Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XIV, Soviet Union

260. Paper Prepared in the Central Intelligence Agency¹

No. 0577/68

Washington, January 9, 1968.

THE USSR: PROBLEMS, POLICIES, AND PROSPECTS 1967–1968

General Perspective

1. History may ultimately record that the Soviet Union of Brezhnev, Kosygin, and company was not much different in its essentials from the Soviet Union of Nikita Khrushchev. There are, of course, notable differences in temperament and style between the present careful collective and the impulsive and impatient Mr. Khrushchev. But—in contrast with the impressive series of changes which occurred in the aftermath of the death of Stalin—the main lines of Soviet doctrine and policy have remained substantially unaltered in the roughly three years since the fall of Khrushchev.

2. It is true, nevertheless, that under a collective leadership there have been important changes in the way that national policy is formulated and in the way that it is carried out. If the present leaders have not been inclined to find new paths or to seek new purposes, they have nonetheless repudiated Khrushchev’s excesses of style and extremes of policy. They have chosen to reign as a largely colorless committee and to govern primarily through compromise and consensus. They seem to recognize—as Khrushchev often did not—that many of the problems facing them are very complex and that their ability to act on these problems is limited. Another domestic undertaking comparable to Khrushchev’s vast program to transform the Virgin Lands, for example, would seem to be beyond the courage and the capacities of the collective. Similarly, abroad, another move analogous to Khrushchev’s brash (and disastrous) missile venture in the Western Hemisphere would seem to be completely out of character for the wary group of men now in the Kremlin.

3. Thus the spirit of the collective is cautious. Perhaps as important, the machinery of the collective is cumbersome. It is certainly an oversimplification to say that, if Khrushchev controlled the bureaucracy, the bureaucracy controls his successors. There is, however, some truth to this notion. Brezhnev, for example, often seems to speak for the professional party apparatus; Khrushchev usually spoke to it. In any case, with a variety of views and interests represented within the Politburo, it cannot always be easy to arrive at decisions and may often then be difficult to execute them. Moreover, it is clear that there are strong disagreements among the top leaders over such diverse matters as the pace and character of economic reform, the proper allocation of the nation’s economic resources, and what some regard as the declining momentum of Soviet foreign policy.

4. The shortcomings of committee rule, together with the political appetites of the leaders who operate within it, are matters of common knowledge and concern within the Soviet establishment. And certainly the inadequacies of accomplishment and the failures of policy serve to give the discontented and the ambitious both a pretext and a reason for seeking change. But no one can say—and perhaps least of all themselves—how many specific failures (such as their inability to foresee or forestall the Arab collapse in the June war) the present leaders can suffer, or how many chronic issues (such as their constant struggle over economic priorities) they can endure.

5. Nevertheless, if the present Soviet leadership, standing on the brink of a new year, is of a mind to congratulate itself, it could do so on several grounds. First, it has, after all, managed to survive for more than three years without major changes in its composition or in the way that it functions, and—whatever happens in the future—this in itself is no small accomplishment. Second, even if they should not claim the lion’s share of credit for themselves, the top leaders have at least helped to put some momentum back into an economy which, under Khrushchev, was showing signs of foundering. Third, they have some reason for satisfaction in a number of lesser gains, including a measure of progress in the implementation of the limited economic reform program, and some apparent improvement in relations with the general public as a result of the increased availability of consumer goods during the 50th Anniversary year. In the international sphere, they can feel some pleasure about the way events are moving in Western Europe and about the trend of their relations with Turkey, Iran and India. They have preserved their foothold in the Middle East and probably think their chances of expanding it are good. They can also derive some comfort from the distress the United States is suffering from the war in Vietnam. Concerning the Communist movement, they can feel substantial relief at the way Peking has damaged its own position.

6. Despite accomplishments such as these, the Soviet leaders, looking back on the year just past, have little reason for jubilation. Indeed, they have reason devoutly to hope that next year will be better than last, for 1967 brought them woe as well as blessings.

Thus, at home, 1967 brought them:

• —in the economy, the slighting of investment, the key to future growth;
• —within the leadership, an apparent intensification of controversy over the question of resource allocations;
• —and, in the area of popular and party morale, waning ideological fervor, unrelieved discontent among many writers and artists, and continuing restiveness among the young.

And thus, abroad, 1967 also brought the leaders:

• —surprise and pain at the Arab military debacle in the six-day war in the Middle East;
• —some reason for increasing concern over the possibility that the US would take actions which would enlarge the war in Vietnam, raising the question of more direct Soviet involvement;
• —anxiety over the potential dangers of Mao’s cultural revolution, frustration over the antics of the Cubans and the Rumanians, and dismay over their inability to restore discipline among the Communist parties of the world.

7. What of the new year 1968? Will it bring a similar mixture of profit and loss, pleasure and pain? Probably so. Domestic prospects are not especially bright. The question of resource allocation, for example, will almost certainly remain at issue, and contention between the regime and some of its unhappy subjects is not likely to be dealt with in any effective and lasting way. Much the same can be said about the USSR’s prospects abroad. The urge to compete with, to outdo, and indeed to undo the United States in most areas of the world and in most areas of international policy will no doubt remain one of the strongest impulses behind Soviet policy. At the same time, this urge is likely to some extent to be curbed by the Soviets’ appreciation of the limitations of their own capacities and by their awareness that nuclear conflict between the two great powers would be mutually suicidal. Thus, the quandary the Soviets find themselves in vis-á-vis the United States will almost certainly remain precisely that during 1968.

8. Moscow, however, will certainly see opportunities for gain in 1968 which it may be all the more eager to exploit because of the strategic standoff with the US. Though essentially cautious, the Soviet leadership is conscious of its “superpower” role and of a steadily growing capacity to make its political, economic and military weight felt in areas outside its traditional orbit. There is every reason to expect that Moscow will be especially alert to extract advantage from the position it has established in the Arab world and in the Mediterranean Basin generally. Here, as elsewhere in the Third World, military aid will continue to provide a handy opening wedge, though there will be both trials and errors and the Soviets will find it impossible to impose a single pattern on relations with these countries. In Europe, there will be further losses in the East, some progress in the West. Toward China, there is a chance of a modest improvement in relations only if Mao should die or be replaced.

9. The ambivalence involved in seeking to compete with the US without confrontation will lead to uncertainties and, at times, arguments within the leadership. Even should the leadership change appreciably (and this is always possible), its collective nature will probably endure over the short term. To many of the Soviet leaders, the power relationship with the US, though improving, will continue to appear unsatisfactory; some will wish to devote priority attention to all manner of efforts to eliminate the imbalance. Others, however, will see less need of this, will be content to settle for an adequate level of deterrence; any other course, they would fear, would simply provoke the US to an even greater military effort and force the USSR into arms expenditures which could only cripple the Soviet economy as a whole.

10. Although disagreements as fundamental as this are not likely to be resolved totally next year, there are few grounds for the West to be encouraged about the general trend of Soviet thinking. The pattern of recent developments—the tenor of public discourse, the disbursement of funds, the completion of missile silos, the reluctance of the Soviets to discuss US offers concerning arms control, the Soviet posture in the Middle East, and even the increasing eminence of Brezhnev—all these signs suggest that the leadership has concluded that it must continue to seek major improvements in the Soviet strategic position, even at the risk of jeopardizing economic growth.

I. The Political Scene: Domestic and Foreign

[Here follow the Introduction and a section on Internal Politics.]

Foreign Policy

11. The present leaders would like to see Soviet power and ideology become dominant on a world scale. As a real prospect, however, the notion of a world-wide Soviet triumph has long since lost much of its substance and virtually all its immediacy. Too many things have happened in recent years—too much trouble with the economy, too many rows with the Chinese and within the international movement, and too few gains against the West—to permit any responsible Soviet leaders to view the future with the kind of simplistic optimism once expressed by Khrushchev.

12. But if the Soviets now understand that there are definite limits to their ability to shape and exploit the course of events abroad, they have not as yet shown signs of accepting this appreciation gracefully. They sometimes seem most reluctant to match their ambitions to their means. Consequently, Soviet foreign policies now seem to reflect both a new sophistication (a more realistic and flexible awareness of national interests) and an old simplicity (the dogmatic insistence that the world conform to the Soviet image of it). This ambivalence can be expected to persist for some time and to be evident in the way Moscow deals with the most pressing international issues now facing it.

Relations With the US

13. In no aspect of Soviet foreign policy is this ambivalence more conspicuous than in relations with the US. The attitudes of the Soviet leaders are conditioned by persistent, underlying suspicion of the purposes of the foremost “imperialist” state, on the one hand, and, on the other, by an awareness of the dangers in the nuclear age of uncontrolled antagonism between the two great powers. The second of these conflicting impulses has, in general, prevailed under the collective leadership, as indeed it did under Khrushchev, but not without creating tensions in the policy-making process. In particular instances, where decisions affecting relations with the US were concerned, hesitancy, ambiguities and the attraction of a harder anti-imperialist line have been apparent. From time to time, episodes occur, such as the recent drugging of the US military attachZ and his British colleague and similar KGB-engineered incidents, which are hardly contrived to improve the state of US-Soviet relations.

14. The Soviet leaders have publicly asserted that no resolution of basic differences with the US is conceivable so long as the US is involved in the war in Vietnam. But they have also indicated (and, during the Middle East crisis, demonstrated) a strong desire to keep the lines open to Washington. And though they have at times insisted that US-Soviet relations must remain frozen for the duration, they have been willing to conclude specific agreements (e.g., on the peaceful uses of outer space) and to negotiate about others (e.g., nuclear proliferation) when they saw larger advantage to Soviet policy. In formulating its policies toward the US, the leadership has been unable to resolve the contradictory demands of a policy which seeks, on the one hand, gains against the US in Europe, the Middle East and elsewhere and, on the other, a tacit understanding with the US to avoid measures and countermeasures which would seriously risk international crises.

Arms Control

15. The USSR does not view arms control as a problem of great urgency. Moscow does see, however, some political profit in disarmament negotiations and in US-Soviet agreement on certain limited forms of control, such as a nuclear nonproliferation treaty, especially when it can be used as a means of promoting the political and military containment of West Germany. There is no reason to believe that the desirability of a treaty has been at issue within the Soviet leadership.

16. Other arms control proposals now pending hold little interest for Moscow. Thus, for example, proposals to restrain the world arms trade are not likely to appeal to the Soviets since such trade and aid is clearly regarded in Moscow as its primary political tool in the Third World. And concerning measures of greater scope, such as the control of strategic weapons, the Soviets are likely to proceed with great caution and suspicion. In this instance, the collective leadership’s characteristic hesitancy when faced with questions of considerable import is probably compounded by the apprehensions of the Soviet military, by the baneful influence of Vietnam on US-Soviet relations, and possibly by differences of opinion within the leadership as well. It is possible that the Soviet leaders will, after considerable agonizing among themselves, decide to enter into exploratory discussions with the US on the ABM question, but for the present the prospects appear to be slight that they would be willing to agree to any comprehensive program of strategic arms control.

Vietnam

17. The Soviet leaders have seen in US involvement in the war in Vietnam an opportunity for diplomatic and political profit, and they have been quick to try to exploit this opportunity wherever possible (as for example, in Western Europe). They are also concerned, however, that through their own involvement in the war they might become embroiled in situations which they could not control. Neither the US nor North Vietnam, the principal actors in the conflict, is very susceptible to Soviet influence; either of them could behave independently in a way which could test the USSR’s resolve, strain its resources, and risk its direct involvement. But, if uncomfortable about the degree of their commitment to an ally which has a will of its own and which pursues a cause (control of the South) which is not of vital concern to the USSR, the Soviets nonetheless see no acceptable alternative. Almost certainly, they hope Hanoi or Washington, or both, will some day make a political solution to the war possible. In the meantime, they will seek to persuade the US not to escalate the conflict any further and to agree to terms for a settlement which would be acceptable to North Vietnam.

China

18. The USSR’s delight at the way China was able to dissipate its resources in the Communist world by behaving bizarrely at home seems to have been tempered by concern over China’s rabid hostility, bewilderment over the course of events inside China, and apprehension over what might happen next. Over the last few years, the Soviets have strengthened their armed forces along the Sino-Soviet frontier and in Mongolia and—though probably fearing only border skirmishing—are probably preparing for more serious contingencies. In the political and propaganda arena, the Soviets have won handsome dividends by striking an attitude of cool restraint toward the Chinese. Although it is conceivable that there are varying estimates within the Soviet leadership of the long-term outlook for Sino-Soviet relations, it is most unlikely that Moscow will consider an alternative to its present course as long as the Mao faction remains in power in Peking.

The Communist Movement

19. By and large, the trend toward declining Soviet authority in the Communist world has not been arrested. Among the Eastern European states, Rumania has been the most vocal and demonstrative in claiming the right to pursue its national interests largely according to its own lights, but such tendencies are growing, though more quietly, elsewhere in the region. And the USSR’s problems with Castro’s Cuba—particularly over whether Latin America is ripe for revolutionary upheaval or not—make the emotional gulf between the two Communist states ever wider.

20. At the same time the Soviets have some successes to their credit. They have managed to slow down the movement in Eastern Europe toward broader contacts with West Germany and other West European states. They have also finally, thanks again in no small part to Chinese extremism, made a step toward the convening of a unity conference of the international movement. Nevertheless, it is evident that the kind of international Communist cohesion that Moscow longs for is a forlorn hope. Most of the Communist parties which will gather in Budapest in February to “consult” on an international conference want no part of a Soviet-imposed policy consensus.

Europe

21. The Soviet leaders appear to be convinced that their generally conciliatory approach to Western Europe is a promising one and seem to recognize that they would have much to lose and little to gain by reverting to a harsher policy. They will probably continue for some time their present line of trying to persuade the West Europeans that the US is beginning to disengage from Europe and that détente with a benevolent Soviet Union is an ever growing possibility. The Soviets will almost certainly continue publicly to treat West Germany as a pariah, but will privately seek to explore the possibility of movement in Bonn toward acceptance of the status quo in Germany.

The Middle East

22. The Soviet decision in the midst of the Arab-Israeli conflict to start some replacement of military equipment in friendly Arab countries was probably provisional, intended primarily as a political holding action and not as an encouragement to continued Arab militancy. But the Soviets must recognize that, if they wish to enlarge their influence in the area, an aim they are very unlikely to abandon, they have no alternative to continuing to work with the radical Arabs. The speed with which the Soviets moved into the military vacuum opened up by the Egyptians in the Yemen and their incipient courtship of Jordan are proof that Moscow will not be backward in exploring avenues of new influence. But it is still unlikely that they will wish to do this by entering into actual military alliances with any of the Arab states, for the USSR has no desire to give these states a hold over its policies. The establishment of Soviet bases in the area would contain some of the same hazards and would, in addition, seriously undercut the USSR’s “anti-imperialist” stance. Short of this, however, Moscow is likely to see both political and military advantage in expanding its military presence in the area.

23. Moscow will continue to exploit anti-Western attitudes in Arab countries, but it will not run the military risks or accept the political costs of identifying itself with Arab aspirations to destroy Israel. It follows also, however, that—barring a major change in Arab attitudes—the Soviets will not give very much help to diplomatic efforts to move toward a basic settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict.

The Third World

24. Partly as a result of its experiences in recent years in such places as the Congo, Ghana and Indonesia, the Soviet Union’s confidence that it possesses a reliable formula for dealing with the Third World has diminished. Khrushchev’s simplistic assumption that the underdeveloped nations were animated by a single economic and social impulse which could be exploited in a uniform way has been confounded by events. The USSR has made steady progress in increasing its influence in the states on its southern periphery, such as Iran and Turkey, and will continue to give careful attention to its relations with them. Elsewhere in the Third World, it is questionable whether the USSR’s political profits have been commensurate with its expenditures of cash and diplomatic energy. In any case, recent history has demonstrated that military and economic aid and the appeal of common socialist aspirations cannot guarantee the Soviet Union a stable political foothold in the midst of nationalist turbulence.

25. In Latin America, Moscow, seeing little prospect that the Communists can achieve power in the present circumstances by insurrectionary methods, has counseled the parties of the area to pursue united front tactics wherever possible. Meanwhile, the Soviets themselves, despite Castro’s angry protests, are trying to build for the future on the basis of expanded commercial, consular and diplomatic ties with governments of varying political coloration. Much the same approach is taken toward Africa and the non-Communist nations of Southeast Asia and the Far East.

26. Despite its disappointments, the USSR will almost certainly maintain sizable aid programs for the less developed countries. Economic aid patterns may change; there are signs of a more discriminating approach and a shift to greater emphasis on military aid. But, while new extensions of economic assistance have been declining, total drawings by recipient states next year are likely to be about the same as in recent years, about $300–350 million.

27. The lessons of the Middle East war have obviously not made the Russians any the less ready to use military aid as an instrument of political influence. To this end, the USSR is evidently fully prepared, where opportunity arises and where geography permits, as in the case of Nigeria and the Yemen, to call on its capacity to provide military aid promptly and in quantity. Despite their reluctance to make extended commitments, the Soviet leaders are almost certainly convinced that, as a great power, the USSR has a legitimate interest in practically all areas of the world and a political need to assert that interest.

[Here follow Part II, The Economy, and Part III, Defense Policy.]

1. Source: Johnson Library, National Security File, Country File, USSR, Vol. XVIII. Secret. Prepared jointly by the Offices of Current Intelligence, Economic Research, and Strategic Research of the Directorate of Intelligence and the Office of National Estimates. Rostow forwarded the paper to President Johnson under a June 12 covering memorandum that stated: “The first 5 pages [“General Perspective”] of this give you some picture of how CIA would appraise Soviet prospects in 1968 on a state of the union basis.” The paper is marked with a “ps,” indicating the President saw it.