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I would like to comment on two aspects of Dr. Klingman's article on the implications of President Nixon's trip to China: the policy of containment and the war in Vietnam.
When George Kennan described the policy of containment, effectively creating a bi-polar world power structure, he was following in the intellectual tradition of the 20th century. In the early years of the century the formerly multi-polar European power structure had evolved into two massive military alliances of roughly equal strength. After years of horrific carnage the only great power outside the system, the United States, entered the war, changing the military balance sufficiently to lead to the surrender of the Central Powers.
After World War I, a multi-polar world was restored, only to fall prey to the combination of fascist powers. Again, the United States was late entering the war, and again its military strength was decisive. Very soon after the end of the war American and Western European leaders perceived the Soviet Union, and its new vassal states in Eastern Europe, as a threat equivalent to that recently posed by the fascists. The threat was both military (a great power and its allied states) and ideological (communism/totalitarianism vs capitalism/democracy). In this it resembled the religious conflicts in Europe of the 16th and 17th centuries. Western leaders resorted to the formation of a new bi-polar system, recreating a structure that had been successful in 2 world wars. Something more than a
simple alliance system was needed; Kennan's policy of containment filled the void. The communist contagion already infected China, where it achieved success in 1949. The Western powers ringed the communist states with alliance systems (NATO, CENTO, SEATO) and determined to stamp out communism wherever it jumped the barrier.
The communist states were led by the Soviet Union, which had a long history of invasions from the West intended to change basic institutions, from the Teutonic Knights' crusades against the Orthodox Church to the Allies' intervention after the Bolshevik revolution to the fascist invasion. One would not be surprised to find in the Kremlin an "us vs them" mentality. For several years the Soviet Union led the communist alliance, submerging the long-time antagonism between China and Russia.
However, the policy of containment did not mean absolute isolation. For 15 years the United States and the Soviet Union had had diplomatic relations. Even after the Cold War started (the term "Cold War" being a useful shorthand for the policy of containment and the creation of a bi-polar world system), those diplomatic relations continued. The British
recognized the Maoist regime in 1954, the French a few years later. When Richard Nixon began talking with the "Chicoms" he was not abandoning the policy of containment, nor was that policy subsequently abandoned. When left-leaning governments appeared in Angola, Mozambique, Nicaragua, and Afghanistan in the period after Nixon's trip to China, the United States provided substantial overt and/or covert support to their opponents.
The opening to China can be seen as furthering the policy of containment. By encouraging the great-power rivalries between the Soviets and the Chinese, Nixon's policy weakened the communist states' abilities to spread beyond their borders. The opening to China also was meant to affect the war in Vietnam.
The great event of the war in Vietnam was the communists' Tet offensive in 1968. That offensive was mounted by the Viet Cong, the indigenous South Vietnamese communists. Despite early successes, they were destroyed by the U.S. and South Vietnamese forces. Dr. Klingman is incorrect when he describes Tet as a military failure; it actually was an intelligence failure. The reports of a massive enemy build-up were there, but the analysts in Saigon disbelieved them. The American news media failed to recognize the military defeat of the Viet Cong; consequently, it became a public relations success for the communists. And, the enemy in Vietnam changed. Rid of their troublesome Viet Cong allies, the North Vietnamese committed their armed forces to the war in the south and became our principal adversary in the war.
The Chinese and Vietnamese are traditional enemies. The exigencies of the conflict in Southeast Asia required Beijing to provide some support to the Vietnamese. Hanoi's primary sponsor, however, was Moscow, and there was a very long supply line to Haiphong from Europe. Some of those supplies found their way to Laos and Cambodia for use by indigenous communist movements. The Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, were supported by Hanoi. Given the inability of the Cambodian army to defeat the Khmer Rouge even with extensive direct American military aid, it is unlikely that they would
have had much success fighting on their own. The murderous Pol Pot regime was delayed, not caused, by the American intervention.
The stated aims of the war in Vietnam were not the military defeat of the communists, but rather propping up the South Vietnamese government until it could stand on its own against its enemies, domestic and foreign. For the American military, this meant that the possibility victory was really in the hands of the South Vietnamese. Not surprisingly, given the powerful American forces in their country, the South Vietnamese military leadership was reluctant to fight, which would mean exposing their troops to the
possibility of heavy casualties. The vague war aims also precluded full use of American military might against the enemy. We could bomb North Vietnam, but not all areas, such as the dikes. We could not place American troops on North Vietnamese soil. Given these conditions, a decisive military victory was impossible in the near term, and the Joint Chiefs had no plan to achieve victory in the near or long term. The corrupt and inefficient South Vietnamese government was nowhere near being able to defend itself against the North Vietnamese.
Nixon took the only way out of Vietnam: he followed Senator Everett Dirksen's advice of saying we had won and leaving. This was called Vietnamization. There is plenty of room for debate over whether Nixon should have pursued this policy in January 1969, rather than waiting 4 years. Perhaps he felt it necessary to prove his mettle to the Russians and Chinese (and North Vietnamese) before he could make overtures for a disengagement. Nevertheless, the trip to China was part of a concerted strategy to pressure the North Vietnamese for a disengagement, for "decent interval" of relative peace for American forces to leave and for the feckless South Vietnamese to consolidate their strength for the next assault. American prisoners of war would be released. Hanoi, emboldened by the progressive withdrawals of American forces and the obvious weaknesses of the Thieu regime, had been unwilling to agree to this "saving face".
Nixon persuaded the Russians and Chinese to lean on their ally and ultimately to stand by while we attacked formerly interdicted targets in Hanoi and Haiphong. Nixon thus "played the China card" twice: against the Soviet Union to further the policy of containment and against the North Vietnamese to obtain a face-saving exit from the war. As Dr. Klingman notes, American conservatives did not see, or did not accept, this logic.
The military services, which never had agreed on a plan for victory in South Vietnam, nevertheless felt betrayed by Nixon's failure to consult their leaders about any significant aspect of his plans, hence the resort to the spy ring. The virulent anti-communists felt betrayed by the President playing great power politics with the Soviet Union and China. In their view, only an unprincipled cynic would thus truck with the Devil. Nixon, who never enjoyed personal popularity, had lost his power base.
He did what he thought was right for the country. He also believed that the right wing had no choice but to continue supporting him, that the only alternatives were liberals like Humphrey and McGovern. He was aware of the coalescing of support for Ronald Reagan, then Governor of California, but he had little respect for Reagan's abilities and spent little time shoring up his support on the right. One wonders what he would have done if he had suspected that his policies would lead to his being driven from office.
Would his concern for his political future and his place in history have overridden his pleasure in playing great power politics and doing what he thought was right at that moment in time?
Fred Graboske is the archivist of the United States Marine Corps and formerly was the supervisory archivist in charge of processing the Nixon White House tapes.
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