World in the Grip of an Idea

W)rld inthB glfI?Qfan IoefL Clarence B. Carson 23 The Cold War: RevoUtionaryva EvoIutioncr'ySocialism THE UNITED STATES emerged from World War II as the pre-eminent military power in the world. That pre-eminence was symbolized by the development of the atomic bomb, two of which were dropped on Japanese cities inducing that coun try to surrender. The great world powers of the interwar years had either been crushed or were very nearly impotent. Germany had been as absolutely defeated as possible. About all that remained to make the In this series, Dr. Carson examines the connection between Ideology and the revolutions of our time and traces the Impact on several major countries and the spread of the ideas and practices around the world. devastation complete would have been to sow the bombed-out cities with salt. Japan saved a shred of honor by being permitted to keep its emperor. The weakness of France had been decisively demonstrated by the Nazi conquest. Only the swaggering and 'boasting of Musso lini had made Italy appear to be a great power. Britain emerged vic torious in the war but was shortly reduced to minor power potential by the nationalizing zeal of the Labour Party, China faced, as it had, incip ient civil war and was hardly in position to play the role of a major power.

The Soviet Union, too, emerged 661 662 THE FREEMAN November victorious in World War II. How that empire would rank as a mili tary power is still a controverted question. The devastation wrought by the German armed forces on that country had been great. Stalin had so disrupted agriculture with his ef forts at collectivization that produc tion was far from adequate for the population. Forced industrialization had succeeded only in getting pro duced what the political powers con sidered most urgent. But the Soviet Union had something beyond ordi nary military powers; its leaders had the will and know-how to use terror. Terror was used both in the subjection of the peoples of Eastern Europe and probably more exten sively than ever the peoples within the Soviet Union. The combination of military power, terror, and decep tion made the Soviet Union a major power in effect. At any rate, most of the powers that had been were no longer major powers. Western Europe was largely a power vacuum, as was the Far East. This had repercussions in many other parts of the world, for the former great powers had carved much of the rest of the world into spheres of interest and colonies.

Many of these colonies broke away or were turned loose to fend for themselves. The British Empire hardly deserved the name any longer after a few years of Labour rule. The United Nations was supposed to fill this power vacuum, or at least, to stand guard while old nations re covered and new nations took shape and emerged. It did not work out that way. Such authority as the United Nations had was vested in the Security Council. The perma nent members had a veto power over any action, and the Soviet Union began quickly using this power to forestall unwanted action. This was especially disruptive be cause, as it turned out, the major threat to the peace was the Soviet Union and the international com munist movement it spawned. Wherever they could, Soviet leaders fomented civil war to advance Communist Party takeovers any where the opportunity occurred. Some Moments of Doubt The world was not as clearly in the grip of an idea at the end of World War II as it has since become.

The defeat of Nazism and Fascism discredited those particular var ieties of revolutionary socialism. West Germany and Japan were not only freed from the control of to talitarian regimes but also given great impetus by the occupying forces to adopt institutions more in accord with freedom. It is true that the United Kingdom went headlong toward socialism for a few years after the war and that India's lead ers were under the spell of socialism, 1978 THE. COLD WAR: REVOLUTIONARY VS. EVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM 663 but the course of many countries was unusually uncertain. The United States bent away somewhat from the collectivist path of the 1930s-not for long, no doubt, but enough to illustrate the pos sibilities. Television had not yet taken hold as the shaper, molder, and decider of opinions. The sway of the intellectu als was still largely dependent upon the influence they could wield upon poli,ticians. College education had not become so common a possession, and it is perhaps the single most important way that intellectuals fasten their ideas upon people. Intel lectuals were still marginal in many lands, and the lines between ideologies rather more clearly drawn than in a later day. Many people still lived mainly by custom, tradition, and within the framework of family and religion, a much larger percentage, at any rate, than would so live thirty years later. It is dif ficult to grasp how drastic the changes have been, facilitated by technology and guided increasingly by ideologies.

It will be helpful to keep this in mind as we explore the impact of the Cold War. There was a time, at least for Americans, when the Cold War appeared to be simple enough and readily understood. The world was divided in two, or so we were told. One world was communist, and the other was free. The two worlds were engaged in an ongoing conflict which was not out-and-out war, but was not peaceful either. (The con flict was also often described as be tween communism and democracy.) The United Nations became the verbal battleground of this conflict, and nations were aligned there with one side or the other. Bench marks in the conflict were such events as Churchill's ((Iron Curtain Speech" at Fulton, Missouri, military aid to Greece and Turkey, the revelations of Soviet atomic spies, the fall of China to the Communists, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and the Korean War, among others.

The Cold War Reinterpreted What was once clear and distinct, however, has since become fuzzy and indistinct. What was called a Third World emerged in the late 1950sand in the 1960s, aligned with neither side. The Soviet Union and Com munist China became embroiled in their own ideological conflict. Re visionist historians began to rein terpret the Cold War. The more rad ical of these declared that the con flict was all a product of American hysteria, that communism had not so much fomented it as been vic timized by it. Communism, in this view, was a bugaboo invented by Americans so far as its aggressive ness and threat to world peace was concerned. While such revisionist history is 664 THE FREEMAN November sorely out of touch with reality, it may at least open the way to revi sion that is needed. The nature of the conflict has indeed been mis construed, perhaps not so much as it was originally represented to be but as it turned out. The tyrannical character of communism has rarely, if ever, been exaggerated. Nor would it be easy to overstate the imperial aims of Soviet Communism. An international conspiracy has existed as long as the Soviet Union, and there are several of them now. That this movement has engaged in sub version, espionage, and terrorism is well-established fact. Whether it has posed an immediate threat to the United States, or what the na ture of the threat was and is, may be open to debate, although there is no conclusive answer available.

Most of the misconstruction of the Cold War, however, has been over the nature, character, and tendency of the opposition. That the opposi tion has been between communism, on the one hand, and freedom, on the other, is certainly doubtful. This is not to question that there are many who are opposed to communism or that there are those who stand for freedom. It is rather to question that they have generally been in control of or directed the actual conflict. The actual events of the Cold War come into much clearer focus when we conceive of it as a conflict between revolutionary and evolutionary socialism. This takes into account the actual tendencies in the so called Free World as well as the thrust of developments within the Cold War. Varied Opposition to Communism There are undoubtedly many an gles from which communism may ~ opposed. Indeed, they may be as numerous as have been the abuses of power and atrocities of communist rulers. Some have opposed com munism because the rulers do not permit freedom of speech and of the press and suppress dissenters.

Others, because there is no freedom of religion but rather religious per secution. Some find it objectionable tha t there is no freedom of migra tion' and they are apt to see the Berlin Wall as the symbol of what they oppose. The slave labor camps have been more than many people can stomach. There are even those who find most deplorable the prohi bition of jazz and experimentation with the arts in general. The ubiquitous bureaucracy has its ar ticulate opponents. There are those who focus mainly on the economic wrongs-of communism: the confisca tion of private property, the state planning, and the absence of the free market. But all opposition to communism that amounts to anything can be reduced to two headings. One is what will here be called Metaphysi1978 THE COLD WAR: REVOLUTIONARY VS. EVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM 665 cal Opposition to Communism, and the other Tactical Opposition to Com"munism. These can be employed in such a way as to sub sume virtually every level and kind of opposition.

Metaphysical Opposition The use of the term «metaphysi cal" may appear to be a poor choice of words. It is certainly the case that in the last century or so many have used the term as if it were synony mous with mystical, superstitious, something vague and imaginary, or evanescent. These are, however, misuses of a most valuable word for which there is no ready replace ment. Metaphysics is the study of and refers to that underlying order in the universe which gives form and regularity to things and rela tionships. It is the source of natural law a-nd normality in beings. If it is mystical it is so only in the sense that our sensual know ledge of this realm is indirect. Metaphysics is ac tually the foundation of precise knowledge. Without it, we are left only with a poor substitute statistics-whose precision is achieved only by distortion. It may be objected, however, either that my phrase does not take into account religious opposition to communism or that what I am really referring to when I call it metaphys ical is religious. An explanation of the meaning of Metaphysical Opposition to Communism should make it clear that neither of these objections is valid. I mean that the opposition to communism is based upon fixed and immovable positions, on the be lief that communism cannot and will not work, that it can only be tyrannical and destructive. Why?

Because it requires the transforma tion of human nature, something that is fixed and immutable. Be cause it requires the abridgement of the natural order of things, some thing that has not occurred and so far as we know cannot and will not occur. Because it requires that indi viduals no longer pursue their self interest, that they abandon what is essential to their survival. In brief, these things consti tute the metaphysical opposition to com munism. More Philosophic than Religious It should be clear that this is not a religious opposition to communism. It is a philosophic or, mayhap, scien tific opposition. True, there is reli gious opposition to communism, and for good and sufficient reason. Communism is atheistic and com mitted to wiping out all independent theism. But when the religious op position is examined carefully it will be discovered that so far as it is a fixed and immovable position it is based on a metaphysics-like posi tion' namely, that God is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow, 666 THE FREEMAN November that He has implanted in us our immutable human nature, and that He has ordained an order for things and for men. Take away the concep tion of God as Creator and man as Creature, with all that is implicit in this, and the religious opposition to communism tends to melt away. In short, the firmness of the religious opposition to communism has a metaphysic-like base. For any who might have difficulty accepting the above formulation, let· me put the matter another way: Metaphysics provides sufficient ground for an un altering opposition to com munism.

It still may be objected, however, that there are those who are appar ently immovably opposed to com munism who know naught of metaphysics. This is an objection, fortunately, which involves only semantics. For example, there are those who oppose communism on the grounds that it is contrary to human nature. This position, and others like it (the economic arguments, for instance), are metaphysically founded, whether those who use them are aware of it or not. Igno rance of philosophic terminology does not alter in the least the philosophic base of a position. Even so, it may be useful to broaden somewhat those that might be included among the metaphysical opponents of communism. There is a sense in which all who are inalterably committed to an opposition to communism-as, for example, those who would maintain that if it would work they still would not want it, for whatever reasons-are metaphysi cal opponents. It is permissible to use the word in this way, for by so doing we embrace all metaphysic like positions, Le., all that are firm, hard, rock-like, and underlyingly immovable.

Tactical Opposition Tactical Opposition to Com munism is of a quite different order. It is opposition to communism on the ground that one or more or many of its tactics or methods are wrong. (Those who oppose it on metaphysi cal grounds might be expected to find the tactics objectionable also, and they usually do. They may even make arguments against com munism in terms of methods, but that is not the final ground of their opposition.) The position amounts to this: If communists would uclean up their act," they would be acceptable. If they would grant free speech, not persecute religion, provide due pro cess of law, permit migration, allow opposing political parties, abolish slave labor camps, and so on, they would no longer be objectionable. When they oppose communism, evolutionary or gradualist or demo cratic socialists are by the necessity of their position tactical opponents. Twentieth century liberals (who 1978 THE COLD WAR: REVOLUTIONARY VS: EVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM 667 vary in the extent to which they are socialists) are also generally tactical opponents of communism when they oppose it. Communism-in-power has been a source of great embarrass ment to other socialists. Indeed, it has been an embarrassment or much worse, to many communists as well. The violence, the terror, and the drastic action have raised doubts as to the validity of the socialist enterprise.

It is worthwhile to note that the most vociferous opposition of socialist intellectuals is class-like. They object most strenuously indeed, many reserve their objec tions-to the persecution of intel lectuals. Thus, Stalin's most hein ous crime for many of them was the Purge of the late 1930s. Millions of peasants and Kulaks could be persecuted and die with never a whimper from Western intellectu als. But when a few thousand intel lectuals came under the gun, many socialist intellectuals began to ques tion Soviet Communism. The same play is still being enacted today, though the scene has changed. A few intellectual dissidents in the Soviet Union can bring the glare of public ity to bear on their persecutors, thanks to Western intellectuals, but the other persecution goes largely unnoticed. However that may be, socialist opponents of communism have usu ally had to try to balance themselves on a razor's edge. On the one hand, they have opposed communism. In its own way some of this opposition has been real enough. That is, evolutionary socialists do believe, often enough, that the revolutionary way is the wrong way, that drastic measures are harmful and unneces sary. Moreover, they may be as op posed to Soviet or Chinese or Cuban Comm unist expansion as anyone else. In fact, evolutionary socialists may go to war against communists, albeit reluctantly and limitedly.

But the anti-communism of gradualists must always be re strained. It must stop short of being or becoming Metaphysical Opposi tion to Communism. If it should be come metaphysical in character it would be tantamount to a repudia tion of socialism. Another way to say it is to formulate it this way: Opposi tion to communism must not trace communist practice to the socialist idea-to the idea that has the world in its grip. Deplorable communist practice must be ascribed to an ex cess of revolutionary zeal, to evil men, such as Stalin (once he had passed from the scene), to persecu tion of communists and inhibition of their legitimate aims by others. It has been a most difficult task for evolutionary socialists to oppose communism, one that has fre quently been made necessary by the communists but unpalatable at best. If communism would just become 668 THE FREEMAN November another political party, the diffi culty would vanish, for evolutionary socialists could oppose it without any danger of the opposition becom ing metaphysical. But that can only happen where communists have not come to power or have not consoli dated their power.

The Opposition Performs a Double Reverse One way that evolutionary socialists (which generally includes liberals in the United States) main tain their balance on the razor's edge is to focus their efforts on op posing anti-communism. Techni cally, they oppose communism, but this position can be made largely harmless by rigorous attention to the methods by which communism is to be opposed. The method that is generally proscribed in the United States and Western Europe is what goes by the name of McCarthyism (which takes its name from the late Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wis consin). One dictionary defines McCarthyism as tt1. public accusa tion of disloyalty, esp. of pro Communist activity, in many in stances unsupported by proof or based on slight, doubtful or irrele vant evidence. 2. unfairness in in vestigative technique. 3. persistent search for and exposure of disloyalty ..." Indeed, ttMcCarthyism" is the unpardonable sin in the American liberal ranking of evils. It ranks alongside if not above (tRed Scares"

and ttwitch hunts" for communists. Tactical Opposition to Com munism turns into tactical opposi tion to anti-communism. The threat of communism is transmuted into the threat of anti -communism. This is an easy shift for evolutionary socialists to make, indeed, a shift difficult to avoid. The reason is that opposition to anti-communism has a metaphysical base or, if anyone pre fers, an anti-metaphysical base. All socialism is premised on the possi bility of transforming human na ture. Metaphysics is the level at which this is found to be impossible. Hence, revolutionary and evolution ary socialists are at one at the metaphysical, or anti-metaphysical, level. They are irreconcilably op posed to metaphysical anti communism. I do not deduce this from the phenomenon of ttMcCarthyism," of course. It is deduced, so far as it is deduced, from the philosophical, or ideological, premises of socialism.

But there is a great body of evidence which is explained by and supports this conclusion. When ttMcCar thyism" or a HRed Scare" is under way these occupy the center stage of tactical opposition. But once they have abated, then virtually any tac tic by which communism might be opposed comes under fire. In the final analysis, all metaphysical or tthard core" opposition to com1978 THE COLD WAR: REVOLUTIONARY VS. EVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM 669 munism is intolerable to socialists, though tactical opposition is permit ted except by uhard core" com munists. Differences Not Understood The depth of this division has not been generally admitted, if it has been understood. There are many practical reasons for not dramatiz ing or for not recognizing it. Evolutionary socialists cling to or at least profess many of the common values which derive from Western Civilization, such as representative government (which they tend to telescope into democracy), religious toleration, free speech and press, free elections, and so on. By their very evolutionary method they at tempt to avoid arousing a metaphys ical opposition to themselves. Anti communists, too, have hoped to en list them in a common cause against communism. Some anti-communists have portrayed social reformers and liberals as dupes of communists, as taken in by them. (Indeed, this was the general view of the matter as held by anti-communists in the 1950s.) They may have been, indeed may be, but if the above analysis is correct the affinity between them is not something skin deep as such a construction implied.

In any case, it is what has hap pened when common cause against communism has been made by metaphysical opponents and tactical opponents. The contest has been called the Cold War. The main con test has been between the United States and its allies on the one hand and the Soviet Union and its allies and satellites on the other. Com munist China was formally excluded from the Cold War most of the time but was nonetheless a sub ordinate part of it. The contest was carried on in many ways-by diplo macy, by propaganda, by subversion and espionage, and in actual wars-but the examination of it here will be restricted to three levels: war, foreign aid, and espion age. No Chance for Alliance If the preceding analysis is cor rect, it is unlikely that evolutionary socialists and metaphysical anti communists could make common cause against communism. They cannot effectively wage war, either hot or cold, against communism.

They cannot, that is, if evolutionary socialists are to maintain their bal ance on the razor's edge. To wage war effectively the enemy must be clearly identified, support for the war must be mustered, and force brought to bear sufficient to over come the enemy. It is not possible to do this from a razor's edge; it re quires a broad base rather than a tenuous position. It may well be that the animus behind the Cold War came-from 670 THE FREEMAN November metaphysical anti-communism. The provocation came from the com munists, of course. But the Cold War strategy was largely shaped by Democratic Presidents. Between 1933 and 1969 there was only one Republican President-Eisenhower. Nixon worked vigorously to defuse the Cold War, so he was not an architect of it, not as President any way. The main outlines of the Cold War were shaped by President Tru man. Eisenhower and Dulles con tinued it, as did Kennedy and Johnson.

It is significant in the context that Democrats were the main strategists. The Democratic Party has been by far the more deeply infected of the two major parties by evolutionary socialism. Liberal in tellectuals have· had their greatest infl uence .within the Democratic Party, though they have exercised considerable influence on Republi cans as well. The domestic programs of the Democrats since 1913 have been in the direction of centralizing power in the federal government, manipulating the money supply, regulating and controlling business, managing the economy and redis tributing the wealth. True, they have only limitedly pushed for gov ernment ownership and have taken the route of control instead. But that has come increasingly to be the method of evolutionary socialism for the past several decades. Democrats have tended to get the United States embroiled and en tangled in international affairs in the twentieth century. Beyond that, they have tended to get us into wars.

There is no particular mystery as to how this should be explained. Democrats have been enamored with the use of government power. Whatever they have been con fronted with, they have inclined to the view that the solution lay in the exercise of political power. In inter national relations, this tends to lead to war or to involvement in what ever conflicts are taking place. Hot Spots in the Cold War Twice during the Cold War, the United States became extensively involved in an armed conflict: first in Korea and then in Vietnam. Pres ident Truman gave the order which brought Americans into combat in Korea. President Kennedy got the United States armed forces increas ingly embroiled in Vietnam, and President Johnson made the war primarily an American responsibil ity. The main point here is the kind of wars these became, not whether American involvement was justified or who was to blame for them. In both cases, they were what came to be called limited wars. Under Gen eral Douglas MacArthur's com mand, American forces, along with such allies as they had, mainly 1978 THE COLD WAR: REVOLUTIONARY VS.EVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM 671 South Koreans, were close to over running and defeating the North Korean army. At that juncture the Communist Chinese intervened with massive ground forces. Mac Arthur proposed the bombings of the Chinese access, but he was re fused permission to do so. When he persisted by criticizing the policy behind the scenes, he was relieved of his command. The war· zone was restricted to Korea, and the war was eventually ended without a de cision having been. reached.

In Vietnam, no American military commander attempted to win the war by invading North Vietnam. Even the bombing of North Vietnam was restricted, and major ports were not shelled by sea. The justification of the conflict, where any was given, was so narrow and subtle, with infi nite attention given to subtle niceties, that Americans were con fused and baffled by the whole af fair. After MacArthur's dismissal, no grand strategy was devised to achieve victory at arms. None was ever inaugurated in Vietnam. The justification offered was that the war might be vastly expanded by any aggressive action. Actually, this might have been a sound argument for never becoming involved in the conflicts at all. After all, it was cer tainly possible to foresee that China might intervene in Korea. North Vietnamese intervention in South Vietnam was a fact, and Chinese or Russian intervention a distinct pos sibility from the outset. What the enemy might do is hardly ever a foregone conclusion.

Why a No-Win Policy? The deliberate limitation of these wars needs a better explanation than those that were offered. The framework has been supplied for a better explanation. It is this. Evolutionary socialism must pre vent, even at very high cost, the opposition to communism from be coming metaphysical. Any all-out war-any war to be fought through to victory-will become metaphysic like because of the ideological char acter of the conflict. Once the gener al opposition to communism be comes metaphysical, all of socialism is likely to be indicted. Undoubt edly, the motives that inhibited American leaders were complex. What persuaded anyone of them to the limited war concept cannot, of course, be known. But that an ex tensive apology for limited warfare was prepared and disseminated by American intellectuals, aided and abetted by their counterparts in other lands, cannot be doubted.

That these same intellectuals have bent their energies over the years to forestall the arising of an artic ulate metaphysical anti-communism can be demonstrated ad nauseam.

672 THE FREEMAN November Intellectuals have worked dili gently over the years to turn the Cold War into an internecine con flict between revolutionary and evolutionary socialism. A concerted effort was made to do that in Viet nam. They kept up a continual clamor over the alleged undemo cratic character of the government of South Vietnam. Similar, though not as vociferous, charges were leveled at the South Korean gov ernment. That many South Viet namese continued to pursue their individual self-interest economi cally was considered shameful by these intellectuals. Efforts were made to turn the American army into a combination of Red Cross and Little Sisters of the Poor. They were set to the task of rebuilding Viet namese villages, tending the sick, and feeding the hungry. Only if evolutionary socialism (usually de scribed as democracy) could demon strate its superiority to the claims of communism (revolutionary social ism) would the American involve ment be justified, presumably.

A Smoke-Screen for Communism My purpose in discussing these matters is to describe the role that the Cold War has played in spread ing the idea and fastening its grip upon the world. The initiative be longs to international communism. Communist lands are generally closed to foreigners except on a limited and supervised basis. Massive efforts have been made over the years to shield the rest of the world from the reality of communism. In effect, the attempt has been made to have communism known only as an ideal system. This ideal is spread around the world by whatever propa ganda outlets communist powers have. The reality in other lands is measured against the communist ideal, to its detriment, as a rule. Evolutionary socialists tend to take these criticisms seriously as, in a sense, they must. They are, after all, of a competing brand of socialism and must constantly dem onstrate the superiority of their way. Hence, communist pressure is turned into a necessity for pushing socialist measures by the other camp. In short, anti-communism be comes pro-socialism at the hands of evolutionary socialists.

This was nowhere better illus trated than in the foreign aid pro grams. When the foreign aid pro grams got under way under Presi dent Truman they were billed as an effort to stop or contain Soviet ex pansion. As such, military aid had top priority. Very soon, other kinds of aid became increasingly impor tant. It became, in the course of time, a major international device for propping up socialist regimes in many lands. Actually, the above chronology is not quite correct. Some foreign aid programs propped 1978 THE COLD WAR: REVOLUTIONARY VS. EVOLUTIONARY SOCIALISM 673 up floundering socialist regimes from the beginning. In England, the Labour Government was in deep trouble by 1947, within two years of its installation, and was appealing, with success, to Washington for aid. The European Recovery Program was from the outset a venture in promoting collective efforts among nations. But foreign aid must be given closer examination later on.

The Points Summarized The points here are rather general ones. They are: 1. That the Cold War, whatever its origins, was turned into a contest between evolutionary and revolu tionary socialism. 2. The conflict between these two varieties of socialism is over means not ends. 3. To prevent their common end from becoming apparent, as well as the probability that they would not ultimately differ much from one another, the whole attention must be focused upon methods. 4. The common cause between Metaphysical Opponents of Com munism and Tactical Opponents could not and did not survive the trial by fire. Truman's conduct of the Korean War disenchanted those who deeply opposed communism. Foreign aid was subjected to withering criticism over the years by both sides. American intelligence and se curity agencies have now been sub jected to such exposure and curtail ment that it is doubtful they can perform any function successfully.

5. In the conflict between evolutionary and revolutionary socialism, evolutionary socialists advance their own variety of socialism. 6. Communists are thus enabled by their criticism to push toward more and more socialist policies in the world. In brief, the Cold War provided the occasion for the spread ing of socialist ideas, even though it was supposed to contain com munism. This is the general framework from which the Cold War is to be viewed. It serves as a transition, too, from the more detailed examination of the application of the idea in a few countries to its general spread to countries around the world. It has been spread both by international communism and from country to country as socialism, liberalism, the welfare state, social democracy, or whatever. First, we will deal with the spread of communism. Ii Next: 24. The Cold War: The Spread of Communism.