THE NEW RIGHT  America's foreign policy |
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The Prussians v the Traders
When America sneezes we all reach for the cough mixture. So when looking at how the New
Right views the outside world it is the foreign policy of the Reagan Administration that
has implications for us all. Staff writer Wayne Ellwood assesses the great divide in the
White House between the belligerent militarists and the corporate businessmen: between the
Prussians and the Traders.
The recent decision by the United States to quit UNESCO was a shock.
But for US foreign policy watchers it was not totally unexpected. In fact,
Washington’s move to leave the UN agency is symbolic of the move by the Reagan
administrations to bolster its independent image in the international community. The US is
attempting to cut its losses at the United Nations and is instead opting for a one-on-one
relationship with Third World nations where its clout can not be muffled by the UN’s
diplomatic machinery.
In stark contrast to the late 1970s liberalism of President Jimmy
Carter, Ronald Reagan’s strategists see nations beyond their borders either as
‘friends’ or ‘enemies’. There are three tests that allow you to join
the US friendship club:
. how hostile are you to the Soviet Union.
. how open are you to US corporate
investors
. how committed are you (rhetorically at
least) to democracy and free enterprise.
In practice this means that all world events are judged according to
their impact on America’s ‘national interest’ - a concept which is sufficiently elastic to mean just
about anything the Reagan team wants it to mean.
UNESCO is being punished because it refused to play by American rules.
The US charged the agency with undermining freedom of the press and ignoring its mandate
to foster world literacy. The target of criticism was UNESCO’s New World Information
and Communications Order, vigorously opposed by Western media and by Washington. The real
substance of the Information and Communications debate is how to restructure a world
communications system dominated by Western technology and Western multinationals. So the
Reagan administration decided to pick up their chips and go home. (And those chips are
significant since Washington antes up 25 per cent of UNESCO’s yearly budget).
This change in the policy of dealing with America’s world
neighbours reflects the rise to key positions of right-wing ideologues like UN Ambassador
Jeane Kirkpatrick, Secretary of State George Schultz and Defense Secretary Caspar
Weinberger. All are hawks. All firmly believe the US is a beacon of freedom and justice
with a civilizing mission to spread enlightenment and check the advance of Mr
Andropov’s ‘evil empire’. Their disposition towards the outside world is
framed by the crude calculus of the Cold War.
American analyst Michael Klare sees a split in the US foreign policy
elite between the Reagan group - the ‘Prussians’ - and a ‘softer’ conservative faction he calls the ‘Traders’.
The Traders are practical businessmen who believe the Cold War is a barrier to healthy
global trade and that regional political problems have to be dealt with on their own
merit. The Prussians, on the other hand, believe military strength is paramount and that
the US should fight for what it believes in.
The Prussians are simply unwilling to accept that the configuration of
global power has changed since 1946. But changed it has. The Third World has emerged as a
forceful, if divided, lobby. The economies of Japan and Western Europe have bloomed. The
Soviet Union has become a super-power with imperial designs of its own. Western nations no
longer see eye to eye with the US on foreign policy. Détente for one thing is a much more
pressing concern for France, Germany andthe other European countries that must share a
continent with the USSR.
With a wary eye, Europe accepts the Soviet reality; the US quite
simply does not. President Reagan describes communism as ‘another sad, bizarre chapter in
human history, whose last pages even now are being written.’ Those who live in
‘totalitarian darkness’ he says ‘are the focus of evil in the world.’
Not since Vietnam has militarism become such a large part of American
life. Arms spending is expected to jump by 20 per cent yearly in 1984 and 1985. The
country’s largest arms manufacturer, General Dynamics of St. Louis, has been praised
as a sure-fire bet by stock market promoters. Nuclear freeze advocates have been labelled
sincere but woolly-headed dreamers by Mr Reagan. After years of covert meddling in Central
America the US finally intervened directly in the affairs of a sovereign state by invading
Grenada. This was the first military intervention in the outside world since Vietnam and
the first in South America since the invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1965.
Ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick set the tone for the new militarism in a
1979 article called Dictatorship and Double Standards - a piece which reportedly brought her to the
attention of the President. She argued that America should be prepared to throw its weight
around:
‘A posture of continuous self-abasement and apology vis-à-vis the
Third World is neither morally necessary nor politically appropriate.
Ms Kirkpatrick went on to distinguish between ‘traditional
authoritarian dictatorships’ and ‘revolutionary autocracies’. The former - like Nicaragua under President Somoza,
the Philippines under Marcos, Chile under Pinochet -
are preferable to the latter - Nicaragua under the Sandinistas, Cuba under Castro, Mozambique under
FRELIMO. Why? Because, in Ms Kirkpatrick’s reasoning, the former are more susceptible
to ‘liberalization and democratization’ and ‘more compatible with US
interests’.
If it wasn’t for the ‘socialist threat’ of equality and
social progress, the argument went, there would be no push for revolutionary change in the
Third World. Somehow for Ms Kirkpatrick lousy living standards, hunger, illness; these
simply don’t figure as reasons why people might want to struggle for something
better.
‘Because the miseries of traditional life are familiar, they are
bearable to ordinary people who, growing up in the society, learn to cope, as children
born to Untouchables in India acquire the skills and attitudes necessary for survival in
the miserable roles they are destined to fill.’ Poverty is lamentable, Ms Kirkpatrick
implies. But in the long-run, liberal do-gooders will only make a worse mess.
This right-wing mix of bluster, suspicion and self-interest has,
predictably, hobbled American aid policy. In an effort to put more political muscle into
its aid programme the US is cutting back on its donations to agencies like the World Bank
where it cannot exert direct control. There has even been a push by ultraconservative
Congressmen to slash US support to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Up to now most
criticism of the IMF has come from the Left who complain that IMF loan conditions punish
the poor and increase Third World dependency. The Right argues that international banks
and poor nations got themselves into trouble: and they can get themselves out again
without American help.
Mixed in with the general right-wing attitude towards the outside world
is a generous sprinkling of racism and knee-jerk patriotism. The destruction of the Korean
747 airliner, causing the death of 269 people, by the Soviets was a public-relations
Godsend for the Reagan administration, which manipulated and stereotyped the event into a
crude propaganda coup. The Soviets were denounced as mass murderers who had, according to
Reagan, ‘committed a crime against humanity’ by deliberately shooting down a
commercial passenger plane. Moscow’s response was that they thought the 747 was a
spy-plane and shot it only after repeated warnings. That complicated the black/white
morality of the story. If the Korean jetliner was being used for spying, then the US would
have to share the blame for the tragedy. Instead the Soviets were reduced to subhuman
cartoons, denied their humanity as thinking, feeling people and turned into drooling,
trigger-happy lunatics. Score one for the Reagan camp’s ideological battle against
the Soviets.
It is this potential for hysteria and need for scapegoats which is most
frightening about the Right’s attitude towards the world beyond its borders. There is
no room for diversity in political thought or models of economic development. Nations and
individuals with different beliefs, different experiences and different solutions are
either misled or wrong. The legitimacy of their world view is rejected. And with it their
humanity.
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From Boston, USA
Brian O’Shay
THERE is no doubt in my mind that my
children’s lives will be better than mine,’ says Brian O’Shay, a 49 year-old employee at a large lumber
company outside Boston. Brian’s doing all right. And he knows it. He has been
steadily employed at the same job since high school. He grew up in the city but now owns
his own home in the suburbs. His two teenage children will go on to college. His wife
works full-time - by
choice, he emphasizes, not because she has to.
In 1980 O’Shay voted for Ronald Reagan. And he plans to do the
same in 1984. ‘Reagan is doing a good job. People are more American now. They like
his strong stand with other countries - and they like the way people aren’t getting anything for free any
more.’
O’Shay likes Reagan’s style.
There are a lot of Americans like Brian O’Shay. Neither rich nor
poor, they are grateful beneficiaries of the economic boom following World War II. They
are people who, in O’Shay’s words, do not look to the federal government for
‘handouts’ or ‘favours’. Not particularly political, they believe in
individual initiatives, fairness and strength. And their struggle with these contradictory
values results in views which are often more pragmatic and compassionate than those of the
craggy politician they elected President.
O’Shay recognizes that the Reagan administration’s budget
cuts caused hardship for many. ‘But, to be honest, a lot of those cuts slid right by
me. They don’t affect me personally so I don’t pay much attention.’
O’Shay believes that there is ‘waste, fraud and abuse’
(one of Reagan’s favourite phrases) in government socia spending. But he is just as
convinced that the same waste and abuse exists throughout government - including the Pentagon and the Halls of Congress. And he knows who
benefits the most from Reagan’s program: ‘The tax cut didn’t amount to much
for me. But it did for those who make a lot of money. I don’t think all those
loopholes should be there.’
He wants change, but is deeply cynical and distrustful of politics.
‘I am not political. I do not get involved with candidates. They all have feet of
clay.’ ‘Throwing money at problems’ is unproductive, he believes, and
supports the Reagan ideology of ‘belt-tightening’.
Even more persuasive, though, is Reagan’s foreign policy.
O’Shay does not trust the Russians. He sees the Soviet Union - and its allies such as Cuba - as ‘very real threats to US
interests’. It is unclear which interests he means, but he believes that only
the US is preventing still further Russian expansion. ‘Russia is a young country.
They beat their chests a lot and jump in with both feet. Unfortunately, we’re the
only ones who care.’
Thelissue is not nuclear arms. O’Shay thinks the US has enough
missiles, but thinks they should spend more on conventional forces and should take a
strong stance. The Grenada invasion was a step in that direction. ‘It seemed
reasonable. And we should have done it at the beginning in Cuba before things went sour
there.’
In the end, the deciding factor for O’Shay in voting for Ronald
Reagan is style and image. He disagrees with Reagan on many fundamental issues, both
domestic and foreign. But he thinks the general direction Reagan has moved in - and his leadership image - is what the United States needs at
home and abroad. As the economy continues to recover, O’Shay and millions like him
are ready to vote for Reagan again.
By Richard Kazis
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