Foreign Policy Failures in China, Cuba, and Nicaragua: A Paradigm. - book reviews

National Review, June 21, 1993 by Peter D. Hannaford

Foreign Policy Failures in China, Cuba, and Nicaragua: A Paradigm, by Ray S. Cline and Roger W.. Fontaine (United States Global Strategy Council 246 pp.. $20)

"PARADIGM" is a word that deserves a good long rest, but let us acknowledge that Cline and Fontaine have not thrown it around loosely. That is exactly what they found when they examined closely the superficially dissimilar losses of China, Cuba, and Nicaragua as U.S. allies. The three cases had several things in common. One was the State Department dissatisfaction with the other country's government because of corruption, mismanagement, inefficiency, or other shortcomings. Another was fascination with what seemed to be a utopian alternative (Mao Tsetung, Castro, the Sandinistas). A third common thread was the presence of one or more journalists stationed in the subject country who took it upon themselves to "educate" the folks back home to the sins of the local government and the shining idealism and moral superiority of the insurgents. The authors conclude that "a common American pattern is to criticize the struggling good and hope to replace it with an ideal best which never, in fact, becomes a reality." The reason may be "that Americans are so fortunate and comparatively wealthy that they do not study international conflicts very carefully.