U.S. Department of State
Dispatch Volume 7, Number 44, October 28, 1996
Bureau of Public Affairs


ARTICLES IN THIS ISSUE:

1.  Force, Diplomacy, and the Resources We Need for American Leadership 
-- Secretary Christopher 
2.  America and Russia in a Changing World -- Deputy Secretary Talbott 
3.  The Continuing Need for America's Global Leadership -- Nancy E. 
Soderberg 




Article 1:  

Force, Diplomacy, and the Resources We Need for American Leadership
Secretary Christopher
Address to Cadets at the United States Military Academy, West Point, New 
York, October 25, 1996

Today, I want to talk with you about combining diplomacy and force to 
advance America's interests and ideals. There could be few more 
appropriate places for such a discussion than West Point, with its 
tradition of eminent soldier-diplomats. This is a tradition to which 
your new Superintendent, General Christman, certainly belongs.

In his two years as my military adviser, General Christman's counsel was 
superb -- especially on the many important trips we took together. As a 
Vietnam veteran, he contributed greatly to the success of my trip to 
normalize relations with Hanoi last year. Dan also succeeded in bringing 
together for the first time high-ranking general officers from Israel 
and Syria -- even though the two countries remain technically at war.

Dan's assignment to West Point seems an ideal opportunity to return to 
the scene of his early achievements -- he graduated first in the class 
of 1965. I understand he has already earned a nickname for himself up 
here -- "Chief Rabble Rouser." Given how good he was at rousing the 
troops wherever we went together, I hope that he -- and you -- will give 
a demonstration right here and now.

West Point is very fortunate to have Dan at this moment in history, when 
so much has changed from the world we knew during nearly half a century 
of Cold War. Your instructors never imagined 10 years ago that their 
students would be going on joint patrols with Russian soldiers in Bosnia 
or exercising with Baltic troops on the bayous of Louisiana.

But in the midst of these changes, the fundamentals have stayed the 
same. American leadership and strength are just as critical to our 
nation's security and prosperity now as they were 50 years ago. Consider 
where we might be today if we had failed to lead over the last four 
years. Iraqi troops would be back in Kuwait. There would be not just one 
but four nuclear states on the territory of the former Soviet Union. 
North Korea would be well on the way to possessing nuclear weapons. War 
would still rage in Bosnia. Dictators would still rule Haiti. And there 
would be no framework for peace in the Middle East.

Where America is called upon to lead, often it is you who will be on the 
front lines. That is why President Clinton, with bipartisan support in 
Congress, has made sure that the United States has the best-trained, 
best-equipped, and most ready forces in the world. And today, our 
military might is matched by the strength of our economy and by the 
powerful attraction of our ideals. Together with our diplomacy, they 
allow us to exercise our global leadership and to protect our interests.

In today's world, when American interests are more global than ever, our 
national security requires the wise use of force and diplomacy together. 
Diplomacy that is not backed by the credible threat or use of force can 
be hollow -- and ultimately dangerous. But if we do not use diplomacy to 
promote our vital interests, we will surely find ourselves defending 
them on the battlefield. Today, in more places and more circumstances 
than ever before, we must get the balance right. To do the job properly, 
we must field and fund a world-class military. But we must also field 
and fund world-class diplomacy.

The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, General Shalikashvili, understands 
well that defense and diplomacy must work hand in hand. As he says, "the 
walls have come down between our two institutions . . . the days when 
the military viewed diplomats as the striped pants set . . . are long 
gone." He has personally put that insight into action in recent missions 
such as Operation Restore Democracy in Haiti and IFOR in Bosnia.

The lesson of our time is that we must combine force and diplomacy when 
our important interests are at stake. We are working together across a 
broad spectrum of circumstances. Let me discuss several of them today: 
defending against aggression, deterring potential adversaries, and 
securing peace in regions of vital interest.

It is the fundamental responsibility of the President to defend against 
attacks on our nation, our people, our allies, and our vital interests. 
The military role is critical -- but our diplomacy is also 
indispensable. There is probably no better example than Desert Storm, 
when our diplomacy built a coalition to turn back Iraq's invasion of 
Kuwait. Since then, we have maintained strong partnerships with our 
friends in the Gulf. And we have kept robust forces available. As a 
result, we were ready when Saddam Hussein renewed his threats against 
Kuwait in 1994. Within hours, with the cooperation of our Gulf partners, 
the President was able to send Army tank units to the border and order 
an aircraft carrier group to the region, together with over 300 Air 
Force planes. Our resolve forced Saddam to stop in his tracks and pull 
back. Today in Iraq, we maintain our strategy of troop deployments, an 
expanded no-fly zone, and a tough sanctions regime.

There is no doubt that we will use force when we must. But our military 
can also provide deterrence to make it less likely that our service men 
and women will be sent into battle.

On the Korean Peninsula, our soldiers and diplomats together practice a 
textbook example of deterrence. Some 37,000 American troops still stand 
watch on the last fault line of the Cold War. There they deter an attack 
from the North. Our strong alliance with Seoul has allowed our two 
countries to stand shoulder to shoulder against aggression. 

In recent years, North Korea has raised the stakes with its pursuit of 
nuclear weapons. We reinforced our troops and pursued tough but 
painstaking diplomacy to halt and reverse North Korea's nuclear program. 
Negotiations have brought important progress. But we have left no doubt 
that we are prepared to respond militarily in defense of our interests 
in this critical region.

In the Taiwan Strait, the timely combination of our military presence 
and our diplomacy helped ensure the stability of the whole region at a 
moment of great tension last March. We demonstrated our resolve by 
sending two carrier groups into the waters around Taiwan. 
Diplomatically, we reiterated our adherence to the three communiques 
that have defined our long-standing China policy. And we pressed both 
sides to reduce tensions and resume their dialogue.

The combination of force and diplomacy is also essential to deal with 
the complex challenges of securing peace in many regions of vital 
interest to the United States. In Bosnia, it took both American 
diplomatic initiative and intensive NATO airstrikes in the summer of 
1995 to end four years of war that threatened the stability of Europe. 
Without overwhelming air power, we could not have brought the Serbs to 
the negotiating table. But without a dedicated negotiating team of both 
diplomats and soldiers, we could not have produced the Dayton Agreement.

We did this through the unprecedented involvement of the military 
members of our negotiating team, led by General Wes Clark -- who, by the 
way, also was first in his class here, in 1966. Their pivotal role in 
Dayton last fall ensured that IFOR's mission would be well-defined and 
appropriately limited -- and that our soldiers would have the authority 
and the rules of engagement they needed to do their job. And let me also 
say that our 20,000 IFOR troops, led by another West Pointer, General 
William Nash, have performed superbly. 

Only IFOR could create the secure environment in which a lasting peace 
can be built. But only civilians can rebuild a civil society in Bosnia. 
That is why our diplomatic efforts have emphasized elections, multi-
ethnic institutions, and economic reconstruction.

Haiti was another example of careful advance cooperation to ensure that 
the civilian and military parts of the operation would work effectively 
together. Our troops gave Haitians the security they needed to hold free 
and fair elections resulting in the first peaceful, democratic transfer 
of power in Haiti's history. And our diplomats assembled the coalition 
we needed to convince Haiti's dictators to stand aside -- allowing U.S. 
troops to come in peace and leave on time. Now we are working with the 
people of Haiti and the international community to support economic 
reconstruction and help build a strong future for democracy. 

But, of course, we will serve the American people best of all if we can 
prevent the conflicts and emergencies that call for a military response. 
As Secretary of State, it is my responsibility to marshal our resources 
to do just that. Secretary Perry calls our diplomacy our first line of 
defense. If we hold that line around the world, we are much less likely 
to have to send you and the troops you will command into harm's way.

Nowhere does the United States have more at stake than in Europe, where 
5 million Americans were sent to fight in this century. After World War 
II, we created NATO -- perhaps the most successful example of military-
diplomatic cooperation the world has ever seen. Today, NATO plays a 
central role in overcoming Europe's historic divisions and laying the 
foundations for a lasting peace. Now we are adapting and expanding the 
alliance -- NATO should take in its first post-Cold War new members by 
1999. They will be ready, both politically and militarily, "to share the 
risks and responsibilities of freedom," as President Clinton said on 
Tuesday. And as we consolidate the political gains of Europe's new 
democracies, we are making it less likely that we will ever again have 
to send American troops to fight a war or to keep the peace on the 
borderlands of central and eastern Europe. And we are working with all 
the nations of Europe, including Russia, to build an undivided and 
peaceful continent.

In Asia, President Clinton has renewed our commitment to remain a 
Pacific power with 100,000 forward-deployed troops. Alongside the 
deterrence our military presence provides, our diplomacy is building the 
cooperation that will keep the region stable. We have reinforced our 
core alliances with Japan, Korea, Australia, Thailand, and the 
Philippines, and we have promoted a new structure for regional security 
cooperation as well as dialogues among former adversaries.

In Africa, we are building a broad strategy to prevent the violence that 
threatens the future of many emerging democracies. Our diplomacy is 
helping to rebuild civil society in countries such as Mozambique and to 
avert new conflicts. We are also prepared to help Africans respond to 
African crises. That is why we are working with our partners in Africa 
and Europe to create an African Crisis Response Force. African nations 
would provide the troops for such a force. The United States and other 
nations would make a substantial contribution of equipment, training, 
and logistical support -- to help Africans build peace themselves. 

Here at West Point, I doubt that I need to convince you of the need for 
this kind of diplomacy. You know the world is now more interdependent 
than ever, that the line between domestic and foreign policy has been 
erased, and that our security and economic interests are inseparable. 
The logic of these changes is that America must be more engaged in the 
world, not less. 

Especially because you are future officers, you have a keen interest in 
a foreign policy that helps us avert costly conflict and crisis. It may 
sound like a paradox, but the history of this century teaches us that as 
America's engagement around the world increases, the likelihood we will 
be drawn into conflict decreases. It is when we seek to escape the 
world's problems that we pay the greatest price.

Americans understand we need a strong military whose requirements are 
strongly supported. Because American diplomacy is also vital, I believe 
the national interest requires that we provide sufficient funding for 
both. Only by doing so will we be able to maintain and enhance our 
diplomatic readiness.

Just as military readiness requires maintaining forces and bases around 
the world, so diplomatic readiness requires keeping embassies open and 
trained personnel posted around the world. 

Diplomatic readiness means maintaining constructive relations with the 
great powers. For example, we need a strong presence in Russia to manage 
relations with that country as it goes through a momentous transition. A 
presence in each of the New Independent States of the former Soviet 
Union is also decisively important.

Diplomatic readiness means reaping benefits for our own security and 
prosperity by playing a central role in international organizations. Our 
funding for the International Atomic Energy Agency, for example, 
supports inspections that help control the nuclear programs of such 
countries as North Korea and Iraq. 

Diplomatic readiness means supporting American business overseas, so we 
can break down barriers to American exports in countries such as Japan 
and Brazil. Business leaders often tell me how much they appreciate our 
support -- and how they wish we had the resources to do more.

Diplomatic readiness means having adequate communications facilities. In 
today's 24-hour, fast-paced world, we cannot make do with information 
technology that is years out of date.

Diplomatic readiness also means providing targeted aid to struggling 
democracies -- an investment in their future and in ours. Earlier this 
month in the West African country of Mali, I saw firsthand how just a 
few hundred dollars of materials and the labor of our Peace Corps 
volunteers are helping farmers defend their land against the encroaching 
Sahara Desert and build a better future for their families.

Today, our diplomacy is also essential to confront the new transnational 
threats to our security, such as international crime, drug trafficking, 
terrorism, proliferation, and environmental damage. These threats 
respect no borders. No nation -- and no army -- can defeat them alone. 
Without diplomatic representation in almost every country of the world, 
we could not have marshaled global support to renew the nuclear Non-
Proliferation Treaty -- or to adopt the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. 
Without law enforcement agents stationed around the world, we could not 
track down criminals and drug dealers to make sure they stand trial in 
the United States.

Simply put, we cannot sustain our diplomacy on the cheap -- unless we 
want to shortchange the American people. But that is just what is 
happening. Since 1984 our international affairs spending has fallen by 
51% in real terms -- 51%. The total amount the United States spends on 
international affairs now constitutes just 1.2% of the federal budget -- 
a tiny fraction of the amount we must spend when foreign crises erupt 
into war.

I am constantly impressed by the ingenuity our people around the world 
show in doing more with less. But there comes a time when less is really 
just less. As President Clinton said last month, our international 
affairs budget "is well below what we need to assure that we can achieve 
our foreign policy objectives." This reflects the fact that the 
President has consistently sought greater resources than the Congress 
has provided. 

We have long since cut through fat to muscle and bone. Since I became 
Secretary of State, budgetary pressures have forced us to close 30 
embassies and consulates. We cannot advance American interests by 
lowering the American flag. Our global presence should be expanding, not 
contracting. We must find a way to continue to provide vital facilities 
and services to military attaches and personnel from other government 
agencies. And we must be able to provide essential services to American 
citizens.

In a world without dangers, these cuts in our diplomacy might be 
comprehensible. But in the real world, the failure to maintain 
diplomatic readiness will inevitably shift the burden to America's 
military. The President has made clear that we will use force when we 
must. But if we rely on our military strength alone, we will end up 
using our military all the time. That would impose too high a cost in 
lives and dollars.

I do not believe we can sustain our global leadership and protect our 
interests with constantly contracting resources. We must do better. Next 
January a new Congress will be sworn in. Whatever its composition and 
whoever is elected President, it will be high time to face up to the 
implications of the funding cuts of the last few years and the 
requirements of future budgets. In the context of the need for deficit 
reduction, I believe that we must renew our support for American 
diplomacy.

Our diplomacy and our military power must go hand in hand if our great 
nation is to fulfill its potential. It is time for our nation to commit 
itself to a new bipartisan consensus recognizing that diplomatic 
readiness remains fundamental to our national security and that we must 
-- and we will -- fulfill the responsibilities of leadership.

As President Clinton put it on Tuesday, "Wherever I go, whomever I talk 
with, the message to me is the same: We believe in America. We trust 
America. We want America to lead. And America must lead." With a new 
generation of leaders like you, I am confident that, working together, 
our military forces and our diplomats can meet that challenge of 
leadership today -- and tomorrow. Thank you. 

(###)




Article 2:

America and Russia in a Changing World
Deputy Secretary Talbott
Address at the celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the Harriman 
Institute, New York City, October 29, 1996

Thank you, Dick [Holbrooke], for that introduction, and thank you, too, 
Pamela [Harriman]. I owe you both a lot, including some memorable 
adventures. In 1990, when I was still a journalist, Pamela included me 
as the expedition scribe on a trip she and Bob Legvold made to Moscow, 
Kiev, and Tbilisi. It was one of the last looks I got at Ukraine and 
Georgia before those republics of the U.S.S.R. became New Independent 
States. During that same period Dick and I geographically bracketed the 
Soviet Union -- traveled first to Tallinn on the Baltic, then to 
Vladivostok on the Pacific. For the nearly 20 years I've known him, 
right up until about half an hour ago, Dick has helped me grapple with 
the issues I will be addressing in these remarks -- and quite a few 
others besides.

I would also like to say a personal word about the Institute and the 
people who have made it a national and international treasure. I count 
Marshall Shulman and Bob Legvold among my wiser and more generous 
mentors. Twenty-two years ago, when the politburo of the Khrushchev 
project at Time Incorporated was looking for a permanent home for Nikita 
Sergeyevich's tapes and transcripts, it was a no-brainer that they 
should reside here at Columbia, under Marshall's and Bob's 
custodianship. 

Quite a few of my colleagues at the State Department studied here, 
including Toby Gati, the Assistant Secretary of State for Intelligence 
and Research, who is with us this afternoon, and Andrew Weiss of our 
Policy Planning staff. My friend and your fellow New Yorker, Madeleine 
Albright, received a certificate in Russian studies from the Institute 
in 1968. I also see several people who served previous presidents with 
great distinction and who were kind to me in my own career. I would like 
to mention particularly George Kennan and Jack Matlock -- two gentlemen 
from Princeton: Professor Kennan and the Kennan Professor. George, I can 
only echo what Dick Holbrooke said on behalf of all of us: We are deeply 
honored by your presence here. You represent not just great knowledge of 
Russia but great civility of discourse about Russia. Averell Harriman 
was a paragon of that quality himself and a great champion of 
bipartisanship in foreign policy -- an ingredient in our national life 
that I hope will be in even greater evidence after next Tuesday, 
whatever the outcome.

There is another key aspect of the Harriman legacy that goes to the 
heart of the subject I would like to speak about this afternoon. In 1971 
-- a quarter of a century ago -- Averell Harriman wrote a volume of 
reminiscences called America and Russia in a Changing World. With Pam's 
permission, I have expropriated that title for these remarks. In the 
introduction to that book, Arthur Schlesinger, who is also with us this 
afternoon, described the Governor as an idealist without illusions. 

That is a distinctly American expression of praise. It captures not only 
something essential about Averell Harriman's own statesmanship, but also 
something essential about America's role in the world: namely, a quality 
of hard-headed idealism; a conviction that America is at its best when 
it defines its interests overseas in terms of those values and ideals 
that have nourished us here at home. From the moment we became a new 
independent state 220 years ago, we have believed that the principles of 
governance codified in the Constitution and the Bill of Rights are 
global in their appeal and global in their relevance. It follows that we 
should want for other countries what we want for ourselves. That is, we 
want them to be democratic, secure, stable, prosperous, and integrated 
into a growing community of other states that are similarly constituted 
and similarly oriented. 

We want that for our own sake as well as for theirs. Why? Because such 
states are more likely to be reliable partners for American diplomacy 
and trade and less likely to threaten American interests. That is a 
general premise of American engagement in the world. Now let me apply it 
to Russia. 

Fifty years ago, when the Russian Institute opened its doors on West 
117th Street, Joseph Stalin was drawing the Iron Curtain across Europe. 
Twenty-five years ago, in 1971, when Governor Harriman wrote America and 
Russia in a Changing World, the Soviet Union had settled into its ice 
age. Not even as recently as a decade ago would many of us have imagined 
that we, or even our children, would live to see the Soviet Union 
abandon Marxism-Leninism and dissolve peacefully into 15 separate 
countries. 

Perhaps even more extraordinary, Russia, Ukraine, and the other New 
Independent States have set about reconstituting themselves on the basis 
of ideas that are essentially -- or at least potentially -- compatible 
with those that have undergirded our own system of government and our 
own preference for the international system as well. 

Let me put it this way, by going back to the title that I have 
plagiarized from the Governor: America and Russia in a Changing World. 
The biggest change in the world in the quarter-century since he wrote 
his book is the change that Russia has chosen for itself. If sustained, 
that transformation will make it possible in the 21st century for 
America and Russia together to keep changing the world for the better. 

Now, the 21st century is just around the corner. It begins in exactly 
three years, two months, two days, and seven hours. It will take Russia 
a lot longer than that to complete its transformation. A safe working 
assumption is that it will take a generation or more, partly for what 
are precisely generational reasons. The consummation of the process now 
underway in Russia will require the passing from the scene of those who 
learned too well the Soviet way of doing things -- or of not doing them. 
It will require the passing of those who are embittered about what they 
feel Russia lost between 1989 and 1991;  namely, a defining ideology, a 
political and economic system that had been in place for more than 70 
years, a quarter of the territory and half the population of the state 
of which Russia was the center, and an alliance in which the Soviet 
Union was the first among non-equals. That generation must give way to a 
new one imbued with an understanding of what Russia has gained in these 
last few years: in a single word -- freedom; and in an additional phrase 
-- the chance for Russia, thanks to the vast potential of its land and 
its people, to be both a contributor to and a beneficiary of an 
increasingly interdependent global economy. Meanwhile -- and, as I say, 
it will be a very long meanwhile -- Russia will face any number of 
alternative futures, some of which are as ugly and dangerous as its 
past. 

But a realistic recognition of how far Russia has to go, of how long it 
will take, and of how badly it could stray should not obscure another 
recognition: how far Russia has come in an extraordinarily short period 
of time in what is essentially the right direction. To validate that 
basically positive though interim verdict, let me touch on three areas: 
Russian politics, the Russian economy, and Russia's relations with the 
other former republics of the U.S.S.R.

Russian Politics

First, politics which means, above all, democratization. That process is 
happening continually, and it is happening all over the country. The 
people of Russia -- the supposedly apathetic and authoritarian-loving 
masses -- have shown that they value having the decisive voice in 
choosing their leadership. 

Part and parcel of democratization is decentralization. Political power 
is devolving downward from the Kremlin and outward from Moscow. Granted, 
this dynamic means that across the expanse of Russia, there will be a 
lot of unevenness and anomalies -- or what Marxists used to call 
contradictions. Some parts of the country will thrive as oases of 
economic and political liberalization, while others will remain, for a 
while at least, bastions of reaction. But overall, the devolution of 
power has already made government in Russia more accountable to average 
citizens. It has engendered greater pluralism and more competition of 
ideas. 

Those welcome signs are also evident in the pages of newspapers and on 
television screens. It is a measure of how far Russia has come that its 
media was taken to task earlier this year for not granting enough free 
air time and balanced coverage to the communist candidate in an openly 
contested presidential election. The partisanship of the press during 
the campaign was blatant, but it was hardly surprising. Many 
journalists, editors, and broadcasters feared that a communist victory 
would lead to a crackdown on the free press. And immediately after the 
election, many in the media resumed their vigorous criticism of the 
government.

As for communism itself, the unreconstructed, militantly retrograde 
brand associated with Viktor Anpilov is a spent force. The more 
amorphous, adaptive Communist Party of the Russian Federation probably 
achieved its high-water mark with Gennady Zyuganov's strong showing in 
the first round of the election in June. Zyuganov and his comrades seem 
to realize that Brezhnevism, to say nothing of Stalinism, is no longer a 
viable model for the Russian state. They have found it difficult to 
broaden their appeal beyond a graying base of pensioners and senior 
citizens. All of which is to say there has been much to applaud in the 
drama of Russian politics over the past couple of years, including the 
very fact that so much of the action has taken place centerstage, under 
the spotlight, with the curtain open.

But there is still plenty of suspense about what will happen in the next 
act and the one after that. While Russia has abandoned autocracy and 
embraced the idea of democracy along with many of its forms, it could 
not possibly change overnight a political culture rooted in earlier 
decades and centuries. It will take time; it will take patience and 
persistence on their part -- and on ours, in our support for Russian 
reform.

 What we should hope for in Russia is what Russian democrats and 
reformers themselves are trying, sometimes against the odds and against 
stiff opposition, to bring about: A system of checks and balances; an 
enhanced, protected role for the legislature and the judiciary; full 
respect for the law; and full rights for all citizens and all ethnic 
minorities. 

By the same token, we should oppose what Russian democrats and reformers 
oppose. For the past two years, that has meant, first and foremost, the 
brutalization of Chechnya. We should associate ourselves with those many 
Russians who are determined to make sure that that tragedy turns out to 
be a grotesque aberration from which the center learns the right lessons 
about dealing with the regions.

The Russian Economy

Let me turn now to the Russian economy. Again, the glass is at least 
half full. The rudiments of retail commerce, market mechanisms, and a 
financial infrastructure are now in place. Political monopoly of 
economic resources is a thing of the past. The largest transfer of 
assets in history has put nearly 70% of Russia's gross domestic product 
into the private sector. Perhaps most important, Russia appears to be 
well on its way to slaying the beast of hyperinflation, which is a true 
killer of reform and a lethal threat to the viability of the state 
itself.  

But in the Russian economy, as in the arena of politics, there is a 
struggle underway -- not just between the old and the new, but between 
competing versions of the new -- some laudable and healthy, others 
disagreeable and destructive. This struggle is bound to be waged with 
particular ferocity over privatization. Russian reformers as well as 
outside experts are concerned that if there are too few rules of the 
game, there will be too many losers. It is a warning sign when average 
citizens regard "market" as a dirty word, and when another word, 
"mafia," is more common in modern Russian than in either Italian or 
American English. 

Crime and corruption -- all-too common not just in transitional 
societies but in developed ones as well -- threaten to discredit and 
even doom reform. They pose that threat because they undermine the 
Russian people's confidence in government and in democracy itself, and 
they could serve as a pretext for the reimposition of stultifying state 
controls. In fact, the best remedy for corruption is actually less 
intervention by the state in the economy but more commitment by the 
state to the protection of property rights and the enforcement of the 
law. 

I would like to single out one other economic woe because it is impeding 
our ability to support Russian reform right now. Russia urgently needs a 
prompt and massive overhaul of its tax-collection system. The Russian 
Government's failure to collect revenues has jeopardized its eligibility 
for further lending from the International Monetary Fund. It has scared 
off badly needed foreign investment and stimulated the flight of Russian 
capital abroad, which is another impediment to growth. 

The good news in all this is that key officials in the Russian 
leadership are acutely aware of these problems. Also, they have 
established solid personal and institutional channels to the major 
governments and institutions of the West. Our own government has been 
particularly receptive and supportive. The U.S.-Russian Joint Commission 
on Economic and Technical Cooperation meets twice a year under the co-
chairmanship of Vice President Gore and Prime Minister Chernomyrdin. It 
has become an extraordinarily effective vehicle for working through 
tough economic issues to the benefit of both countries. 

Russia's Relations With Its Neighbors

The third area I would like to examine is Russia's relations with its 
neighbors. This is far and away the most salient issue of Russian 
foreign policy, both for Russia itself and for the rest of the world. 
Many of those who make up the Russian body politic feel the loss of 
empire like a phantom pain in a lost limb. There are 25 million ethnic 
Russians who now live outside the borders of Russia proper, in what are 
now independent, sovereign countries. They rightfully want to be full 
citizens of tolerant, inclusive democracies. Any grievances they have, 
legitimate or otherwise, play into the hands of  ultranationalists back 
in Russia.

So far, however, to its credit, Russia has kept irredentist impulses 
largely in check. Not too long after the breakup of the U.S.S.R., Boris 
Yeltsin made a historic decision: He affirmed the old interrepublic 
borders as the new international ones. He has, at several key points, 
repudiated the bellicose claims of his noisier opponents. Just last 
week, he disavowed an incendiary Duma resolution on the sensitive issues 
of Crimea and the Black Sea Fleet.

In short, we should be alert to warning signs, but we should also listen 
to the dogs that are not barking in the former U.S.S.R. today. Just 
imagine how different and how catastrophic it would have been if post-
Soviet Russia had behaved like post-Yugoslav Serbia and Croatia, using 
force to change borders along ethnic lines. Imagine, in other words, the 
recent horror of the Balkans replayed in Eurasia, across 11 time zones, 
with 30,000 nuclear weapons in the volatile and violent mix.

To be sure, there are still plenty of questions and, among Russia's 
neighbors, plenty of anxieties about how Moscow will handle its 
relations with the other members of the CIS. Whether that grouping of 
states survives and prospers will depend in large measure on whether it 
evolves in a way that vindicates the name -- that is, whether it 
develops as a genuine commonwealth of genuinely independent states. If 
it goes in another direction -- if its largest member tries to make 
"commonwealth" into a euphemism for infringement on the independence of 
its neighbors -- then the CIS will deserve to join that other set of 
initials -- U.S.S.R. --  on the ash heap of history.	

President Clinton framed the issue succinctly 2 1/2 years ago. During 
his first visit to Moscow as President, in a televised town meeting at 
Ostankino television station, he put to the Russian people -- and to the 
Russian leadership -- a fundamental question: "How will you define your 
role as a great power?" he asked. "Will you define it in yesterday's 
terms, or tomorrow's?"  Russia, he said, has a chance to show that a 
great power can promote patriotism without expansionism; that a great 
power can promote national pride without national prejudice. . . I 
believe the measure of your greatness in the future will be whether 
Russia, the big neighbor, can be the good neighbor.

I was there when the President delivered that message, and I was struck 
that his youthful audience -- an audience representing Russia's future, 
Russia's next generation of leaders -- burst into applause.

Progress Report

So here, in summary, is a progress report on Russia five years after the 
tricolor replaced the hammer-and-sickle over the Kremlin: Since that 
time, Russia has made a number of fundamental, difficult, courageous, 
and -- both from its own standpoint and from ours -- correct choices. At 
the same time, in each of the three areas I've mentioned -- politics, 
economics, and foreign policy -- the redefinition of Russian statehood 
is a work in progress; the Russians still have tough choices ahead of 
them. 

U.S. Policy

Now a word about American policy toward Russia. President Clinton 
believes that we, too, face some major choices -- ones that will have an 
important influence on how Russia deals with its dilemmas and 
difficulties, its opportunities and temptations. 

One choice facing us is whether to keep investing in Russian reform and 
thus to invest in our own long-term security. Here we have a major 
problem with the United States Congress, which is undernourishing our 
foreign policy in general and starving our assistance programs for the 
New Independent States. Our support for the emerging democracies of 
Eurasia has declined by 75% since 1994. Our support for Russian reform 
has fallen by 94%. When the 105th Congress assembles in January, it 
should, as Secretary Christopher said in a speech at West Point last 
Friday, face up to the implications of the funding cuts of the 104th. 
This is not just a budgetary issue; it is a matter of urgency to the 
national interest.

The other continuing task we face --  the other choice we must make 
correctly every time it comes up -- is to continue using our leadership 
position in various regional and international organizations to make 
sure that their doors remain open to Russia and to the other New 
Independent States, as long as they keep moving in the direction of 
reform and responsible international conduct.

In the last several years, Russia has joined organizations as diverse as 
the Council of Europe, the Missile Technology Control Regime, and the 
Partnership for Peace. Russia recently became a founding member of the 
successor to COCOM, which seeks to regulate international trade in 
armaments and sensitive technologies. The Group of Seven Major 
Industrial Democracies has brought Russia into a new political body, 
known simply as "The Eight."  And we are working with Russia to help it 
qualify for admission to the World Trade Organization. 

We must continue to encourage and, when we can, to sponsor Russian 
admission to, participation in, or at least association with as many of 
these bodies as possible. We must do that because together they make up 
the larger community of democracies of which we want to see Russia as a 
full member.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization

Let me, in this regard, say a few words about one international body 
much on everyone's mind these days: the North Atlantic Treaty 
Organization. NATO has always been, is now, and will remain a mutual 
defense pact. But it is much more than that -- and again, it always has 
been. During the Cold War, even as it was attending to its principal job 
of deterring the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact, NATO promoted the 
consolidation of civilian-led democracy in Spain, and it helped keep the 
peace between Greece and Turkey. As it adapts its mission and expands 
its membership to meet new challenges and opportunities, NATO will be a 
positive factor in the promotion of democracy and regional peace. The 
very prospect of admission to NATO for a number of central European 
states has already induced them to accelerate their internal reforms and 
improve relations with their neighbors. Russia, which has come to grief 
twice in this century because of instability in central Europe, has a 
security interest in these favorable trends.

Now, obviously, the Russians are a long way from seeing NATO enlargement 
in this benign light. Our ability to manage and ultimately resolve our 
disagreement over this issue is going to be an important test of the 
U.S.-Russian relationship. Last week, President Clinton set as a 
deadline for the admission of the first new members the 50th anniversary 
of the alliance in 1999. That goal, which we are determined to meet, is 
fixed in our minds. But it gives us time to work out, in parallel with 
the process of enlargement, the terms of a cooperative and mutually 
reassuring relationship between NATO and the Russian Federation. 
Secretary Christopher has been working on this issue very hard, 
including during his talks with Foreign Minister Primakov here in New 
York six weeks ago. There is no subject to which I have devoted more of 
my own energies. 

We are convinced that a modus vivendi between NATO and Russia is not 
just desirable, it is doable. But it will take political will on both 
sides, and it will require that both sides get past the stereotypes of 
the Cold War. On our side, some self-described "realists" see the Russia 
of today as the Soviet Union of 15 years ago, only slimmed down and 
wearing a pseudo-democratic disguise. They disparage Russian democracy 
as an engine of expansion, fueled by deep-seated neo-imperialist urges.

The notion that predatory behavior is somehow encoded in Russian genes 
grossly misrepresents both Russian and Soviet history. It deserves an F-
minus from any member of this faculty. In fact, one of your former 
colleagues, Steve Sestanovich of the Carnegie Endowment for 
International Peace, effectively debunks the concept of genetic 
expansionism in the current issue of The National Interest, drawing, I'm 
sure, on the wisdom he absorbed here 24 years ago. But it was Ian Buruma 
who offered the definitive rebuttal in his book, The Wages of Guilt. He 
was writing about two other great nations -- Germany and Japan -- whose 
peoples not so long ago were feared, even hated, as inherently 
militaristic. "There are," said Buruma, 

no dangerous peoples; there are only dangerous situations, which are the 
result,  not of laws of nature or history, or of national character, but 
of political arrangements.

Applying Buruma's observation to the topic at hand, I would suggest that 
what American policy toward Russia must do is come up with the right 
political arrangements. That means -- and here I am echoing the 
principle that I identified at the outset as animating American foreign 
policy as a whole -- that means we should weave relationships and devise 
incentives that will encourage Russia to evolve as a  democratic, 
secure, stable, prosperous state, at peace with its neighbors and 
integrated into a community of like-minded nations.

But to do that, one challenge America faces, quite frankly, is to 
overcome Russian suspicions, Russian conspiracy theories, and Russian 
old-think. More to the point, I would say that is a challenge the 
Russians themselves face: They must overcome their lingering Cold War 
stereotypes about us if they are going to realize the opportunities for 
them that come with the end of the Cold War. Quite a few Russians have 
made clear that they believe America's real strategy -- indeed, this 
Administration's real strategy -- is actually to weaken Russia, even to 
divide it. It does not much reassure them to hear us say we want to see 
Russia fulfill its "greatness." In their ears, that word has a mushy, 
disingenuous, even deceitful ring. It sounds as though we are talking 
about the cultural genius of Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky -- not about the 
brawnier brilliance of Kutuzov and Zhukov.

This jaundiced view from Moscow of our intentions is the mirror-image of 
the prejudice among some in the United States that Russia is a stunted 
U.S.S.R. just itching to return to its former size and its former ways. 
We had plenty of experience with just this sort of mirror-imaging during 
the Cold War, and we should beware of a repetition now. It would be 
particularly unhelpful if worst-case assumptions on the part of the 
Russian foreign policy elite were to drive Russian Government policy. 

Let me be a bit more specific about my concern here: If too many 
Russians overindulge their misplaced suspicions that we want to keep 
them down, then words such as partnership and cooperation will become 
synonyms for appeasement, subservience, and humiliation at the hands of 
the West. The result then could be that we will indeed cooperate less 
and compete more on precisely those issues where it is in our common 
interest to cooperate more and compete less: arms control, environmental 
degradation, terrorism, regional conflict, and proliferation of weapons 
of mass destruction. 

This unwelcome prospect raises another, related concern. Russian 
policymakers -- especially those still inclined to see their country's 
relationship with the United States as intrinsically a rivalry -- may 
fall into the trap of defining what is in their national interest as 
pretty much anything that annoys or causes problems for us. If that 
reflex for trying to score points against us in a zero-sum game becomes 
a kind of default feature in the software of Russian foreign policy, it 
will only generate mistrust on our side. Suspicions of each other's 
motives could prove self-justifying, and pessimistic prophecies about 
the future of the relationship may be self-fulfilling. 

Again, we saw enough of this kind of vicious cycle during the Cold War. 
If it recurs, it would be bad for everyone, but, without doubt, it would 
be particularly bad for the Russians themselves. They would risk 
repeating at least some of the mistakes that made nine-tenths of the 
20th century such a disaster for them. Those mistakes included defining 
their security at the expense of everyone else's and misdefining 
security itself as the expensive and wasteful capacity to destroy and 
intimidate. Russia's human and natural resources -- not simply its 
military might -- are what will make Russia truly secure and influential 
in the next century. 

The Russian people and leadership must believe that. Moreover, they must 
also believe that we believe it, and that our belief in that essentially 
respectful and supportive proposition about their future motivates our 
policy toward them today. As with the more specific issues facing us, we 
have a lot of work to do with the Russians. 

But as with those other difficult subjects, we have some time. We also 
have the right ideas to guide us and the right people -- present company 
emphatically included -- to make sure we develop those ideas and put 
them into practice. So despite the difficulties ahead, there's every 
reason for confidence that we are up to the challenges of the post-Cold 
War era just as we were able to deal with those of the Cold War itself. 
I, for one, am all the more confident because the Harriman Institute and 
its alumni will be with us for the next 50 years to help us get it 
right. 

(###)



Article 3:  

The Continuing Need for America's Global Leadership
Nancy E. Soderberg, Deputy Assistant to the President for National 
Security Affairs
Remarks before the Women's Foreign Policy Group, Washington, DC, October 
17, 1996


I would like to talk with you today about two central tenets of a 
successful foreign policy -- American leadership and bipartisan 
consensus -- and how they apply to some of the most important global 
challenges that we will face in the coming century.

First, it is clear that the need for America's global leadership is more 
important than ever. While the end of the Cold War has left us with no 
single overarching foe, we face a host of threats -- from rogue states, 
from terrorism and organized crime, to the spread of weapons of mass 
destruction. And all of them have grown more deadly in a world grown 
closer. We cannot hope to confront these immediate dangers, much less 
continue to advance our ideals and interests, without strong American 
leadership. Indeed, only by leading abroad can we hope to stay 
prosperous and secure at home. 

Consider for a moment just some of the things that could have happened 
over the last four years if we had not led.

If we had not led in Bosnia, Europe's worst war since 1945 would 
continue to rage, killing thousands and threatening the security of our 
allies. Because we led, the bloodshed in Bosnia has stopped and the 
Bosnian people have held peaceful elections.

If we had not led in Haiti, dictators might still rule and refugees 
would be flooding our shores. Because we led, Haiti's dictators are 
gone, the flow of refugees has stopped, and 34 out of  35 countries in 
our hemisphere are democracies. 

If we had not led in North Korea, its nuclear facilities might be 
churning out enough plutonium for dozens of bombs, and the world's most 
dynamic economic region would face the prospect of a nuclear arms race, 
if not armed conflict. Because we led, North Korea's nuclear facilities 
are frozen under international supervision, and a proposal for a 
permanent peace on the Korean Peninsula is on the table. 

If we had not led in Iraq, Saddam Hussein's reckless attacks would have 
gone unpunished, emboldening him to act in a manner more dangerous to 
our interests. Because we led, we have tightened the strategic 
straitjacket on Saddam, making it harder for him to threaten Saudi 
Arabia and Kuwait, and easier to stop him if he does.

As is the nature of foreign policy, none of these efforts to promote 
peace and security is finished. Each requires continued hard work. But 
none of them would have started without American leadership. As 
President Clinton has said, "America remains the indispensable nation." 
America cannot be everywhere. We cannot do everything. We must always 
carefully weigh the risks and costs of our actions against our 
interests. But by keeping our military strong and maintaining our modest 
foreign affairs budget, by using diplomacy where we can and force where 
we must, and by working with others where possible and alone if 
necessary, we can advance our goals and interests while making a vital 
difference around the world. 

The second central and related tenet of a successful foreign policy is 
that we cannot sustain America's global leadership without a strong 
bipartisan consensus. For much of what we call the American century, 
that consensus has been a vital source of America's strength. Fifty 
years ago, it enabled Democrats such as Harry Truman and Republicans 
such as Arthur Vandenberg to work together to create NATO and the 
Marshall Plan. In recent  years, it has undergirded our efforts  to 
advance our interests by passing NAFTA and GATT, promoting reform in the 
former Soviet Union, and supporting the Middle East peace process. 

When that bipartisan consensus on the need for American leadership has 
faltered, the interests of the American people have suffered. We saw 
that during the early 1980s, when partisan wrangling by Republicans and 
Democrats caused disarray in our policies toward Central America. Now we 
see it again in the assaults on American leadership by those who would 
have America turn its back on the world or walk away from our global 
interests. We must reject that view. Isolationism in the 1990s won't 
work any better than the 1930s variety -- especially in a world tied 
together more closely than ever before by satellites, modems, and jumbo 
jets. Moreover, we cannot continue to enjoy the benefits of being the 
world's most powerful nation without also continuing to meet our 
responsibilities.

If we are to sustain America's global power for the benefit of the 
American people, both parties must work to restore the bipartisan 
consensus that has given our foreign policy force and direction. While 
that consensus does not preclude heated disagreements on policy, it does 
affirm a basic agreement -- an agreement that America must continue to 
be the leading force for democracy, freedom, security, and prosperity 
around the world. 

If we continue to lead, we can take advantage of an unprecedented 
opportunity to advance our ideals and interests. Never before have we 
had a better chance to create a world where peace and democracy prevail, 
where the peril of mass destruction has passed, where our streets are 
safe from terrorists and criminals, and where open markets bring new 
growth and prosperity. This morning I'd like to focus on four elements 
of our vision for the 21st century.


First, the United States has a unique role to play in promoting peace 
and democracy around the world. Some view this work as a "soft" issue 
that promises few concrete returns. On the contrary, promoting peace and 
democracy is one of the best long-term investments we can make -- an 
investment that advances our fundamental interest in global stability 
and prosperity and our core ideals as Americans. The unrivaled force of 
our might and our ideals can help resolve festering conflicts that would 
otherwise eat away at our resources or ultimately require costly 
military solutions. And by standing up for democracy, we also enlarge 
the community of nations committed to work together on behalf of 
freedom, prosperity, and security.

That is why we must continue our hard work on behalf of peace and 
democracy. There are no easy solutions to conflicts in places such as 
the Middle East, Bosnia, or Northern Ireland. Yet, while the 
responsibility for achieving a lasting peace will always rest with the 
parties themselves, the United States has made a critical contribution 
in each of these places over the last four years by supporting those who 
are willing to take risks for peace. We must also continue to take the 
lead in bringing the newly liberated nations of Europe into the 
democratic fold, helping them to establish fair elections, free media, 
and independent judiciaries; to forge new links with NATO through the 
Partnership for Peace; and to bring those that are ready to assume their 
share of responsibilities into NATO itself. Around the world, we must 
work to strengthen democracy by supporting its followers and pressuring 
its opponents, whether assisting elections in Central America or 
maintaining sanctions on Cuba and isolating dictators in Burma and 
Nigeria. 

The hopeful global trend toward peace and democracy is neither 
inevitable nor irreversible. Encouraging it will require strong American 
leadership and the resources to support it. It is not possible to have 
leadership on the cheap. It borders on the irresponsible to propose -- 
as some in the Congress did last year -- cuts in the State Department's 
budget that could have forced us to close almost 50 embassies and 
consulates -- the equivalent of every post in Asia or Africa. Now is the 
time to take advantage of an opportunity that we worked a half-century 
to realize -- not by pursuing budget increases but by sustaining our 
current efforts. The roughly 1% of federal spending that we devote to 
international affairs is a modest but wise investment in our security 
and prosperity.

Second, just as the fall of the Iron Curtain has given us an 
unprecedented opportunity to extend freedom's reach, it also has given 
us a remarkable chance to make the world a safer place by reducing the 
danger posed by weapons of mass destruction. 

Over the last four years, we have pursued the most ambitious non-
proliferation agenda in history. In fact, its success has surprised even 
some  of its most enthusiastic supporters. President Clinton made the 
tough decisions that led to the conclusion of the Comprehensive Test Ban 
Treaty -- the longest-sought, hardest-fought prize in arms control. Our 
diplomacy was critical to extending the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty 
-- the cornerstone of our efforts to control nuclear proliferation. 
Through the START treaties, we are cutting Cold War nuclear arsenals by 
two-thirds. By the end of the year, Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakstan will 
have completely given up the 3,400 warheads left on their land after the 
Soviet Union dissolved. Working with the Congress, we are helping to 
improve security at nuclear facilities in the New Independent States and 
to convert nuclear weapons to peaceful uses.

Continued bipartisan support will be essential to the success of this 
agenda, which is vital to the security of each and every American. That 
makes it all the more unfortunate that the Chemical Weapons Convention 
was caught up in partisan politics. The CWC is crucial to our effort to 
keep weapons of mass destruction out of the hands of rogue states and 
terrorists. The President is committed to securing its passage. As we 
pursue our non-proliferation agenda, we are also determined to maintain 
our nuclear arsenal as long as necessary to deter nuclear threats and to 
develop an effective defense against missile attacks on our troops and 
our citizens. While there is a strong bipartisan consensus on behalf of 
both goals, we must oppose efforts by some to saddle us now with an 
obsolescent National Missile Defense System that could break not only 
the budget but also the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. Instead, we 
should work to develop an effective system for when the threat becomes 
real. Both Democrats and Republicans must strive to ensure that partisan 
disagreements over how best to protect our people do not undermine our 
country's ability to do just that.

Third, like our fight to stop the spread of weapons of mass destruction, 
our efforts to create a strong global coalition against terrorists, 
criminals, and drug traffickers are fundamental to ensuring the security 
of our citizens. No nation is safe from these enemies who take advantage 
of open borders to attack open societies.

We have worked hard here and with other nations to fight and root out 
today's transnational syndicates of death and destruction. Our efforts 
have foiled terrorist attacks, successfully targeted criminal assets, 
and resulted in a record number of arrests and extraditions.
 
Just last week, for example, the United States and law enforcement 
authorities in Thailand and Pakistan rolled up a Nigerian drug 
trafficking operation, from its couriers to its kingpins, making 34 
arrests in three nations. We are pursuing a three-part strategy against 
terrorists by working more closely than ever before with our allies and 
partners, giving our law enforcement authorities the counterterrorism 
tools they need and making our airports and airplanes safer from 
terrorist attack. In his speech last month to the United Nations General 
Assembly, President Clinton reiterated his call for new measures to 
ensure that terrorists, criminals, and drug traffickers have no place to 
run and no place to hide. Only by forging a strong global commitment to 
zero tolerance for terrorism and lawless behavior can we hope to protect 
the security of our citizens at home.  

As we tackle this difficult task, all open societies face a difficult 
balance between fighting terrorism and protecting civil liberties. That 
tension underscores the need to maintain a bipartisan consensus as we 
work through these difficult issues. It also makes the need for progress 
on the first two challenges that I discussed --  peace and democracy and 
non-proliferation -- even more compelling. In a world where there are 
more working democracies and fewer weapons of mass destruction, 
terrorists, criminals, and drug traffickers are likely to be less 
prevalent and less powerful. 

Finally, President Clinton came into office firmly convinced not only 
that our definition of national security must encompass our economic 
well-being but that the economic and security components of our foreign 
policy must go hand in hand if either is to succeed. Progress on peace 
and democracy, non-proliferation, and terrorism is fundamentally linked 
to the task of promoting economic prosperity. 

We have made great strides toward our goal of a new global trading 
system. The more than 200 trade agreements -- from NAFTA and the Uruguay 
Round of GATT to APEC -- that we have concluded over the last four years 
have opened more markets than ever before to our products, created 
almost one-and-a-half million export-related jobs, and made our country 
the world's number one exporter again. 

Now we must extend the reach of free and fair trade even further. But as 
we seek to fulfill our vision for free trade in the Americas, the Asia-
Pacific region, and elsewhere, our economic diplomacy also faces a new 
challenge: Where once we argued with our trading partners about whether 
to open markets, now the question is how we open markets. As we saw in 
the debates over NAFTA and GATT in 1993 and 1994, issues such as the 
environment and labor rights -- to name just two -- can have a 
profoundly divisive effect. Our global leadership on behalf of open 
markets can continue to provide valuable new opportunities for American 
workers and companies, but only if we work together to build a strong 
bipartisan consensus for efforts to create a new global trading system 
that the American people believe is both free and fair.

These efforts to expand trade and investment have also furthered our 
larger strategic objectives. From the Middle East to Bosnia and Northern 
Ireland, we have used our economic diplomacy to promote the prosperity 
that is an essential ingredient to lasting peace. Last week, for 
example, as the IRA was launching its recent bomb attack outside of 
Belfast, I was at a conference in Pittsburgh designed to boost U.S. 
trade and investment with Northern Ireland -- and thus offer its people 
the hope of a better future and debunk the mindset that peace is a zero-
sum game. Moreover, from South America to Southeast Asia, our promotion 
of open markets and economic development also supports our commitment to 
democracy and human rights. As societies become more open economically, 
they also inevitably become more open politically and develop a growing 
stake in peace and stability. 

Over the last four years, I believe that our work on these four and 
other long-term challenges has made a positive difference in the lives 
of Americans and countless other people around the world. I believe that 
despite the debates of this campaign, the next president will vigorously 
pursue actions in these four areas because they are in the American 
interest. I believe they will extend into the term of the next president 
of the 21st century -- whoever she may be.

As we prepare to enter a new century, the United States has an 
unparalleled opportunity to continue advancing our ideals and interests. 
But to do so, we must squarely face up to our responsibilities as the 
world's leading force for democracy, freedom, security, and prosperity. 
We must restore the consensus that has enabled our nation to meet the 
great challenges of the last 50 years.  If we do, we can ensure that the 
next century will be an American century 
as well. 

(###)



[END OF DISPATCH VOL. 7, NO. 44]

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