Foreign Relations of the United States, 1981–1988, Volume I, Foundations of Foreign Policy

198. Information Memorandum From the Chairman of the Policy Planning Council (Rodman) to Secretary of State Shultz¹

Washington, July 3, 1984

SUBJECT

• Looking Ahead to 1985

If the President is reelected in November, we want to be able to hit the ground running. Therefore, you tasked us to prepare the ground for initiatives that would be desirable or appropriate for 1985. This paper examines the main areas where new initiatives may be possible. It also notes some areas where we must be prepared to head off possible challenges.

The Context: International and Domestic

If the President is reelected, our friends overseas will be enormously encouraged by the prospect of continuity, one of the qualities they value most in American policy precisely because it has been so rare in recent decades. To our adversaries, at the same time, the President’s reelection will be a psychological blow of some magnitude: Whatever hopes the Soviets, Nicaraguans, Angolans, et al. may have nurtured that relief was on the way, will have been dashed. They will all face hard choices knowing that the pressures we have subjected them to will likely continue for four more years.

With both allies and adversaries there will be new opportunities for US policy: With allies, a reinvigorated US administration will be in a position to pursue the agenda of issues that we think important to Western security and prosperity (conventional forces, trade liberalization, etc.) on which the allies have not been so cooperative. As for our adversaries, weak Soviet clients like the Angolans may be disheartened by the President’s reelection to the point that it decisively affects their view of their strategic options; Cuba and Nicaragua, to a lesser degree, also may conclude that some restraints have been removed from Presidential action. The Soviets themselves will face the choice of stonewalling for four more years (and risking further isolation) or resigning themselves to the “objective necessity” of doing business with the United States. More about these specific issues below.

This is a time of essentially favorable trends in the world: US rearmament and self-confidence; economic recovery and declining energy prices; Soviet leadership crisis and economic stagnation; a solid coalition of the Atlantic Alliance, Japan, and China holding the ring against the Soviet Union. But we must also be aware of risks and longer-term problems:

— Alliance solidarity will be, as always, a constant struggle to maintain: We will still be plagued by political disagreements on out-of-area issues, by allied pressures on us to be more flexible on East-West issues, and by Nunn-Amendment-type pressures at home.² Down the road, we face serious problems if left-wing parties like the British Labour party or German SPD come back into office at the next swing of the electoral pendulum.

— The deadlock in US-Soviet relations might be broken next year and enable the two sides to get down to business—or it might not. While we are in a good position to tough out a long period of chill, there are risks: not only in the likelihood of constant allied harassment, but also the possibility that if a future crisis materializes, the nerves of the two sides are so raw that it could turn out to be dangerous. However, there are no issues now on the horizon that are likely to produce a direct US-Soviet confrontation.

— The US position in the Third world is much improved. Much of this, frankly, is due to the devastating world recession that has forced many LDC’s to adopt free-market reforms and consensus policies at home and to turn to the West for economic help. Escalating interest rates, however, will increase the political pressure on LDC governments, and the more favorable attitudes in some LDC’s could change abruptly into disillusionment and bitterness. Key points of vulnerability in the Third World—such as Pakistan, the Philippines, and the Sudan—bear close watching.

As a general matter, if we maintain our alliances and our military strength, there is a certain essential stability in the equilibrium among the major powers. The Third World, in contrast, is the arena of the most likely threats to international security. No new pattern of order has yet been fashioned to replace the order that was imposed by colonial empires. Third World instability is sure to generate new crises and opportunities for Soviet and radical challenges.

The irony is that even these problems are not inherently unmanageable. Far from it. Many, if not most, upheavals in the Third World do not even seriously affect our interests. Other problems would probably be amenable to the discrete application of American power or resources. The difficulty is most likely to lie in the domestic constraints in America that limit or prevent our discretionary action.

It is in this area (Third World intervention) that the American domestic consensus was most shattered by Vietnam. The anti-defense mood that Vietnam spawned began to turn around by the late 1970’s; the anti-interventionist mood, however, is still powerful. The Central America and Lebanon debates show how true this is.

The President has proven in Grenada that strong leadership can rally broad support. Once reelected, he will be able to claim a fresh popular mandate for his policies, since the electorate will have faced a clear philosophical choice. Nevertheless, the lineup in the Congress will probably be about the same, at best; the Democrats will claim that the public still wants Congress to act as a brake on the President as before. Therefore, unless there are stunning Republican gains in the Congress, we will probably face undiminished Congressional opposition on the whole range of controversial issues like Central America, arms control, arms sales to Arab countries, and War Powers.³

We continue to be in an historical period of Congressional ascendancy, with many of the Vietnam-era restrictions on the Executive now embedded permanently in legislation as well as in the political culture. In addition, the leadership structure in the Congress will continue to be weak, making it difficult for the President to negotiate with the Congress when he is willing to do so since the leadership will be unable to deliver (or discipline) the troops. One of the major initiatives we may want to consider for next year, in fact, is an attempt to work out some rules of comity on War Powers and other issues of Executive-Legislative relations.

Thus the challenge will be formidable: an America no longer predominant in the world as it was in the 1940’s; with less margin for error and with more of a premium on coherence and consistency; and with an unruly domestic system and uncertain domestic consensus that make this coherence and consistency difficult to achieve. This will be a major test of leadership.

This paper will examine possible opportunities (and challenges) grouped largely in six key areas:

— The Atlantic Alliance

— US-Soviet Relations and Arms Control

— Middle East and Persian Gulf

— East Asia and the Pacific

— Latin America

— Africa

[Omitted here are pages 5–15 covering the topics listed above.]

Other Issues

Under Ken Dam’s direction, a study has been going forward on Libya—examining in detail the nature of the threat and the range of options for US policy. The basic discussion paper written for the beginning of this effort is at Tab G.⁴

Last but not least is the long-gestating US initiative for a new trade round. We should pursue the agreement of the major industrial countries, confirmed at the London Summit, to seek “decisions at an early date” on a new round of multilateral trade negotiations.⁵ Our concern has been to broaden the GATT regime to cover services, agricultural and high-technology trade, and wider trade liberalization including in the developing countries. We should try to get the process underway in 1985.

1. Source: Department of State, Executive Secretariat, S/P Files, Memoranda and Correspondence from the Director of the Policy Planning Staff to the Secretary and Other Seventh Floor Principals: Lot 89D149, S/P Chrons Looking Forward 7/3/84. Secret; Sensitive. Drafted by Rodman. Sent through Armacost, who did not initial the memorandum. McKinley initialed the memorandum and wrote “3 July.” Rodman sent the memorandum to Armacost and Hill under a July 3 typewritten note: “This cover memo has not been cleared by the bureaus. I did not want to invite a prolonged negotiation with EUR and ARA at this stage, if only in the interests of speed. (Bill Kirby, Paul Wolfowitz, and Dick Fairbanks did look over the Middle East and Asia sections, however, on an informal basis).” (Ibid.)
2. Reference is to an amendment offered by Nunn in June that specified the removal of up to 90,000 U.S. troops stationed in Europe if NATO members did not increase their defense commitments. On June 20, the Senate rejected Nunn’s proposal 55 to 41. (Congress and the Nation, vol. VI, 1981–1984, p. 241; Helen Dewar, “Nunn Loses Bid to Cut U.S. Forces,” Washington Post, June 21, 1984, pp. A1, A15)
3. See footnote 5, Document 191.
4. Tabs A–G were not attached.
5. At the conclusion of the G–7 Economic Summit meeting in London, the leaders released the text of an Economic Declaration that reaffirmed the importance of holding a new round of multilateral trade negotiations. For the text of the Declaration, released on June 9, see Department of State Bulletin, August 1984, pp. 2–4.