American Foreign Policy: The Bush Agenda
Begins with a hard-hitting description of Gorbachev as a cold and calculating realist, intent on invigorating the Soviet political and economic system. Warns against the illusion that the West can influence internal developments in the USSR, then discusses (1) Europe's renewed role in the East-West conflict (2) arms control (3) Bush's need to address the issues of Afghanistan and Central America. In particular, argues that NATO must maintain a residual tactical nuclear capability in Europe, and that arms control should be treated as only one part of Western defence policy. Calls for a 'revitalizing' of the Western alliance. Former US president.
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Site of post-WW2 tensions, Berlin now finds itself relegated to the margin of political and economic change across Europe. Even the FRG is showing less and less interest in Berlin's future. Nevertheless, NATO should not ignore it, but include it in a new vision for FRG-GDR relations and the ending of the division of Europe.
The central concern of US foreign policy -- relations with the USSR -- could be derailed by stakes in lesser countries, namely South Korea, the Philippines, Panama, and some states in Central America. Assesses each 'danger zone', and concludes that Bush cannot "postpone the reckoning ahead".
Defends the traditional, pessimistic evaluation of NATO's conventional capabilities against revisionists, and argues that "NATO is highly unlikely to make the conventional force improvements seemingly dictated by the INF treaty". Predicts a Soviet arms control offensive upon "a vulnerable and divided NATO... the alliance has painted itself into a corner, and the paint will not dry". Despite all this, NATO will continue to prevent war in Europe.
