two to tango.*
After all, we did not build the Berlin wall. The Soviet government
is and always has been inherently paranoid and apparently oblivious
to the ethics and cooperation that underly business.
I heartily agree that if there is any hope of imroving our
relations, the initiative will have to come from us.
Reagan certainly hasn't done much to bring us closer together.
I fear, however, that trying to reason with a nation that shoots
down commercial airliners as a matter of state policy may present
a few unexpected difficulties.
--
ihlts!dew
At&T-Bell Labs IH 5B-411 (312) 979-4105keller@uicsl.UUCP (03/30/84)
#R:uofm-cv:-53300:uicsl:16300060:000:758 uicsl!keller Mar 29 11:09:00 1984 This is a single viewpoint analysis of the rise of the Soviet military state. There are plenty of contributing factors and perhaps more decisive ones, for example the confusion after the war, the fall of the czar, and the ideological orientation of the new government. The question of whether free trade would help or hurt is indeed an interesting one, and one that Libertarians might fervently promote on the belief that exposure to capitalism and its products would quickly undermine the repressive government. Maybe the only thing we need to drop on the USSR to topple the government is Sears catalogs. However, we should seriously consider whether the government could so control imports that only technology useful for warfare would be allowed. -Shaun
reza@ihuxb.UUCP (H. Reza Taheri) (03/30/84)
{}
This is true that economic reasons were partly responsible for the
World Wars. The further left of center you are inclined the more
obvious it becomes. Jack London wrote The Iron Heel around 1906. In
that book he predicted coming of a world war caused by the economic
strangulation of Germany by the US and the UK. I believe that even
conservative politicians admit some economic reasons for the two WWs.
But there is another economic reason for the US-USSR arms race.
You see, if the US keeps building up its arsenal, the USSR will follow
suit. Proof? They have done that in the past, haven't they? Now,
the US GNP is many times larger than the USSR GNP. The idea is that
if we make the Soviets spend as much money and resources on the
nuclear weapons as we do, it will affect their economy much more than
ours and eventually will drain their economic system and lead to some
kind of revolt by the Russian people.
If so, why should USSR follow this lead? Simple. Even though they
are tolling their resources more than the US does, they believe that
the race will bring down the US system first. This is because
Americans have more say in their lives and live in a more open
society. Even if an American is less affected by the build-up of the
arms race, he is more likely to have a reaction against it. A chaos
in the US caused by the arms race is going to benefit the Soviet
goals. Look at the difference between the anti-nuclear movements in
the US and the USSR.
Comments welcome.
H. Reza Taheri
...!(most major machines on the net)!ihnp4!ihuxb!reza
(312)-979-1040dew@ihlts.UUCP (dewysama) (03/30/84)
[]
Last night (3/29) on WNIB (Chicago), there was a
program on Nixon that highlighted his attempts to
establish broader trade with the USSR.
In ~1972, we consumated the "big grain deal" in which
we sold the Soviets all our surplus wheat. That
action drove the price here sharply higher and left
us in the odd position of watching food prices go
through the ceiling while we were loading their
tankers with our bargain-priced wheat.
Nixon wanted to have the USSR upgraded to "favored
nation status" which opens the door to trading a
broad line of products at favorable prices.
This whole matter was debated in Congress for ~2
years. Senator Jackson led the fight against
approval with strong support from labor. They
introduced legislation which prohibited trade
agreements with nations that did not follow our
"human rights" beliefs on things such as allowing
free emigration. His bill came to vote during the
election year, and it was the kind of thing that
anyone running for office could hardly vote
against.
This all was happening against the background of
Watergate, so the executive branch was scarcely
in position to put up much opposition.
Our relations with the USSR have rapidly gone to
pot since that time, so maybe Heimlich has a
valid point. It would be rather simiplistic, however,
to assume this matter has not been considered in
some depth by the government.
Hope my summary of the above did not contain too many
boo-boos. It is certainly not my field of expertise.
--
ihlts!dew
At&T-Bell Labs IH 5B-411 (312) 979-4105alan@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Alan Algustyniak) (04/02/84)
* dew says that the program he saw on TV said that as a resuult of a 'big grain deal' in which Nixon sold ALL of the US's surplus grain to the USSR, grain prices sky-rocketed here. I'm skeptical. It seems to me that selling our surplus grain to one of our standard buyers would cause the price of the non-surplus grain to go DOWN, not up, since the world supply is then greater, while the demand remains the same. Also, if the grain was really surplus, and we had all the farmers were goinf to sell us anyway, how in the world could our prices go up?? Also, in the US bought it as surplus, it certainly wasn't going to sell it on the US market and defeat the whole purpose of buying it in the first place. So again, how could this have caused our prices to go up?
al@ames-lm.UUCP (Al Globus) (04/04/84)
The concept of making the people of the USSR suffer and eventually revolt by forcing competition with the US has a serious flaw. The Russian people have an unbelievable ability to suffer (evidence, WWI and WWII). WWI did lead to a revolt, but the suffering was far beyond what any economic war or arms race could produce. In any case, the results of that revolt were far from favorable. By the way, only Congress can declare war and they have NOT declared war on the USSR. We are at peace with that country, contrary to what the executive branch of government would have us believe. Only Congress can say otherwise, and they haven't.