American Foreign Policy in the Light of National Interest at the Mid-Century

AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN THE LIGHT OF NATIONAL INTEREST AT THE MID-CENTURY by GEORGE A. LUNDBERG By following the policy we have adhered to since the days of Washington we have prospered beyond precedent; we have done more for the cause oi liberty in the world than arms could effect; we have shown to other nations the way to greatness and happiness. . . . But it we should involve ourselves in the web oi European politics, in a war which could effect nothing, . . . where, then, would be the last hope oi the friends oi ireedom throughout the world? Far better it is . . . that, adhering to our wise pacific system, and avoiding the distant wars oi Europe, we should keep our own lamp burning brightly on this western shore, as a light to all nations, than to hazard its utter extinction amidst the ruins of fallen or tailing republics in Europe. —HENRY CLAY, 1852 We went into the fight [the Korean war] to save the Republic oi Korea, a free country established by the United Nations. . . .

Meanwhile, we must continue to strengthen the iorces oi ireedom throughout the world. . . . That means military aid, especially to those places like Indo-China which might be hardest hit by some new Communist attack. . . . In Europe we must go on helping our friends and allies to build up their military iorces. . . . —HARRY S. TRUMAN, address to Congress, 1952 George Andrew Ltindberg was born in Fairdale, North Dakota, October 3, 1895. He received his A.B. degree at the University of North Dakota in 1920, his M.A. at the University of Wisconsin in 1922, and his Ph.D. degree at the University of Minnesota in 1925. He was also a Fellow in Sociology at Columbia University and he studied at the University of London. He has taught sociology at the University of Washington, the University of Pittsburgh, the University of Minnesota, Columbia University, and at Bennington College. Since 1945 he has been head of the Sociology Department at the University of Washington. He has filled a number of governmental posts, including research supervisor, F.E.R.A., and consultant of the National Resources Planning Board. He was president of the American Sociological Society in 1943 and he has also served as president of the Sociological Research Association and of the Conference on Methods in Science and Philosophy. He was in France with the American Expeditionary Force during the first World War. In 1952 he served as Research Consultant to the Air Force in Japan with the rank of colonel. He received the Distinguished Achievement Medal from the University of Minnesota in 1951.

Professor Lundberg's chief books are: Social Research (1929); Leisure: A Suburban Study (1934); Foundations of Sociology (1939); Can Science Save Us? (1947). He is nationally recognized as a leading protagonist of rigorous scientific method in social science. He has been one of the few sociologists who has, from the first, recognized the paramount importance of foreign policy for both social science and public welfare. He has applied to this subject the same unflinching scientific method that he has so ably utilized in the study of domestic social problems. He has not fled for succor or cover to our "Ministry of Truth." His insight, candor, and courage in dealing with the bearing of foreign policy on sociology and social science are reflected in his presidential address before the American Sociological Society on "Sociologists and the Peace" (American Sociological Review, February, 1944), which thoroughly aroused the traditionalists in the society; his article on "Scientists in Wartime" in the Scientific Monthly, February, 1944; Chapter VI in his book, Can Science Save Us?; his article on "Semantics in International Relations" in American Perspective, June, 1948; and his article on "Conflicting Concepts of National Interest" in American Perspective, Fall, 1950. No man living is better equipped than Professor Lundberg to examine and assess contemporary American foreign policy in terms of social and political science.

I. THE MEANING OF NATIONAL INTEREST The only realistic way of defining national interest from the standpoint of policy is in terms of (1) the values cherished by the people of a nation, or by their de facto spokesmen, in relation to (2) the costs, and (3) the resources available. If these values are security, liberty, equality, and fraternity, as defined by the people in question, the national interest is served by whatever policies conduce to these ends. If these values are expansion, domination, conquest, or the evangelization of an ideology, whether of Christianity, Communism, or Democracy, then the national interest is served by all measures that contribute to these goals. Questions of national interest begin, therefore, with an inquiry into the values of the people of a nation (or of their de facto spokesmen), always in view of the sacrifices entailed in realization. In countries where the consensus of the adult population is supposed to determine national values and policies, extensive and intensive polling is one method of determining existing values and, therefore, the definition of the national interest. For countries and populations professing or practicing no democratic doctrines, the same basic information can presumably be secured with much less trouble from the dictator, the king, or the pope currently in power.

With such a statement of the values before us, social scientists should be able reliably (1) to construct policies in accordance with these values, (2) to determine their feasibility in the light of available resources and the sacrifice-potential of the population, and (3) to measure the degree to which the policies adopted do or do not actually contribute to the national interest as defined. Informally, and perhaps to some degree unconsciously, the above is approximately the natural process by which national interests and national policies are, in fact, determined. The imperfections of inNOTE: Some parts of this essay first appeared in American Perspective, Summer, 1949, and Autumn, 1950. 557 55& PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE formal and unconscious methods in large societies, however, become very great because of the breakdown of the kind of intimate communication and communion which operates in primary groups.

Hence, formal methods of determining the existing consensus have appeared, such as elections and polling. The cultural compulsion to invoke the plebiscite, at least in form, appears to be very great throughout the Western world. The plebiscite is solemnly maintained even in times and places where everyone recognizes its completely farcical nature. In fact, elections and mass voting seem to take their place among the vast superstructure of folkways, customs, and ceremonials which survive long after the population has forgotten the original purpose of the ritual. Up to the present time the direct empirical investigation of the values of men in different cultures has somehow seemed beyond the proper province of scientific inquiry. It has been felt that this is a subject rather for religious and philosophical speculation, intuition, or for the judgment of politicians and "writers."1 Even social scientists have generally been under this misapprehension.

The development of the technique of public opinion polling within the last fifteen years, however, now definitely has made possible the reliable determination of values of all kinds among different groups. Foreign policy is usually conducted by a few persons. The wise or unwise decisions of these few, from the standpoint of their own definition of national interest, is actually what is operative in concrete situations. This state of affairs makes all the more important, from the democratic point of view, the application of new methods of more reliably determining the wider basis of national values and conceptions of national interest in the underlying population. In addition to the desirability of correctly gauging national interest according to the values of the people in one's own country, it is necessary for the administrators of national policy to have a keen appreciation of how these values and policies appear to the minds of the governing classes and masses of other countries. In the future this basic information can be determined much more reliably through the application of the technique of public-opinion polling.

The extent to which there exists in a nation any single goal or goals that are held in common to a high degree is itself a question AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 559 of fact. To the extent that the goals and ideals actually cherished by groups within a nation are different, the definition of national interest will be correspondingly obscure. Inquiry into this subject is likely to reveal that, while there is high agreement about the ends, there is sharp disagreement about means. Accordingly, the first task in the determination of policy is to determine how the values of different economic or religious classes, regions, or other classifications of men, agree or differ (1) with respect to goals and (2) with respect to permissible or desirable means of pursuing the desired ends. This essay is not concerned with the question of whether national interest is a desirable or defensible goal of policy. There are those who, like certain adolescent "world citizens," have loftily dismissed nationalism as a primitive and parochial ethnocentrism and have started for themselves to live, perhaps a bit prematurely, but with some attempt at consistency, in realms transcending national self-consciousness. They would, presumably, argue that national interest and world interest are identical or, in any event, that the national interest must be subordinate to world interest.

In this connection would doubtless arise, also, the question as to whether national interest should not be liquidated in a general pool from which all humanity should share equally. We confine ourselves here to a very much less romantic but more practical problem, namely: What is the relation of certain specific policies now under discussion to the national interest of the United States.2 II. CONTINENTALISM VERSUS THE NEW INTERNATIONALISM If we accept the proposition that a desirable definition of national interest should be based on a consensus of the values of the population as a whole, then a very much more adequate and relia560 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE ble inquiry into the nature of these values than has hitherto been undertaken would be necessary. In the absence of such data, however, it is possible to discuss the subject in frankly hypothetical and approximate terms. That is, we may accept certain current statements of the national interest and follow through with a consideration of whether and to what degree actual policies now pursued serve the proclaimed end. This essay will consider and evaluate from this point of view the two principal conceptions of the national interest which are at present before the country.

The policy of continentalism affirmed a concentration of interest on the continental domain and the development in this area of a civilization in many respects peculiar to itself and to the potentials of its own heritage. Concretely, the policy meant nonintervention in the controversies and wars of Europe and Asia and resistance to the intrusion of European or Asiatic power systems and imperial ambitions into the Western Hemisphere. At the same time the policy reserved complete freedom of action as to the concrete acts which the national interest might dictate. Washington urged, for example, all necessary preparation so that the United States could "choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel." It should be obvious that this policy, both in its origin and in its subsequent affirmation and implementation in instruments like the Monroe Doctrine, was in no sense "isolationism," as those opposed to the policy have ignorantly or fraudulently attempted to maintain.3 It was a positive program permitting the making of whatever temporary arrangement with other governments seemed desirable, for choosing war or peace as the national interest seemed to dictate without any permanent commitment to one or another European combination, either under the guise of "world government" or otherwise. The policy did, in fact, contemplate and encourage active commerce and trade with other nations and there was no hesitation to apply force anywhere in the world when the national interest seemed to justify it as, for example, in the case of the Barbary pirates. For a hundred years or more this policy was reaffirmed and applied with remarkable consistency and with the overwhelming support of the people.

The phrase "isolationism" implies a policy of nonintercourse of AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 561 any kind with other countries, a situation which probably cannot exist under modern conditions and which, in any event, has not existed in the Western world for centuries. A highly developed system of diplomatic, trade, and other relations has, of course, existed ever since the appearance of national states. No one, perhaps, is opposed to such relations, although there may be some question about particular proposals. Very few people are opposed to more adequate world organization for the same reason that very few are opposed to good weather, health, peace, prosperity, or happiness. Extremely proper and crucial questions may, however, be asked about types and methods of organization. To designate all who question a particular proposal as "isolationist" is merely using the word as an epithet. This use of the word enables its user to digress from the issues and eloquently to attack a position which nobody holds.

The isolationist-internationalist issue can, therefore, be regarded only as a device which has distracted attention from sober consideration of the real issues and problems of international organization. Some of these have to do with fundamental questions of physical and cultural regions, resources and technology, and with our knowledge of organizational techniques, rather than with questions of the survival of defunct empires, the designation of good men and bad men, the superiority of "our way of life," and the whole traditional moralistic-legalistic attitude. These are not questions of internationalism versus isolationism. In short, the whole frame of reference within which current discussion of international policy is carried on is at best based on ignorance of the real issue and at worst on intellectual fraud. The conception of national interest which departed from continentalism supported overseas expansion and the playing of a major role in world affairs. This conception took various forms, usually referred to as the policy of imperialism, "the new internationalism," or by various names given to idealistic aspirations for world government. In its original form, as expounded by Captain Alfred T. Mahan, it was frankly imperialistic and was supported only by certain business interests, a small group of intellectuals, and a well-financed, extremely articulate, and influential group of 562 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE professional "peace" agitators. Generally, the policy has been defended on the ground that it would pay rich dividends to the nations engaging in it and also because it would become the instrumentality of extending the blessings of industrial society and its culture to the "backward" peoples of the earth. As to the alleged economic profitableness of imperialism, a more adequate accounting soon revealed that, while it did pay well for certain individuals and corporations, its profitableness to the nation, after expenditures for the resulting armaments and wars were considered, was nil. By 1917 the economic argument, except for a continuing delusion about the importance of foreign trade, had been largely supplanted, at least in the propaganda, by idealistic and humanitarian appeals for Wilson's policy. Since that time this conception of national interest has been maintained chiefly in the name of world peace, notwithstanding the fact that, under it, the United States has become involved in two world wars within twentyfive years. A third war is, at this writing, in progress in the name of an international organization representing chiefly the United States and her allies.

The policy here under appraisal represents a departure, under the stress of international crises and war, from the traditional policy, with a vigorous return to the latter between the two wars. At no time has there been evidence of widespread public support of the new internationalism. Only under the impact of concentrated propaganda from the highest official sources regarding the alleged imminent peril, including invasion, of the nation has the necessary support been secured for the wars under cover of which the two ventures into the new internationalism has been achieved. Wilson became president in 1916 and Roosevelt in 1940 on the most outspoken pledges of nonparticipation in European and Asiatic wars. Wilson's departure from this policy was overwhelmingly repudiated in 1920 and his internationalist program was subsequently dropped from the Democratic platforms of 1924 and 1928. Franklin D. Roosevelt himself explicitly declared, in 1932, his opposition to our joining the League of Nations. The neutrality legislation of the 1930's represented a return to our traditional foreign police, and only as a result of the provoked attack upon Pearl Harbor was it possible again to secure a declaration of war in 1941.

AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 563 Since the country has been, in reality, on a war basis ever since (the period from 1945 to date is politely called a "cold" war), it is too soon to report on the reaction to commitments again entered into during the second World War. Also, it appears that during this period we made sufficient progress toward a one-party government (much deplored when practiced in other countries) under the name of a "bipartisan" foreign policy, so that no choice on the subject of foreign policy was afforded by the major parties in the elections of 1944 and 1948. It is true that the commitments entered into have been ratified by Congress and that vigorous official participation in the socalled United Nations is underway, although at this writing small progress is evident in the solution of the principal international impasse that has existed since the war.

As for the world government idea, the fact seems to be that there is negligible public support for the organized movement, despite tremendous publicity and agitation. While the public-opinion polls show a variety of results regarding more or less romantic questions about international relations in general and the United Nations in particular, the crucial issue is whether and to what extent people would be willing to relinquish national sovereignty in the interest of international organization. On this point there appears to be always less than a majority and usually from 17 to 20 per cent who favor the idea when the question is put to them in realistic terms.4 A poll in 1949 in Norway, and one in the state of Washington,5 showed 13.2 per cent and 12.1 per cent, respectively, returning affirmative answers to the question, "Would you favor a world government even if it meant giving up our national independence?" The fact that a country in Norway's position still values her national sovereignty so highly is a pretty good indication of the slender amount of sentiment for world government at present, except that the Norwegian figure represents perhaps the maximum. Among the active propagators of the new internationalism, the largest of the various world-government organizations has a membership of only about 40,000, and the total membership in all such organizations is perhaps considerably under 100,000. In view of this slight foundation of actual support, it is not surprising that international organizations find themselves in difficulty when564 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE ever they confront serious crises. Incidentally, Woodrow Wilson himself conceded before his death in 1924 that, in view of the lack of public support in the United States for the League of Nations, it was better that the United States abstained from entering into that commitment,6 although he had previously contended that our failure to join the League was due to a few "evil" senators.

Even among those who accept the notion of world government with a concomitant loss of national sovereignty, it could perhaps be shown that no considerable number of Americans are contemplating anything but an American world organization. To nearly all Americans who favor the program world organization means American ideals, American democracy, and American ideology benevolently foisted on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this raises the practical question of how appealing this system is to people of other nations. In the absence of comprehensive international public-opinion polls, we may cite the estimates by French and British students who have recently reported on the subject. One of them says, "For the most important and most dynamic masses all over the world, the American ideology is either repugnant or devoid of meaning. Consequently, American power is not on the side of people's hopes."7 Another says, "The American way of life, as a model and as propaganda, is meaningless to the European, with his denser population and more acute problems."8 These are the estimates of competent and responsible French and British spokesmen. Is it necessary to ask what the attitude of Asiatic peoples is?

III. SECURITY AND PROSPERITY Each of the policies outlined above is supported by its respective followers as the most effective means toward the national interest. Scientific inquiry would doubtless show numerous factors in a AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 565 nation's conception of its interest. For the sake of brevity we shall here consider only the two objectives which are most commonly advanced as goals of national policy, namely, (1) security and (2) prosperity. The term security is perhaps the most general and inclusive of the goals usually mentioned as a primary objective of national policy. Security, to any person, usually means the absence of a felt threat of deprivation of any of the conditions which he highly values. It follows that the notion of security probably includes "freedom"9 and most of the other values frequently specified as goals of national policy. Accordingly, it also often happens that he who has most to lose is oppressed with the greatest feeling of insecurity. For this and other reasons it is possible that American leaders, and through them the people of the United States, have developed definitely paranoid10 attitudes with respect to security as measured by objective standards and by the standards of other peoples.

While attitude on foreign policy is determined largely by leaders who are supposed to be in a position to judge these matters, an unwarranted tendency to hysteria on the part of the masses is evident. A nation in which millions of people can be frightened by a radio broadcast into accepting as authentic a wholly fanciful news broadcast about an invasion from Mars, betrays a state of nerves that must be considered pathological. Especially is this true if one considers that it was not principally the illiterate part of the population who were the chief victims of the panic, but rather definitely middle-class people with considerable "education."11 Or, consider the ease with which vast numbers of Americans have accepted the notion that we have, on two separate occasions in the last thirty-five years, been in imminent danger from invasion by Germany and by Japan. No logistics have ever shown that such events were within a range of probability requiring concern. Subsequent investigations have shown that such operations have, in fact, never been contemplated by the countries in question. Yet it is perhaps correct to say that a considerable public in the United States lives in more or less constant fear of such eventualities.

It is true that, when pressed, the propagators of this fear admit 566 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE that they have in mind rather a future development after our present enemies have consolidated extensive intermediate conquests. This is always on the assumption that enemy nations are motivated by insatiable desires for world conquest as an end in itself, instead of as a means to their own security. Even if such programs of conquest could be shown to have existed as enemy projects for the more or less remote future, they surely would undergo modification in the process of attainment. In any event, the only nation that has ever come into power of such proportions as actually to constitute a possible world conqueror is the United States and, even in its case, there is no reasonable probability that it could make good such a conquest. As for the alleged plans of Germany and Japan, and more recently of Russia, to conquer the world, even if such plans could be shown to have existed or to exist, there is every reason to believe that the same forces that have made nations like the United States and Britain greatly interested in promoting world peace would be likely also to overtake other nations. That is, when a nation has completed its own conquests and would be very happy if it could be guaranteed their permanent retention, it usually becomes greatly interested in promoting programs of world government to maintain the status quo, to prevent "aggression," and to establish permanent peace.

The impasse which an unreasonable or paranoid definition of national security may produce is illustrated currently in the case of the United States. According to current policy, our national security demands military bases around the world and elaborate military establishments off the shores or on the frontier of other nations. Perhaps no one will question the purely military advantage of such a program. However, its implications must be considered from the viewpoint of other nations. It is solemnly affirmed that these provisions are for defense only, and any person, party, or foreign nation that fails to take our word for this intent is roundly abused and is accused of aggressive designs upon us. Now I am personally satisfied that no considerable element in the population, and probably few important leaders in the United States, are consciously intent on aggression or the conquest of other nations. It is impossible to see, however, why foreign nations should take this AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 567 view of the matter and accept our word as an adequate assurance of our intent. The failure of some foreign nations to take our word at its face value in this respect is regarded with pained surprise.

The feeling seems to be that our pacific intentions are selfevident or that, in any event, our past record and present reputation should be sufficient guarantee of the purely defensive nature of our policies. Unfortunately, the historical record and the reputation support precisely the contrary thesis—a fact that may be regrettable but which must, nevertheless, be conceded by anyone not hopelessly in the toils of ethnocentric delusions. Professor Sibley recently summarized in briefest outline the record of the United States with respect to war and conquest, as follows: It is difficult to know just what the United Nations Charter means when it speaks of its constituent members as "peaceloving"; but if it means by the term a relative absence of war in the history and traditions of the nations involved, it is not speaking of the United States. First the long and costly American Revolution; then the undeclared war with France; then the war against Tripoli; the fatuous War of 1812; miscellaneous and costly Indian wars between 1800 and 1860, many of them arising because of treaties broken by the United States; the frankly imperialist war against Mexico; the long and bloody Civil War; an extensive series of wars against socalled "uncivilized" Indian tribes beginning shortly after the conclusion of the Civil War; the Spanish-American War; the cruel and costly suppression of the Filipino insurrection; undeclared wars in the Caribbean area during the administration of the "anti-imperialist" Woodrow Wilson; the First World War; undeclared war against Nicaragua during the twenties; and finally the enormously costly Second World War. That is the record—one year in four, conservatively estimated, a war year.12 For the same period of national existence there are perhaps few, if any, countries, except Great Britain, that could equal the record.

568 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE At the very least, foreign nations cannot help but note that twice within the last thirty-five years the United States has invaded both Europe and Asia with military expeditions that could not, except by the wildest stretch of the imagination, be termed defensive. The invasion of Russia in 1919 is not even known to many Americans. It is these objective facts, not our pious and perhaps sincere pretensions regarding them, that must weigh in the opinion of foreign countries. Nor does it help to contend that, in recent years, we have not kept, and do not intend permanently to retain, any of the territory conquered. The regimes we have protected, established, or bolstered in the invaded areas are, from the standpoint of our enemies, merely so many Quisling regimes openly supported financially and with military supplies for the purpose of strengthening our military, economic, and political position for whatever program we see fit to adopt. Possibly the point can best be summarized by asking what would be the attitude of the United States if Germany should have declared, in 1917 or in 1940, and Russia today should insist, that they need to occupy Cuba and make extensive military installations in Mexico purely as a defensive measure against the most powerful and dangerous military power the world has ever known?

At this point, in attempting to determine whether United States' policy in the two world wars and after has been in the national interest, it will be useful to consider the probable consequences of alternative policies. It is significant that doubts regarding American intervention in the two world wars tend to grow as time permits increasing perspective for the appraisal of its effects. The unwisdom of our participation in World War I and the relative tolerableness of the probable consequences of our nonparticipation are now considered everywhere as at least debatable, with a large body of expert and informed, as well as popular, opinion leaning in the direction that the whole undertaking was definitely contrary to the national interest. Even the possible domination of Europe, at least as a sphere of influence, by the Germany of 1914 is now regarded as highly tolerable compared with such developments as the Nazi regime and the second World War. As an inAMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 569 strument toward the unification of Europe, which is generally regarded as desirable, the possibility in question would seem greatly preferable to any development now in prospect. Any eventuality which would have resulted in the rationalization of the economy of Europe, avoidance of the war debts and reparations tangle, and other results which would almost certainly have softened or avoided the economic consequences of the first World War as they actually transpired, would certainly, to a great extent, have served the national interest of the United States as well as that of the world.

(See Section VIII, below.) Granting that is not possible to specify in detail all the consequences which the traditional policy of the United States would have involved, it is nevertheless significant to note the increasing consensus with the passing of time that neither the national interest of the United States nor the interest of the world was served by our policy in 1917. With respect to World War II, the Gallup poll showed the following results in 1946 and 1947: Do you think it was a mistake for the United States to enter World War II? Yes No No opinion 1946 (April) 15% 77% 8% 1947 (October) 24% 66% 10% It will be noticed that affirmative answers increased from 15 to 24 per cent in one and one-half years. For some reason the question has not, to my knowledge, been asked since 1947. There are those, of course, who contend that the people's view of these matters, under the influence of mass hysteria, are actually more sound, reliable, and in accordance with the facts than their appraisal of the same situation in periods between wars and in the perspective of years and decades of considered judgment when they have the relevant facts at hand. Thus it has been contended recently that it was the "revisionists' " appraisal of the first World War that was erroneous, that the war propaganda was true, and that in the future we must protect ourselves against revisionism.

570 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE Perhaps we are entering upon an era of permanent war during which the distortion of the facts, which we now regard with such horror in other lands, is about to become also our settled and permanent policy. In the meantime it is impossible to prevent "revisionism/' for it is merely the report and appraisal of events as seen in the light of fuller information, perspective, and undisputed consequences. Any discussion of alternate policies is, of course, faced with the difficulty that while the results of the policy adopted are known, the effects of those that were not adopted can only be surmised. This is a difficulty which all social appraisal must face, except within that limited domain where actual experimentation with different policies is possible. Still, in view of the results that have in fact ensued under the policy adopted in 1917 and in 1941, it is at least possible, within wide limits of probability, to appraise alternate policies. That is, it is possible to marshal logical evidence that will satisfy most men of the probability that an alternative policy would have been preferable, even conceding a wide margin of imponderables.

There can be no final determination of the legitimacy of a nation's definition of its own security. There is no absolute security and there is no certain method of appraising the degree of security that exists. This essay merely raises three questions which Americans need to ponder seriously in their quest for security: (1) What would be the situation if all nations should adopt our own view as to what their national security demands? (2) Has our security increased as a result of the last war and the policies of which it was the result? (3) Is our national security likely to be increased even under the most optimistic probable outcome of present policies? Next to the security argument for the new internationalism, the most important consideration urged is its alleged benefits to foreign trade. Hereby hangs one of the most amazing delusions to be found in the confused annals of economic and political discussion. The advantages of trade have been appreciated throughout all historic times and need neither explanation nor defense. A simple semantic confusion regarding the meaning of the word AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 571 trade lias, however, resulted in a delusion which is only the more mischievious and astonishing because of the extent of its diffusion among the very people who need to be, and might be expected to be, immune to it. Thus, millions of people, including economists and, of course, politicians and "statesmen," are unable to appreciate the crucially important difference between (1) exchanging commodities and services between nations and (2) the process by which one party sends commodities and services to the other and at the same time provides the purchaser with money with which to "pay for" the things received. As a result it is actually believed that "prosperity" is served by the second as well as by the first of these transactions. It is insisted that we must "get rid of seven billion dollars a year of our export surplus as "insurance against depression/' It is difficult to imagine a more colossal confusion of means and ends. "Full employment" would be just as certainly guaranteed by dumping the seven billion dollars' worth of goods into the ocean. We are not here concerned with the propriety or desirability of charity or loans from which the lender expects a return (economic or political) or which, in any case, may build up the bona fide purchasing power of the recipient. We are concerned only with the infatuation with economic processes and symbols to the point where it is actually believed that the national interest is served by exporting our national resources in return for I.O.U.'s worth only the paper on which they are written.

The self-sufficiency of different nations will obviously vary according to their location, resources, technology, etc., and these conditions are the logical ones which should, and usually do, determine the extent and type of a nation's international trade commitments. The position of the United States and her satellites in the Western Hemisphere in this respect is known to be very fortunate. The problem of strategic commodities is being increasingly met by new synthetic products or by stock-piling. In any event, a nation or an area which produces a surplus of food is always, in the present world, in a strategic position to dictate the conditions of her foreign trade. While particular business concerns may profit from the spurious 572 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE kind of "trade" mentioned above, nothing could be farther from the truth than the allegation that the nation as a whole is "dependent" on foreign markets for "full employment" and "prosperity." Our foreign trade is always less than 10 per cent of our total trade. The most we could lose would be all of it. Granting the temporary dislocations13 in the national economy from a sudden termination of this trade, even if every person who became unemployed or destitute were put on full relief to the extent of his customary income (because of the failure of the foreign market), still the taxpayer would be much less burdened than by providing the larger sums for the ''purchase" of our surplus product by foreign nations. Commodities or services sent abroad, when not repaid by other commodities or services, reduce by so much the natural resources of the nation. This injury to the national interest is multiplied manifold when the commodities in question are war materials which not only contribute nothing to building up the bona fide purchasing power of the recipients but presently fall into the hands of prospective enemy nations to be used against us, as in the case of China, for example. Our present "aid" to Europe is largely of this character. It is a policy based on thinly veiled bribery on our part (for recipient nations to stay nonCommunist), and blackmail on their part ("give us a billion or we will go Communist").

Incidentally, a curious dilemma suggests itself for those who are at once devoted to the "one-world" idea and equally convinced that no peaceful world is possible without foreign trade. Under the various "one-world" schemes there would, of course, be no foreign nations to trade with. To say that domestic trade will then fulfill the present necessities of foreign trade obviously will not do because it suggests that the United States, for example, might substitute trading between the states for its foreign trade which, as everyone is quick to note, is national autarchy and "isolationism," if not Fascism. Planetary autarchy would, I take it, be an even greater evil than national autarchy, for it must not be forgotten that the essential virtue of foreign trade seems to be that it must be foreign. Perhaps the apparent postponement of the "one world" is a blessing in disguise in that, until trade with the other planets AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 573 is developed, we might find ourselves with a perfectly good "one world" hopelessly crippled because of its lack of foreign trade. We shall return to this subject later.

So much for the contribution in theory and in practice of the new internationalism to security and economic prosperity. The true romantic internationalist, however, is more or less bored with these material details. After all, is not the whole program in the interest of freedom and the brotherhood of man, and what difference do other considerations make? There is no doubt but that the whole internationalist enthusiasm rests to a large extent on unbridled idealism of this sort, unchecked by realistic consideration of the program's actual effects. To this type of mind, the objectives are inherent in the program, and no one needs to be concerned too much with questions of the adaptation of the means to the end. Even the rude awakening which the course of events periodically thrusts on his notice fails greatly to shake the faith of the crusader in his obsession. The disastrous results are regarded not as the consequence of any fault of the policy, but merely as evidence that its application was "too little and too late." Whether the nation is physically capable of applying the policy in the required amount and at the appropriate time is one of these material details which seems irrelevant to the true believer.

IV. ECOLOGY AND FOREIGN POLICY In view of what has been suggested in the preceding sections regarding the history, theory, and characteristics of the new internationalism, the reader must be left to decide whether this policy has served or is likely to serve the national interest. It may be helpful in this connection for each person to ask himself to what extent, for example, the "Four Freedoms" have been advanced as a result of the recent war for these alleged objectives. (For a 574 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE summary, see pp. 506 ff. and 597 ff.) In the long run, the masses of people will judge. Furthermore, the considerable increments that are daily being added to the debit side of the ledger would render any account as of the time of this writing largely out of date by the time this is printed. Nor does space permit a discussion of the more fundamental reasons why the approach embodied in the new internationalism must always fail. Most briefly stated, it must fail because it ignores and violates natural laws which govern human society just as surely as the laws of physics and physiology govern their respective fields.

On this main point, there is, curiously, agreement among all factions. They all justify their policies in the name of principles and laws drawn from various sources—from the Bible, from the other Great Books, from direct revelation or "hunches," from astrology, and whatnot. The argument is over which principles should govern. Unfortunately, the social sciences have not yet advanced to a point where they are prepared to take a naturalistic view of their task. They proceed, instead, from radically different premises, namely, philosophical, theological, and legalistic lore which basically seems to assume that man's traditional systems of verbalizations about society are more fundamental guides than the actual empirical events that have transpired. In short, the reason for the miscarriage of the national and international programs discussed above is their violation of all principles of human ecology and sociology, which in fact govern the lives of nations, regions, and peoples.

This is not the place to discuss in detail what these principles are. It is conceded that the stage of development of the social sciences does not permit, at present, as definitive a statement of principles as could be desired. Nevertheless, a simple illustration may indicate the nature and the direction of these principles, as well as the reason why neglect of them must result in disaster. A prominent ecologist reports the following case: It so happened that in the Kaibab Forest in Arizona man had "altruistic regard" for the deer because he wished to do the killing of the deer himself. He therefore "saved" the deer AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 575 by eliminating the pumas. The result was that the deer increased in numbers, could not survive on the limited winter food supply, and died by the thousands. Consequently, there was a smaller population of deer than there would have been had man left the puma alone.14 Consider how one might reason about the above incident if one elected to adopt the frame of reference in which the current international situation is usually discussed. The pumas were unquestionably aggressive and immoral, and they were clearly planning for world conquest. They therefore deserved the fate visited upon them by the hunters for preying on the peaceloving deer.

The hunters of Arizona were very noble in their campaign to establish freedom from fear in the deer world. It is unnecessary further to labor the illustration. It will probably be agreed that neither the interests of the hunters nor those of the deer were served by the policy adopted. It is probable, also, that had the deer been consulted and had the consequences of the hunters' campaign on their behalf been made clear, they would have preferred to put up with the pumas, although they would have been roundly denounced as "appeasers" by their would-be saviours. It may be unfortunate, but it remains a fact, nevertheless, that there are principles of limits and balance operative in human society, based on location and distribution of resources as well as on the technological development and literacy of population, to which realistic, political, and economic programs must conform if they are to achieve their objectives. To ignore these principles, both in theory and in practice, and to launch instead on programs like the Four Freedoms "for all men everywhere in our time"

represents an ignorant or fraudulent disposition to secure under false pretenses a pathetic kind of support from the unfortunate of the earth. At present we apply a legalisticmoralistic method of analysis to these problems, which, when we act upon it, demonstrably aggravates, to an appalling degree, want, oppression, cruelty, and fear. It will promptly be asked if I am taking a fatalistic view of social events and if I am advocating the law of tooth and claw. In 576 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE answer it might be asked whether we have any more striking examples of the operation of the law of tooth and claw than those provided by the two world wars, both of them crusades carried forward in legalisticmoralistic terms, ostensibly to eliminate the law of tooth and claw. The question is what theory of human relations—local, national, and international—corresponds most nearly with the facts. Professor Emerson has said that, "When man upsets the balance of nature, it is often necessary for him to re-establish the balance,"15 and he has given illustrations of the operation of the principle in ecology. Are not the predicaments in which the United States found itself at the close of the two world wars examples of essentially this character? That is, the Young Plan, the Dawes Plan, and others were somewhat desperate and only partially successful efforts to restore a destroyed balance in a large and important ecological area, the imbalance of which, under current organization of communication and trade, also has serious repercussions on outlying areas. Indeed, the attempt on our part to establish an equilibrium continued, by various absurd means, until about 1937, by which time Germany had recovered sufficiently to seek to complete, by the traditional methods of local boundary disputes and wars, the readjustments of essentially the same imbalance that had resulted in the first World War. On both occasions we saw fit to attempt to prevent this readjustment by the traditional methods, although at the outbreak of World War II, twenty years of other methods, League of Nations and all, had failed.

In the absence of any scientific data as to what might constitute the economic and sociological balance in question, or at least in the absence of any disposition to consider such data as might exist, it was instead discovered, about 1937, that the problem was a moral rather than a scientific one. In the former framework, consisting mainly of a Messianic complex of ancient vintage, it became our duty to repeat our previous performances in World War I; this time, however, at much greater cost and with much more serious destruction of the balance which, in intervals between wars, we soberly seem to recognize as necessary and do our best to restore. The current designation of the program is called the AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 577 Marshall Plan, the Atlantic Pact, the NATO, and the various measures to be undertaken, including the rearming of Germany in order to restore the balance of a nonCommunist Europe as against a Communist Russia, which was before the war and still is, the state of affairs most favorable to our national interest. For as long as that balance existed, neither Russia nor Germany could venture far from its own frontiers in any program of expansion.

That we now recognize this fact is clearly indicated by our present frantic efforts to rearm Europe. As for the objectionable regimes in both countries, we were, in 1939, in an ideal position to encourage their mutual destruction through material support without permitting either to destroy the balance by conquering the other, which was probably out of the question anyway. Any realistic suggestion of this kind, however, causes the romantic idealists to cry out against "balance of power" as a selfevident immorality. The fact that they are at the same moment engaged in restoring precisely such a balance by every means at their disposal, including war, does not occur to this large and frequently sincere and idealistic, albeit schizoid, public. The phrase "balance of power" has become a stereotype to which they have become negatively conditioned emotionally to such a degree that they are unable to recognize that the very solutions they advocate in the direction of world organization, including the various world government schemes, are only more formally organized and controlled systems of balanced power, as are the various national governments existing today for that matter, especially in democracies. What the idealists should crusade against is not balance of power but imbalance. (See pp. 610-12, below.) And so our foreign policy, vitiated by its own internal schizoid contradictions, continues to upset the world and to defeat that stability, balance, and peacefulness which is the desire of the overwhelming majority of people everywhere. On the one hand is a small group influenced by natural scientific, rational considerations of what is possible and what the costs and the consequences will be. On the other hand is a more vocal group deriving their programs from revealed principles of justice and right received from higher authority than man's experience. Unfortunately, these 578 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE revealed principles are not considered as subject to validation by any such miserable criteria as mere practicability, relative peace, and prosperity. On the contrary, the accepted approach leads to territorial, demographic, and ecological settlements which create new nations for purely political reasons, although these new nations admittedly cannot survive without foreign subsidy.

One of the principal obsessions which a democratic people will have to get over, if they wish to make a transition to a scientifically oriented approach in human social policy, is the notion that fact and the validity of generalization about the human social order are determined by the noisiness of minorities, majority votes, and the opinion of radio commentators, journalists, preachers, lawyers, and novelists. To be quite specific, the idea will have to be faced that perhaps the views of Charles A. Beard and John Bassett Moore on the consequences of our foreign policy are worth more than the more congenial ideas of ten thousand radio commentators with the whole galaxy of Nobel Prize winners in chemistry, physics, journalism, and literature thrown in. I mention Beard and Moore because they do not even claim to be scientists, but merely sober students of the social scene who believe that under certain conditions it is possible to predict with some accuracy the social results of given foreign policies. Among illustrations might be mentioned John Maynard Keynes' work on the Economic Consequences of the Peace after the first World War.

Warren S. Thompson also showed in his book, Danger Spots in World Population published in 1929, the probable consequences of foreign imperialist policies in the Far East as these events actually transpired in the ensuing decade. More farreaching in its implications is, perhaps, the work of John Quincy Stewart and George K. Zipf on the distribution and equilibrium of population.16 I cite these instances in order to emphasize not only the need for scientific knowledge but the need to apply that knowledge in our approach to social problems. I am not here criticizing journalists and radio commentators for doing rather efficiently what they have been trained to do and what they are paid to do. I am rather commenting on a confusion in people's minds which causes them to look to such sources for guidance in public policy, and to be inAMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 579 fluenced by the labels which are applied to one or another program.

It is of no importance whether a proposed policy is labeled isolationist or internationalist. The important thing is what will be its consequences. The isolationist-internationalist dichotomy was obviously a fraud from the beginning and everyone who continues to use it in any literal sense is a party to the fraud.17 We have not been, and we are not, confronted with any such issue. The only question that has been before us for at least one hundred years is the kind and degree of international organization and participation that will be productive of certain desired results. That is a scientific question, not a question to be settled by Gallup polls, journalists, or third-rate politicians mistaking themselves for statesmen. In view of current differences of opinion, however, and in view of the present undeveloped state of the social sciences, it is more important that this essay should formulate certain questions rather sharply and not become involved in arguments about details. To all scientists, philosophers, formulators of public policy, and thoughtful people everywhere, I, therefore, suggest as a common starting point, these questions: (1) Is it not warranted to assume, in view of the known facts on which we agree, that there are discoverable demographic, ecological, and cultural principles to which successful social organization must, within limits, conform? (2) Are not these principles governing human relations fully as important as, for example, those known to govern the construction of bridges? (3) If so, had we not better make more adequate provision in the future for the reliable formulation and application of these principles on the ground that, without such knowledge and application, all the good will, exhortation, and international organization in the world will not avail?

In summary: We have taken the view that contemporary national problems may be regarded as the result of an inadequate degree of organic integration in the larger social units which today attempt to function as independent societies. That is to say, present societies are inadequately integrated and organized for the environment in which they have to live. One of the essentials for a society's successful functioning in the social world today is.an adequate 580 PERPETUAL WAR FOR PERPETUAL PEACE technique of delayed response, i.e., the capacity to take into consideration aspects of the environment relatively remote in time and space. The possession of such technique is precisely the difference between what is commonly regarded as ''high" and "low" forms of organic life, as well as the criterion of high and low intelligence. The organism which has no adequate mechanism of this sort and which, therefore, does not predict and take into account the relatively remote consequences of its behavior, will behave in an inconsistent, contradictory, and disastrous manner as regards its adjustment over longer periods of time. Thus we find in this country the same administration vigorously supporting neutrality legislation to avoid becoming involved in war one year, and the next year urging the repeal of such legislation in order to participate in war. Great Britain engages in a policy of noninterference with, if not actual encouragement of, German expansion into the Ruhr and elsewhere during a period of seven years, up to and including Munich, and then suddenly declares war on behalf of Poland, an action which even sober scholars who approve of the war regard as an utterly irrational, emotional outburst.18 In the short space of three or four years we change our postwar policy almost diametrically from the Morgenthau to the Marshall Plan. We destroy productive machinery in Germany at the very time that relief plans to replace such machinery are underway, and so forth. Any of these plans might have been relatively defensible if consistently pursued.

To pursue all of them simultaneously is not only frightfully costly in lives and in material wealth but such contradictory action imposes on the body politic all the strains and liabilities that afflict the schizophrenic individual. The criticism leveled in this essay at current policy rests, then, not on any opposition to international organization as such. On the contrary, it rather recognizes that an organization of people of the earth into groupings based on natural areas and principles of ecology and sociology would almost certainly call for a drastic reorganization of the nations, regions, and empires as now combined in national alliances of various sorts, and the establishment of flexible machinery for change in these relations according to AMERICAN FOREIGN POLICY IN NATIONAL INTEREST 581 changing conditions. Sound principles of international organization would arrive at the boundaries of different units on more fundamental grounds than is the case at present. A current news item reports the present method as follows: "The 38th parallel was picked up by a tired meeting on a hot night in Potsdam/' said a State Department official last week. "It's a line that makes no political, geographical, economic, or military sense. But the Russians and Americans at the meeting simply couldn't agree on who should occupy what. Finally, a general suggested the 38th parallel. And that was that."19 The cavalier fashion in which "statesmen" revise boundaries, abolish existing nations, and establish new ones without the slightest regard for the organic conditions relevant to the situation, provides unlimited illustrative material of the same kind. The demarcations thus arrived at thereupon become sacred boundaries, the violation of which constitutes "aggression," an infringement on people's "freedom." The only sound basis for social organization of any kind is organic unity and relative self-sufficiency. In the end, a given population must in any case come to terms with the problem of living in a finite area on finite resources, whether such area embrace a region, a continent, or a planet. What is, at present, the optimum area, population, and necessary amount and variety of resources is a question for scientific determination. The answer will be determined largely by the existing state of knowledge of social and political as well as other kinds of technology. These basic considerations have never been given adequate attention under the legalisticmoralistic approach to international affairs.