[api] Response to Stephen M. Birmingham regarding the Cold War
Russil Wvong
"Stephen M. Birmingham" <s.birm...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote
in message news:<ao29kh$il1pm$1...@ID-97432.news.dfncis.de>...
> "Russil Wvong" <russi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > "Stephen M. Birmingham" previously wrote:
> > > However, if you happen to believe those documents which apparently
> > > make it clear that "the primary goal of U.S. policymakers was
> > > containment of the Soviet Union, ... not because it stood outside
> > > of the capitalist system, but because of its military power," then
> > > I put it to you that you are also likely to be reading the wrong
> > > books.
> >
> > Regarding the disparity between US and Soviet military power: in 1948,
> > following demobilization, the US army had about 550,000 men, mostly
> > new recruits; they only had one combat-ready division. The size of
> > the Soviet army was between 5 million and 6 million -- a ten-to-one
> > disparity. There were 25 divisions in East Germany and Poland alone.
> > NATO never had conventional forces capable of stopping the Soviet
> > army; the NATO forces were described as "plate glass", their main
> > purpose in the event of a Soviet invasion being to trigger a nuclear
> > counterattack. After the Soviet Union exploded its own nuclear bomb
> > (in 1949) and developed missiles capable of targeting the US (in the
> > 1950s), naturally people doubted whether the US would really trigger
> > a nuclear exchange in defense of Western Europe. Soviet leaders
> > brought the world close to the brink of nuclear war more than once by
> > threatening to cut off access to West Berlin, even before the Cuban
> > missile crisis. (See Louis Halle, "The Cold War as History.")
>
> Despite being large in number, the Soviet forces were still relatively
> weak for a considerable period after demobilisation.
Relatively weak compared to what? (They'd just defeated the armies of
Nazi Germany.) Are you suggesting that the West had armies capable of
stopping them? I haven't come across anyone who argues that, including
Chomsky.
Andrew Alexander's argument:
... the supposed military threat was wholly implausible. Had the
Russians, though themselves devastated by the war, invaded the
West, they would have had a desperate battle to reach and occupy
the Channel coast against the Allies, utilising among other things
a hastily rearmed Wehrmacht.
Why would they have had a "desperate battle"? The populations of
Western Europe were in great danger of starvation and freezing to
death, particularly during the terrible winter of 1946-1947. They
were in no shape to fight. "A hastily rearmed Wehrmacht"? Isn't
Alexander overlooking some practical problems here? (Similarly
when you talk about the US "scrambling" troops. Mobilizing millions
of troops and transporting them overseas isn't something that can
be done quickly.)
But, in any case, what then? With a negligible Russian navy, the
means of invading Britain would somehow have had to be created.
Meanwhile Britain would have been supplied with an endless stream
of men and material from the United States, making invasion
virtually hopeless.
Why bother? After taking over Western Europe, the Soviet Union would
have left Britain as an "isolated industrial slum", in Kennan's words.
It sounds like Andrew Alexander's arguing that the Soviet threat to
Western Europe wasn't a threat to *Britain*. (Does he have something
against continental Europe?) I'm afraid here he's arguing against
several centuries of British foreign policy, aimed at maintaining a
balance of power in Europe (whether against Spain, France, Germany,
or the Soviet Union). Britain would have found itself in a very
desperate situation if it faced a hostile power controlling
continental Europe. The most obvious problem is that it isn't
capable of feeding itself; it has to import a great deal of its
food (during World War II, about two-thirds, I believe).
And even if the Soviets, ignoring the A-bomb, had conquered Europe
from Norway to Spain against all odds, they would have been left
facing an implacable United States across more than 2,000 miles of
ocean — the ultimate unwinnable war.
Unwinnable in what sense? Is Andrew Alexander suggesting that the
United States and Britain would have been able to invade Western
Europe and defeat the Soviet Union?
If I had Andrew Alexander's e-mail address, I'd be telling him this
myself. :-)
Alexander is correct to point out the importance of the A-bomb.
The problem is -- what would happen when the Soviet Union had the
A-bomb as well? Wouldn't the US really risk nuclear annihilation
to defend Western Europe from a conventional attack? (As it turned
out, the answer was yes, the US really would risk nuclear war.)
I've posted a number of excerpts from "The Cold War as History" to
alt.fan.noam-chomsky, under the thread "NC on containment." See:
http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=
e57e1dc8.0209262025.19757604%40posting.google.com
> The United States had a number of opportunities to "thaw" the Cold War
> — none more promising than President Kennedy's and Premiere Khrushchev's
> bold plan to combine their manned lunar landing programs and to
> simultaneously curtail their arms forces:
> http://www.spacedaily.com/news/russia-97h.html
Er, from reading the article, it was Kennedy's bold plan. Khrushchev
turned it down several times. Am I misreading the article?
> If the primary goal of U.S. policymakers was containment of the Soviet
> Union, not because it stood outside of the capitalist system, but
> because of its military power, then I put it to you that subsequent
> administrations would have vigorously perused such peace offerings.
Again, who was it who was offering peace -- Kennedy or Khrushchev?
You have heard of detente, right?
> > Of course, I don't imagine I'll convince you, but I may be able to
> > convince other people who are following the thread. (Over the last
> > several months I think I've only convinced one Chomsky fan, Ray
> > Amberg, who took the time to visit the library and look up a book
> > on Kennan and PPS/39 for himself; he also wrote to Chomsky and got
> > a rather hostile response.
>
> You mean this response?
> http://www.zmag.org/content/EastTimorWatch/chomsky_may20.cfm
No, I mean the following:
http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=
514a6774.0203041028.6b5bbc97%40posting.google.com
http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=
514a6774.0203151116.7abd802b%40posting.google.com
> > Regarding the more general issue of US foreign policy: I certainly
> > disagree with your assessment of US foreign policy, but I think our
> > viewpoints may simply be too different for us to have a very
> > productive discussion.
>
> Possibly. I subscribe to the John Pilger and Noam Chomsky train of thought.
> That is, I do not see why people should pull their punches or dilute their
> criticism of somebody or some particular policy when innocent lives are on
> the line.
Who could argue with that? But I think we disagree on the basic facts.
If you think there was no Soviet threat to Western Europe, I doubt I'm
going to be able to convince you.
> > (Briefly, my view is that the US seeks to maintain the status quo;
> > people who oppose the status quo and seek to overthrow it will
> > therefore attempt to weaken or destroy the power of the US, pretty
> > much regardless of what the US does. As a Canadian, I recognize
> > that many people suffer under the existing status quo, and I'm
> > concerned by the unilateralist foreign policy of the Bush
> > Administration, with its dismissal of international treaties and
> > international law; but at the same time, I'm skeptical that
> > overthrowing the status quo and establishing a new status quo,
> > with a great deal of accompanying bloodshed, would result in any
> > great increase in social justice.)
>
> But isn't that somewhat defeatist view to take?
>
> To quote from President John F. Kennedy's Commencement Address at
> American University, Washington, D.C., June 10, 1963:
>
> First: Let us examine our attitude toward peace itself. Too many of
> us think it is impossible. Too many think it unreal. But that is a
> dangerous, defeatist belief. It leads to the conclusion that war is
> inevitable -- that mankind is doomed -- that we are gripped by
> forces we cannot control.
Nice quote. I don't think *peace* is impossible, just that in order to
maintain it you need a balance of power. The use of power is always
morally questionable -- it means overriding the freedom of others --
but at the same time, a society which renounces power will be at the
mercy of others which do not. See the "Parable of the Tribes":
http://www.context.org/ICLIB/IC07/Schmoklr.htm
Russil Wvong
Vancouver, Canada
alt.politics.international FAQ: www.geocities.com/rwvong/future/apifaq.html
Stephen M. Birmingham
> > "Stephen M. Birmingham" previously wrote:
> > Despite being large in number, the Soviet forces were still relatively
> > weak for a considerable period after demobilisation.
>
> Relatively weak compared to what? (They'd just defeated the armies of
> Nazi Germany.)
But at great cost to themselves. Earlier you talked about a disparity and
compared Soviet military strength favourably to that of the United States.
You seemed to be arguing that the Soviet Union rose from the rubble the
strongest. I dispute that vehemently. After WWII it was the United States
who emerged as the most powerful nation on Earth.
If I have misunderstood your contention then, by all means, please correct
me.
> Are you suggesting that the West had armies capable of stopping them?
> I haven't come across anyone who argues that, including Chomsky.
I am arguing that the Soviets were not as strong, and that the initial threat was
not as serious as historians/planners made it out to be. Could we have marched
on Moscow and defeated them soundly? No. Could we contain them?
Easily, in my opinion.
> Andrew Alexander's argument:
>
> ... the supposed military threat was wholly implausible. Had the
> Russians, though themselves devastated by the war, invaded the
> West, they would have had a desperate battle to reach and occupy
> the Channel coast against the Allies, utilising among other things
> a hastily rearmed Wehrmacht.
>
> Why would they have had a "desperate battle"? The populations of
> Western Europe were in great danger of starvation and freezing to
> death, particularly during the terrible winter of 1946-1947. They
> were in no shape to fight.
Yet at the same time your argument seems to rest on the premise that the
Soviets were in fine fettle! The Soviet Union was not immune to starvation,
terrible weather or depression, as you should very well recall.
> Isn't Alexander overlooking some practical problems here? (Similarly
> when you talk about the US "scrambling" troops. Mobilizing millions
> of troops and transporting them overseas isn't something that can
> be done quickly.)
I agree. It's quite a task. But then it was something the United States had
become quite adept at.
> But, in any case, what then? With a negligible Russian navy, the
> means of invading Britain would somehow have had to be created.
> Meanwhile Britain would have been supplied with an endless stream
> of men and material from the United States, making invasion
> virtually hopeless.
>
> Why bother? After taking over Western Europe,
Hang on.. You are getting way ahead of yourself. You haven't demonstrated
that the Soviet Union was capable of taking over Western Europe yet.
> the Soviet Union would have left Britain as an "isolated industrial slum", in
> Kennan's words.
And evidently, that would be a huge mistake.
> It sounds like Andrew Alexander's arguing that the Soviet threat to
> Western Europe wasn't a threat to *Britain*. (Does he have something
> against continental Europe?)
No. He very clearly touches on *some* of the problems the Soviets would
have faced if they were suicidal enough to begin an invasion of Western Europe.
Similarly, he then goes on to highlight *some* of the problems they would have
faced upon reaching the English channel, and so on.
> I'm afraid here he's arguing against several centuries of British foreign policy,
He is arguing against the commonly held view, that much is true.
To quote from his Spectator article:
http://www.spectator.co.uk/article.php3?table=old§ion=current&issue=2002-04-20&id=1779
Revisionist views of the Cold War regularly surface in the United States,
though the case is sometimes spoiled by the authors' socialist sympathies
(something of which I have never been accused). In Britain, the revisionist
view has not had much of a hearing.
One can, of course, understand why few anywhere in the West want the
orthodox view of the Cold War overturned. If that were to happen, the
whole edifice of postwar politics would begin to crumble.
Could it be that the heavy burden of postwar rearmament was unnecessary,
that the transatlantic alliance actually imperilled rather than saved us?
Could it be that the world teetered on the verge of annihilation because the
postwar Western leaders, particularly in Washington, lacked imagination,
intelligence and understanding?
You must remember that Andrew Alexander's argument is twofold. Quite apart
from the challenges of warfare, he is also arguing that we lacked understanding.
This itself raises other lines of enquiry and this is what I am also interested in.
Many people will dispute this (Chomsky included) but I believe there was
something of real value in John F. Kennedy's rapprochement.
And this further ties in with the point Alexander is making:
At times even Eisenhower seemed ambivalent about the Cold War. In his
farewell address in 1960, he warned about the vested interests of the
American ‘military-industrial complex’. Under his presidency US foreign
policy had fallen into the hands of crazed crusaders such as John Foster
Dulles. Of him, Anthony Eden complained that he was the only bull who
carried his own china shop with him. He also accused him of really wanting
a third world war. Followers of Dulles’s crusading approach remained
prominent, especially under Reagan and until the collapse of the Soviet
Union.
His forthcoming book should be very interesting.
> balance of power in Europe (whether against Spain, France, Germany,
> or the Soviet Union). Britain would have found itself in a very
> desperate situation if it faced a hostile power controlling
> continental Europe. The most obvious problem is that it isn't
> capable of feeding itself; it has to import a great deal of its
> food (during World War II, about two-thirds, I believe).
Two-thirds sounds a bit steep. I will have to check that one out. But again,
rationing was something that we adjusted to during WWII and I am sure it is
something we could have adapted again. Sure, it was far from ideal, but you
must not underestimate the willingness to endure. Hitler made this mistake.
In fact it flummoxed him. Goodness know there are plenty of pensioners in
this country alone who are more than willing to bend your ear for an hour or
ten! "When I were a lad, I used to live in a matchbox." :-)
> And even if the Soviets, ignoring the A-bomb, had conquered Europe
> from Norway to Spain against all odds, they would have been left
> facing an implacable United States across more than 2,000 miles of
> ocean - the ultimate unwinnable war.
>
> Unwinnable in what sense? Is Andrew Alexander suggesting that the
> United States and Britain would have been able to invade Western
> Europe and defeat the Soviet Union?
No, I think Andrew Alexander is arguing that a Soviet invasion of Western
Europe was wholly implausible.
> If I had Andrew Alexander's e-mail address, I'd be telling him this myself. :-)
I can't help you out on that particular score. I searched for his e-mail address
myself a few months ago but my efforts were fruitless.
> Alexander is correct to point out the importance of the A-bomb.
> The problem is -- what would happen when the Soviet Union had the
> A-bomb as well?
Then, clearly, that particular playing field is levelled. But I think more value
should be attached to the fact the U.S. had the Atom Bomb when the Soviet
Union did not, making invasion a non-starter. Despite its "ruthless" nature, that
is sure one hell of a bargaining chip, whatever way you look at it.
> Wouldn't the US really risk nuclear annihilation to defend Western Europe
> from a conventional attack? (As it turned out, the answer was yes, the US
> really would risk nuclear war.)
Even more reason to believe a Soviet invasion was farfetched.
> I've posted a number of excerpts from "The Cold War as History" to
> alt.fan.noam-chomsky, under the thread "NC on containment." See:
> http://groups.google.com/groups?threadm=
> e57e1dc8.0209262025.19757604%40posting.google.com
Russil, you seem to be heavily dependant one just a few different works.
Particularly Louis Halle's "The Cold War as History". I am not saying this
is a bad book -- I haven't even read it! -- I am merely saying that it would
be good to specifically purchase and read books that offer dissimilar points
of view. New information is being released all of the time and it's good to
weigh this information dispassionately against that what you have already read.
Don't reject it out of hand simply because it doesn't correspond with the
commonly held view or your favourite text books. I do not mean to be
patronising -- you may well have read more history books than I have --
I am simply highlighting what may be a flaw in your reasoning.
> > The United States had a number of opportunities to "thaw" the Cold War
> > - none more promising than President Kennedy's and Premiere Khrushchev's
> > bold plan to combine their manned lunar landing programs and to
> > simultaneously curtail their arms forces:
> > http://www.spacedaily.com/news/russia-97h.html
>
> Er, from reading the article, it was Kennedy's bold plan. Khrushchev
> turned it down several times. Am I misreading the article?
No, that is quite correct. But allow me to elaborate. Nikita Khrushchev initially
accepted the proposal -- all be it tentatively -- when it was first put to him at the
Vienna summit meeting of 1961. However, in Russia, spaceflight so was closely
interwoven with the military that it was virtually impossible to separate them, so
it quickly became apparent that many Soviet military secrets would have to be
divulged to the United States, *but not necessarily vice versa* as President Dwight
D. Eisenhower had wisely ensured that spaceflight was taken out of military
control and placed into the hands of a civilian body (NASA). So this presented
a major problem to Khrushchev, and he "wasn't ready to overcome this barrier
if it meant pressing the military" (Sergei Khrushchev, "Khrushchev on Khrushchev").
However, instead of firmly closing the door on the offer, Khrushchev kept it
slightly ajar and argued that any such program of cooperation would have to go
hand in hand with substantial disarmament. The reason was twofold: Firstly,
revealing some military secrets would not be so dangerous if the two countries were
working towards disarmament. Secondly, Khrushchev could not quite afford it
otherwise. Needless to say, this proposal was rejected by the U.S. administration
and Kennedy was quickly brought to his senses. For two years he then toed the
anti-Communism line, only to break away again in 1963, when he reaffirmed his
proposal and accepted that their would have to be some kind of winding down
of the arms race. This didn't necessarily spell peace for certainty -- Camelot
was quite literally a million miles away -- but it sure was a good start.
See John F. Kennedy's Address Before the 18th General Assembly of the
United Nations, September 20, 1963: http://www.jfklibrary.org/j092063.htm
So, as you can see, although Kennedy made the offer, Khrushchev was to
some extent unavoidably involved in the shaping of the deal and, naturally,
he would have been directly involved if/when it was implemented.
And I say it was a "bold" plan because it wasn't just JFK who was sticking
his neck out. I contacted Sergei Khrushchev about this matter and he kindly
directed me to his book, "Nikita Khrushchev and the Making of a Superpower".
This contains more detailed information than can be found in his first body of
work, and he also talks about the myth of Soviet strength in his field and the
fear it caused in the West.
> > If the primary goal of U.S. policymakers was containment of the Soviet
> > Union, not because it stood outside of the capitalist system, but
> > because of its military power, then I put it to you that subsequent
> > administrations would have vigorously perused such peace offerings.
>
> Again, who was it who was offering peace -- Kennedy or Khrushchev?
>
> You have heard of detente, right?
Yes. The proposal was Kennedy's and, quite significantly, it caused a storm
of controversy and anger to be directed towards him shortly after having made
it. Lyndon B. Johnson basically danced around the issue after Kennedy's
tragic death and that was the end of that.
Johnson made no secret of the fact the Space Race was a continuation of the
battle of the free enterprise system and totalitarianism, in the continuing fight for
men's hearts and minds.
> > Possibly. I subscribe to the John Pilger and Noam Chomsky train of thought.
> > That is, I do not see why people should pull their punches or dilute their
> > criticism of somebody or some particular policy when innocent lives are on
> > the line.
>
> Who could argue with that? But I think we disagree on the basic facts.
> If you think there was no Soviet threat to Western Europe, I doubt I'm
> going to be able to convince you.
It is not so much that I do not believe they were never a threat, it is the
exact nature of that threat that I am contending.
> > But isn't that somewhat defeatist view to take?
> >
> > To quote from President John F. Kennedy's Commencement Address at
> > American University, Washington, D.C., June 10, 1963:
> >
> > First: Let us examine our attitude toward peace itself. Too many of
> > us think it is impossible. Too many think it unreal. But that is a
> > dangerous, defeatist belief. It leads to the conclusion that war is
> > inevitable -- that mankind is doomed -- that we are gripped by
> > forces we cannot control.
>
> Nice quote. I don't think *peace* is impossible, just that in order to
> maintain it you need a balance of power. The use of power is always
> morally questionable -- it means overriding the freedom of others --
> but at the same time, a society which renounces power will be at the
> mercy of others which do not.
To which I respond: Education, education, education. We should be making
such a transformation right now, while we maintain such a position of power.
I am not so sure that peace can only come from a position of power, but it
certainly helps and it will likely spare more bloodshed in the long-term.
But then here is the problem: our current leaders seem intent on aiding and
abetting the current spiral of violence. I sure wish they would just grow up!
Russil Wvong
> Earlier you talked about a disparity and compared Soviet military
> strength favourably to that of the United States. You seemed to be
> arguing that the Soviet Union rose from the rubble the strongest.
*In conventional military strength*, yes. I'm not sure why you find
this so hard to believe! If you don't trust Louis Halle, there was a
lengthy discussion of the origins of the Cold War on the H-DIPLO
mailing list (a mailing list for diplomatic historians) a while ago.
One exchange between Don Struckmann and Jerald Combs:
Don Struckmann writes:
> The Korean war marked the beginning of the arms race which
> became the center and sustaining force of the cold war for the
> next 40 years.... There were many people within the
> administration who may genuinely have believed that the Soviet
> Union was a threat, and even that the Stalin government was
> actively planning to take over the world. Yet, the informed
> people of the Administration knew this not to be true. The
> reality is that in 1950, and for the then foreseeable future,
> the Soviets did not have offensive capabilities against the US.
>
> The Europeans were under the same veil of dishonesty. The
> Europeans did not clamor for American military support against
> Stalin or the Russian armor.....The true origins of the Cold War
> derive from economic rather than military concerns.
Every one of those statements is demonstrably untrue. In fact, the
arms race began before Korea. As I will show in a forthcoming
article for _Diplomatic History_, Stalin stopped the post-World
War II demobilization of his forces and began to rebuild his army
into an offensive force starting just before the Berlin Blockade
of 1948. The West detected only a portion of that buildup, but
enough to worry its leaders. Many European leaders requested
U.S. help in defending against the Soviet Army's threat to Western
Europe and the result was first the Western Union in 1948 and then
NATO in 1949. But the United States was actually quite cautious
about building a conventional force in Europe, even if it was
confined almost entirely to European rather than U.S. forces,
until Korea. The United States preferred instead to rely almost
entirely on maintaining its lead in nuclear weaponry to offset
increasing Soviet conventional power and the inevitable growth of
Soviet nuclear capabilities. The Korean War changed that. The
United States and its allies feared that U.S. atomic weapons could
not stop a Soviet invasion of Western Europe that might occur in
the next few years and the conquest of Western Europe could well
alter the world balance of power. Meanwhile, the increasing Soviet
atomic weaponry and delivery systems, while they might not be able
to destroy the United States in the near future, might be capable
of inflicting enough damage and casualties to deter the United
States from using its own superior nuclear capabilities to defend
Western Europe against a conventional Soviet invasion, and could
certainly prevent a new Normandy invasion to reconquer
Europe. NSC-68 might have been something of an overreaction to
that situation, but it was a response to a real and growing Soviet
military capability and implied Stalinist threat.
Jerald A. Combs, San Francisco State University
And:
> Soviet mobilization circa 1948 is relevant to the question only
> if the details of the mobilization show deployments that were
> indicative of a first strike against the west. It is possible
> that the increased troops were needed for defensive purposes to
> keep the Soviet sponsored regimes in power. To simply say that
> there were more men in Eastern Europe is not evidence of Soviet
> aggression. Besides, for the Soviets to attack on the ground
> they had to consider nuclear retaliation.
Soviet mobilization in 1948 and afterward did indeed provide the
capability of an attack on Western Europe. Nikita Khrushchev
admitted in his famous speech of 1960 that the Soviet armed forces
(and therefore presumably the army as well) nearly doubled between
1948 and 1955. Western intelligence certainly detected a growth in
the Soviet army in Eastern Europe and the Western zones of the
Soviet Union during that time. In 1948, three of the four
mechanized Soviet armies stationed in Eastern Europe were cadred
at about 1/3 of their TO/E manpower (but 100% of their armament,
including tanks). By May 1949 all of those divisions were at 70%
of their manpower, a level at which they could either go into
combat immediately at this reduced strength or be quickly brought
up to full strength by mobilization. Western intelligence also saw
the deployment of ten armies (40 divisions) in the Western zones
of the Soviet Union to support the 25 divisions in East Germany
and Poland, although they did not have clear knowledge of how much
the divisions in the western Soviet Union were building up. By
1952 all of the Soviet divisions in East Germany were at close to
100% of their manpower. This was clearly a transition from an
occupation to an offensive army that had both the manpower and
armament to invade Western Europe, whether or not Stalin had any
intention to do so and whether or not, if he did so, he would have
considered it a defensive measure against the superior U.S. atomic
force. Meanwhile, NATO did not have more that 18 ready divisions
in Western Europe at any time during this period, so it posed no
military threat whatever to the Soviet sphere.
Acheson and Nitze did not fear an immediate Soviet invasion of
Europe in 1948, and they only temporarily feared in 1950 that the
Soviets might use their conventional superiority in Europe and the
diversion of the Korean War to take Berlin or some other limited
object in Europe. They did fear however, that once the Soviets had
accumulated a hundred or so atomic bombs (perhaps by 1954), even
if those could be delivered only by one-way suicide attacks on
American cities, the Soviets might think that even though such an
attack would not defeat the United States, the potential damage
and casualties might be enough to deter the Americans from
launching their superior nuclear force in response to a mere
conventional attack in Europe. (By the way, NSC-68 said only that
the Soviets might think the U.S. would be deterred from a nuclear
attack in response to a conventional invasion of Europe, not that
it actually would be.) Readers will have to decide for themselves
whether that was a rational fear, but I think there is no question
that the Soviets had or were developing the capabilities that
Nitze and Acheson thought they were.
The full discussion is at
http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~diplo/reGardner.htm
Combs' article was published as
Phillip A. Karber and Jerald A. Combs, "The United States, NATO,
and the Soviet Threat to Western Europe: Military Estimates and
Policy Options, 1945-1963", Diplomatic History 22, 3 (Summer
1998): 399-429.
The reason I particularly like "The Cold War as History" is that Louis
Halle does a good job of evoking the atmosphere of fear in the West;
fifty years later, it's difficult for us to imagine.
> Russil, you seem to be heavily dependant one just a few different
> works. Particularly Louis Halle's "The Cold War as History". I am
> not saying this is a bad book -- I haven't even read it! -- I am
> merely saying that it would be good to specifically purchase and
> read books that offer dissimilar points of view.
I understand what you're saying, and to some extent I do this (which
is why I've read Chomsky, for example), but my general approach to
fact-checking is a little different from what you're suggesting.
Rather than trying to sample the full range of views on a
controversial topic and then "averaging" them out to try to make sure
that the lies and distortions at one end of the spectrum counter the
lies and distortions at the other end of the spectrum, what I do is
try to find at least one source I can trust -- that is, one source
that isn't lying or being careless with the facts. (Or as a friend
puts it, instead of trying to sort out the lies, why not find someone
who's telling the truth?)
To check what author A says about X -- assuming that X isn't a subject
I know much about -- I find a number of techniques to be useful:
- Find something I *do* know about, and see what A has to say
about it. Same principle as checking the reliability of a
telephone book by looking up your own listing.
- Find out what other people have to say about X.
- Find out what other people have to say about A's discussion
of X -- book reviews, for example.
The Internet and Google make it pretty easy to do this even for
someone I've never heard of.
The advantage of this approach is that I don't have to spend a lot
of time reading lies and propaganda. :-)
Nathan Folkert
> "Stephen M. Birmingham" <s.birm...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
> > Earlier you talked about a disparity and compared Soviet military
> > strength favourably to that of the United States. You seemed to be
> > arguing that the Soviet Union rose from the rubble the strongest.
>
> *In conventional military strength*, yes. I'm not sure why you find
> this so hard to believe! If you don't trust Louis Halle, there was a
> lengthy discussion of the origins of the Cold War on the H-DIPLO
> mailing list (a mailing list for diplomatic historians) a while ago.
> One exchange between Don Struckmann and Jerald Combs:
One comparison that might be useful in determining both the actual and
perceived Soviet threat to Western Europe in the early postwar period
would be that of the size, armaments, and readiness of the Soviet
military relative to Western Europe in 1949 or 1950 with the size,
armaments, and military readiness of the German military relative to
Western Europe in 1939. When I have a bit more time, I'll try to find
some relevant sources.
- Nate
Russil Wvong
> One comparison that might be useful in determining both the actual and
> perceived Soviet threat to Western Europe in the early postwar period
> would be that of the size, armaments, and readiness of the Soviet
> military relative to Western Europe in 1949 or 1950 with the size,
> armaments, and military readiness of the German military relative to
> Western Europe in 1939.
Hi, Nathan! I did a quick search in Encyclopaedia Britannica and found
the following:
... In May 1940 the German army concentrated 134 divisions on the
Western front, including 12 panzer divisions, 3,500 tanks and
5,200 warplanes. The French army totalled 94 divisions, the
British 10, and the neutral Belgians and Dutch 22 and eight
respectively. The French army possessed some 2,800 tanks, but less
than a third were concentrated in armoured units. The French air
force, disrupted during the Popular Front, was in any case
antiquated, and 90 percent of the artillery dated from World War
I. More important, French morale was low, sapped by the memory of
the first war's carnage, by political decadence, and by
over-reliance on the Maginot Line. Britain's Royal Air Force had
become a prodigious force thanks to 1,700 new planes, but
commanders were loath to deflect them from home defense to the
Continent.
[20th-Century International Relations]
I couldn't find similarly precise numbers on the military balance during
the early Cold War, but here's a couple general descriptions from
Britannica:
... World War II had laid waste every major industrial region of
the globe except North America. The result was that in 1945-46 the
United States accounted for almost half the gross world product of
goods and services and enjoyed a technological lead symbolized by,
but by no means limited to, its atomic monopoly. On the other
hand, Americans as always wanted to demobilize rapidly and return
to the private lives and careers interrupted by Pearl Harbor. The
Soviet Union, by contrast, was in ruin, but its mighty armies
occupied half a dozen states in the heart of Europe, while local
Communist parties agitated in Italy and France. The United States
and the Soviet Union thus appeared to pose asymmetrical threats to
each other.
And:
... The years of the U.S. [atomic] monopoly, however, were a time
of disillusionment for American leaders, who discovered that the
atomic bomb was not the absolute weapon they had first
envisioned. First, the atomic monopoly was something of a
bluff. As late as 1948 the U.S. arsenal consisted of a mere
handful of warheads and only 32 long-range bombers converted for
their delivery. Second, the military was at a loss as to how to
use the bomb. Not until war plan "Half Moon" (May 1948) did the
Joint Chiefs envision an air offensive "designed to exploit the
destructive and psychological power of atomic weapons." Truman
searched for an alternative, but balancing Soviet might in
conventional forces with a buildup in kind would have meant
turning the United States into a garrison state, an option far
more expensive and damaging to civic values than nuclear
weapons. A few critics, notably in the navy, asked how a
democratic society could morally justify a strategy based on
annihilation of civilian populations. The answer, which had been
evolving since 1944, was that U.S. strategy aimed at deterring
enemy attacks in the first place. "The only war you really win,"
said General Hoyt Vandenberg, "is the war that never starts."
Nuclear deterrence, however, was subject to at least three major
problems. First, even a nuclear attack could not prevent the
Soviet army from overrunning western Europe. Second, the nuclear
threat was of no use in cases of civil war, insurgency, and other
small-scale conflicts, a fact Stalin evidently relied on in
several instances. Third, the U.S. monopoly was inevitably
short-lived....
Stephen M. Birmingham
> > "Stephen M. Birmingham" previously wrote:
> > Earlier you talked about a disparity and compared Soviet military
> > strength favourably to that of the United States. You seemed to be
> > arguing that the Soviet Union rose from the rubble the strongest.
>
> *In conventional military strength*, yes. I'm not sure why you find
> this so hard to believe! If you don't trust Louis Halle,
It's not a matter of trust, it is more a matter of interpretation.
> there was a lengthy discussion of the origins of the Cold War on the
> H-DIPLO mailing list (a mailing list for diplomatic historians) a while
> ago.
Almost five years to the day!
> One exchange between Don Struckmann and Jerald Combs:
<snip cut & paste>
All very interesting. Naturally, I would need quite a bit of time if I were to
study this correspondence in detail. Something I have not the time nor will
to do. So briefly, I think Don Struckmann is absolutely correct when he
immediately points out that there isn't any one solitary truth:
Struckmann: There were many people within the administration who may
genuinely have believed that the Soviet Union was a threat, and even that
the Stalin government was actively planning to take over the world. Yet,
the informed people of the Administration knew this not to be true. The
reality is that in 1950, and for the then foreseeable future, the Soviets did
not have offensive capabilities against the US.
This seems to echo President Dwight D. Eisenhower's thoughts:
While Eisenhower saw economic peril in every budget increase and
worried about democracy's future in a technocratic world, he was less
concerned than many of his contemporaries about the Soviet threat.
As supreme commander of NATO forces, Eisenhower had pondered
the Soviet threat on a daily basis. The experience seems to have left him
less, not more, concerned about the prospect of bold Soviet aggression.
While in the White House, Eisenhower never put credence in the idea
that the Soviets would mount an attack at the first sign of Western
Weakness. On one occasion in 1953, he had complained to his special
assistant for national security affairs, Robert Cutler, that members of the
National Security Council "worry so damn much about what they will do
when the Russians attack. . . .Well, I don't believe for a second that
they will ever attack." ... Eisenhower said that he hoped his advisors
recognized that he had some measure of judgment in this field and he
made it clear that he didn't see any possibility of hostilities with the
Soviet Union.
So when Jerald Combs says "every one of [Struckmann's] statements is
demonstrably untrue" he immediately impairs his own judgment.
Not a very good start, then.
Paranoia was rampant and Eisenhower knew it. He even sought to curb
National Security insecurity through his Open Skies proposal. Sadly, the
scaremongers and hardliners won the day and at the end of his term
Eisenhower was unfairly depicted as a passive and outdated politician.
I quote Eisenhower because his administration is a case in point, and Andrew
Alexander obviously recognises it too:
At times even Eisenhower seemed ambivalent about the Cold War.
In his farewell address in 1960, he warned about the vested interests
of the American 'military-industrial complex'. Under his presidency
US foreign policy had fallen into the hands of crazed crusaders such
as John Foster Dulles. Of him, Anthony Eden complained that he was
the only bull who carried his own china shop with him. He also
accused him of really wanting a third world war. Followers of
Dulles's crusading approach remained prominent, especially under
Reagan and until the collapse of the Soviet Union.
There seems to be a real justificative tone to your response, especially
prominent when you try to devalue the strategic importance of the Atomic
bomb.
Something else: I cannot help but draw parallels between the Cold War
and the current bout of scaremongering we are seeing in relation to Iraq
today.
> The reason I particularly like "The Cold War as History" is that Louis
> Halle does a good job of evoking the atmosphere of fear in the West;
But how good is he at differentiating between that which gave us genuine
cause for concern and that which did not, but was whipped into an imaginary
threat for some other means or motive?
Russil Wvong
> All very interesting. Naturally, I would need quite a bit of time if I were to
> study this correspondence in detail. Something I have not the time nor will
> to do.
Stephen, to be honest, you're making me laugh. What did you say earlier?
I am merely saying that it would be good to specifically purchase and read
books that offer dissimilar points of view. New information is being released
all of the time and it's good to weigh this information dispassionately
against that what you have already read. Don't reject it out of hand simply
because it doesn't correspond with the commonly held view or your favourite
text books. I do not mean to be patronising -- you may well have read more
history books than I have -- I am simply highlighting what may be a flaw
in your reasoning.
> So briefly, I think Don Struckmann is absolutely correct when he
> immediately points out that there isn't any one solitary truth:
What?!
Look, I'm saying that immediately after World War II, the Soviet Union had a
much stronger conventional military force than the West. This statement is
either true or false. We can't say that there's one truth in which this
statement is correct, and another truth in which this statement is false.
We may have different *opinions*, but only one of us will be correct.
It should be possible for us to gather evidence for and against this statement,
to weigh the evidence dispassionately, and to decide whether the evidence is
stronger on one side or the other. But if you don't have the time or the will
to consider the evidence against your existing beliefs, so be it. (Nothing
wrong with that; we all have a limited amount of time and energy.)
Anyway, thanks for your time.
The observable process which Schiller and Dewey particularly
singled out for generalization is the familiar one by which any
individual settles into *new opinions*. The process here is
always the same. The individual has a stock of old opinions
already, but he meets a new experience that puts them to a strain.
Somebody contradicts them; or in a reflective moment he discovers
that they contradict each other; or he hears of facts with which
they are incompatible; or desires arise in him which they cease
to satisfy. The result is an inward trouble to which his mind
till then had been a stranger, and from which he seeks to escape
by modifying his previous mass of opinions. He saves as much of it
as he can, for in this matter of belief we are all extreme
conservatives. So he tries to change first this opinion, and then
that (for they resist change very variously), until at last some
new idea comes up which he can graft upon the ancient stock with
a minimum of disturbance of the latter, some idea that mediates
between the stock and the new experience and runs them into one
another most felicitously and expediently.
... Loyalty to [existing beliefs] is the first principle--in most
cases it is the only principle; for by far the most usual way of
handling phenomena so novel that they would make for a serious
rearrangement of our preconceptions is to ignore them altogether....
[William James, "What Pragmatism Means", 1904]
Stephen M. Birmingham
> "Stephen M. Birmingham" previously wrote:
> > All very interesting. Naturally, I would need quite a bit of time if I were
> > to study this correspondence in detail. Something I have not the time nor
> > will to do.
>
> Stephen, to be honest, you're making me laugh. What did you say earlier?
>
> I am merely saying that it would be good to specifically purchase and
> read books that offer dissimilar points of view. New information is being
> released all of the time and it's good to weigh this information
> dispassionately against that what you have already read. Don't reject it
> out of hand simply because it doesn't correspond with the commonly held
> view or your favourite text books. I do not mean to be patronising --
> you may well have read more history books than I have -- I am simply
> highlighting what may be a flaw in your reasoning.
>
> > So briefly, I think Don Struckmann is absolutely correct when he
> > immediately points out that there isn't any one solitary truth:
>
> What?!
>
> Look, I'm saying that immediately after World War II, the Soviet Union
> had a much stronger conventional military force than the West. This
> statement is either true or false. We can't say that there's one truth in
> which this statement is correct, and another truth in which this statement
> is false. We may have different *opinions*, but only one of us will be
> correct.
You misunderstand me. When I said I think Struckmann is correct and that
there isn't any one solitary truth, I meant this is true in relation to peoples
estimates of the Soviet threat, which were evidently dissimilar. I proceeded
to quote Struckmann and then referred to various other passages that
corroborate this particular point of view. Sorry, I thought that was obvious.
It also relates back to what we discussed elsewhere. Earlier I wrote:
..if you happen to believe those documents which apparently make it clear
that "the primary goal of U.S. policymakers was containment of the Soviet
Union, ... not because it stood outside of the capitalist system, but because
of its military power," then I put it to you that you are also likely to be
reading the wrong books.
Although I still believe this is fundamentally true, I will acknowledge that the
aforementioned point has merit here also. That is to say, I think that there are
too many blanket statements being made and that some of the arguments we
are engaging in are far too simplistic.
Russil Wvong
> "Russil Wvong" <russi...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> > "Stephen M. Birmingham" previously wrote:
> > > So briefly, I think Don Struckmann is absolutely correct when he
> > > immediately points out that there isn't any one solitary truth:
> >
> > What?!
>
> there isn't any one solitary truth, I meant this is true in relation to peoples
> estimates of the Soviet threat, which were evidently dissimilar.
Sorry, I was dumbfounded by your saying "there isn't any one solitary
truth". I agree that different people had different perceptions
of the Soviet threat.
> It also relates back to what we discussed elsewhere. Earlier I wrote:
>
> ..if you happen to believe those documents which apparently make it clear
> that "the primary goal of U.S. policymakers was containment of the Soviet
> Union, ... not because it stood outside of the capitalist system, but because
> of its military power," then I put it to you that you are also likely to be
> reading the wrong books.
>
> Although I still believe this is fundamentally true, I will acknowledge that the
> aforementioned point has merit here also. That is to say, I think that there are
> too many blanket statements being made and that some of the arguments we
> are engaging in are far too simplistic.
Blanket statements? This isn't a blanket statement, it's specific and concrete:
[Jerald Combs]
Combs' statements are concrete and specific; they can be verified or
falsified. There's no possibility that there could be more than one
truth: either they're true or false.
Anyway, do you want to continue the discussion, or should we end it here?
Stephen M. Birmingham
> > "Stephen M. Birmingham" previously wrote:
> > You misunderstand me. When I said I think Struckmann is correct and
> > that there isn't any one solitary truth, I meant this is true in relation to
> > peoples estimates of the Soviet threat, which were evidently dissimilar.
>
> Sorry, I was dumbfounded by your saying "there isn't any one solitary
> truth". I agree that different people had different perceptions of the
> Soviet threat.
And this is something I am finding increasingly apparent the more I learn
about the different elements of the Cold War.
> > It also relates back to what we discussed elsewhere. Earlier I wrote:
> >
> > ..if you happen to believe those documents which apparently make it clear
> > that "the primary goal of U.S. policymakers was containment of the Soviet
> > Union, ... not because it stood outside of the capitalist system, but because
> > of its military power," then I put it to you that you are also likely to be
> > reading the wrong books.
> >
> > Although I still believe this is fundamentally true, I will acknowledge that the
> > aforementioned point has merit here also. That is to say, I think that there are
> > too many blanket statements being made and that some of the arguments we
> > are engaging in are far too simplistic.
>
> Blanket statements? This isn't a blanket statement, it's specific and concrete:
<snip cut & paste>
Yes, it may be a specific statement but it is also a tad simplistic. There were
obviously many more factors to be taken into consideration when deliberating
the exact nature of the Soviet threat, and how to fight/protect against it.
As I said a moment ago, I still believe the above statement is fundamentally
true. That is policymakers were assessing the nature of the Communist threat
principally for what it was: a *Communist* threat.
> Combs' statements are concrete and specific; they can be verified or falsified.
> There's no possibility that there could be more than one truth: either they're
> true or false.
No, that is a complete fallacy -- the Bifurcation, Black-and-White, Either-Or
fallacy, to be precise. It is wrong to claim that there can be *only two*
possibilities when the evidence supports the possibility of a third, or perhaps
even the middle ground (as I have already shown to be the case in just one
area of contention between Don Struckmann and Jerald Combs. Re:
varying estimates of the Soviet threat). The problem arrives when people
cannot reach accommodation and they merely *assume* that the middle
ground must be true, or that there lies a third possibility when it has yet to be
demonstrated. This is then called the Golden Mean or Middle Ground fallacy.
> Anyway, do you want to continue the discussion, or should we end it here?
Well, we have somehow gone from Noam Chomsky and exploitation to
describing the status quo, to identifying flaws in mankind to pointing out
perceived differences in the exact nature of the Soviet threat. And now I
find myself having to elaborate and defend something which itself was meant
to clarify an earlier point of view. At this rate we will be discussing the
Mongolian People's Republic by Christmas!
Russil Wvong
> Yes, it may be a specific statement but it is also a tad simplistic.
Obviously there's more elements to the picture; the fact that the Soviet
Union had the *capability* to invade Western Europe did not mean that
they had the *intention* of doing so. Nevertheless, from what I can tell,
Combs provides pretty solid evidence that the Soviet Union did have
the military capability to invade Western Europe.
> There were obviously many more factors to be taken into consideration
> when deliberating the exact nature of the Soviet threat, and how to
> fight/protect against it. As I said a moment ago, I still believe
> the above statement is fundamentally true. That is policymakers were
> assessing the nature of the Communist threat principally for what
> it was: a *Communist* threat.
It'll be hard to persuade you otherwise if you won't look at the
evidence. :-)
> > Combs' statements are concrete and specific; they can be verified or
> > falsified. There's no possibility that there could be more than one
> > truth: either they're true or false.
>
> No, that is a complete fallacy -- the Bifurcation, Black-and-White,
> Either-Or fallacy, to be precise. It is wrong to claim that there can
> be *only two* possibilities when the evidence supports the possibility
> of a third....
Jerald Combs states that the Soviet Union had 25 divisions deployed in East
Germany and Poland, and 40 divisions in the Western zones of the Soviet
Union; and that NATO had no more than 18 ready divisions in Western Europe
during this period. These statements are either true or false, right?
What third possibility is there?
> > ... should we end it here?
>
> Well, we have somehow gone from Noam Chomsky and exploitation to
> describing the status quo, to identifying flaws in mankind to pointing out
> perceived differences in the exact nature of the Soviet threat. And now I
> find myself having to elaborate and defend something which itself was meant
> to clarify an earlier point of view. At this rate we will be discussing the
> Mongolian People's Republic by Christmas!
I don't understand if that's a yes or a no. Or is there a third
possibility? :-)
Russil Wvong
Vancouver, Canada
www.geocities.com/rwvong