What George Shultz could learn from Don Corleone

National Review, August 1, 1986 by Tom Bethell

What George Shultz Could Learn From Don Corleone

THE UNITED STATES has largely entrusted its foreign policy to a Mandarin class of Foreign Service Officers who are professionally inclined to look upon the creeds and manifestos of foreigners with genial disbelief. Characteristically, within this class, ignorance masquerades as tolerance, gullibility as worldly wisdom. "Khomeini? He couldn't possibly believe all the nonsense he spouts!' "Communism? Outmoded ideology. No one believes in it any more!'

For this reason the very mention of the phrase "State Department professional' is apt to induce a certain apprehension in the prudent man today, as a shopkeeper might feel if asked to entrust his store to children. Gentlemanly etiquette dominates U.S. diplomatic encounters with foreigners, all of whom are assumed to be pretty much alike "underneath.' Jefferson's dictum that all men are created equal is extended to cover the aspirations of nations: All aspire to liberal democracy.

What about the very different ideologies, creeds, and systems in many of these countries? Don't they mean anything? Sure, the pro from State will tell you, they have to pay lip service to a lot of odd notions because (off the record) people are still pretty backward in many parts of the globe. But it's all for show. Go to the UN bar overlooking the East River any evening, and after a few drinks with their representatives over here you'll find that their chaps are pretty much in agreement with us. People Like Us, you might say. Off the record, you'll find that these foreigners are often quite critical of some of the practices back home.

Did someone suggest that they might try to lie to us, take unfair advantage of our various offers? Don't worry, old man. It's not in their interest, you see. They might be tempted, of course, but we have a whole series of carrots lined up to offer them. This means that good behavior on their part is very much in their interest.

In such a world the Communists have thrived for more than forty years. Again and again since Yalta, American diplomats, their suit pockets filled with carrots, have proceeded optimistically to the bargaining table with Communists and have negotiated no more circumspectly than they would with the loan department of the Chase Manhattan Bank. Every time they have returned with empty pockets and worthless pieces of paper.

We have lost considerable ground as a result of these mismatches. Perhaps above all, we have sown a debilitating confusion about the nature of Communism. By sitting down at the negotiating table with Communists, we have actually established them as the co-guarantors of world peace when in fact they are the sole threat to it.

Ever since his Hollywood days President Reagan has understood the problem of dealing with Communists. Shortly after he became President he said that Communist "morality' is "what will further their cause, meaning they reserve unto themselves the right to commit any crime, to lie, to cheat, in order to attain it.' And only recently, at Glassboro High School, Mr. Reagan said, "We must remember that the Soviet government is based upon and drawn from the Soviet Communist Party--an organization that remains formally pledged to subjecting the world to Communist domination.'

Nonetheless, in what appears to have been the interest of preserving domestic political tranquillity, Mr. Reagan has tried to combine these sound sentiments with the incompatible practice of carrying on extended negotiations with Communists. By all accounts he has given his Secretary of State, George Shultz, unusual latitude, and Shultz in turn has done little to resist the will of the State Department professionals who work under him.

In May, President Reagan said he would break the SALT II limits later this year. He promptly drew down the wrath of the liberal-Soviet alliance. Having campaigned against the unratified treaty, calling it "fatally flawed,' he had given the liberals what they wanted by abiding by it anyway. Now, after four years of unilateral compliance, he said enough was enough. But he has kept saying that what he wants is a good arms-control agreement for his signature.

Mr. Reagan is widely thought to be committed to the Strategic Defense Initiative. But when asked recently by Jack Nelson of the Los Angeles Times if SDI deployment was negotiable, he said, "That's right, yes.' FLEXIBLE ON "STAR WARS'--REAGAN, ran the L.A. Times front-page headline the next day. A year or two ago Reagan said that we must "restore the integrity of the ABM Treaty,' which bars deployment of SDI.

Reagan has thereby conceded to the liberal-Soviet alliance the cogency of its major premise: that it is possible to negotiate satisfactorily with Communists. In fact it is not. And we must understand why it is not, before we negotiate ourselves into the grave.

As I write, negotiations with Communists proceed around the globe, or are actively sought by governments threatened by Communist forces. In nearly all such cases the U.S. Government is either participating in the talks or cheering from the sidelines. The delusion of negotiated peace with people committed to violence if necessary persists in Geneva and in Bern; in Vienna and in Manila; in San Salvador and on the island of Contadora. It persists where it may be said to have been born, in the Foreign Office in London, but above all it thrives in the State Department in Washington.