Transcripts For CSPAN3 Rethinking Grand Strategy 20160730

Christopher thank you, andrew. I want to thank people who havent been fully thanked. Bueno anda natalia amazing in organizing behind the scenes. They really have been integral. If you look at the design and branding, he is really our brand strategist. Back roomhe probably interviewing someone for us now. I want to set the stage for some of their, applications, some places where it feel sketchy. On january 81918, Woodrow Wilson walked purposefully to the podium in the center of the capital to a dress a joint session of congress. Much of this cabinet had not been consulted. It was the most significant in his presidency. Nicknamed the 14 points. To create a lasting peace. New vision of nationalism that we are all fairly aware of. Strategic leave a along with the expectations raised by those efforts to realize them. They were as most powerful and influence on World Politics as the settlements they informed. The world war i crucible moment that gave its shape and the American International system it was interlocked with, sometimes setting into motion their own ideas. The 14 points also was the only comprehensive account put forward by any of the belligerent powers. To shape theted peacemaking and put forward provisional announcements. That this emanated not from europe, not from those devastated nations but from the u. S. , a nation that took three years to enter the war. In its history it never developed the capacious european and world political that involved the u. S. In a leadership role is of tremendous significance. Is this peculiar larry weiss is peculiarly why is ily absent . Arit declared, the day of conquest and has gone by. Entered into the interest of particular government and likely at some moments to upset the peace of the world. Is thinking about abolitionist imperialism and other land grabs that were so problematic. It is this happy fact clear to the view of every public man whose thoughts do not linger in an age of med whos dead and gone of men who is dead and gone in which makes it possible for every nation whose purposes to a value now or any other time the object it has in view. He is a test he is articulate a vision of Public Diplomacy he ofarticulating a Vision Public diplomacy. Individuals intellectuals, activists. The great war, the way it was waged, is devastation and consequences revealed its sharp and to others around the world that evens and necessity were driving towards oblivion. M and for him the options of that start. Wilson looms large, like a colossus over the landscape of American Foreign policy. Yet the scholarship on grand strategy is noted. Usage of the term grand strategy peaks through distant rating and searches in roughly 1943. This coincides with a new science of International Relations. It helps us to note the world war ii moment is really the watershed. Wilsons ideas are based on the lack of media policy impact as demonstrated by the Senate Rejection of the league of nations. As charles bluntly put it, the man who made up the war agenda two world war ii ended significance dramatically overshadowed by world war ii. This is a period of the cold war where paul kennedy and others have predicted in it prime moment to understand the grand strategy. Vision nots hegemonic . Some have made that argument. Not justn wilson is aout wilson, it is provocation to think more deeply about how to broaden and deeply understand grand strategy. As a way of knowing, as a way of structuring knowledge. Can provide clarity about the ways in which the crucible of world war i and the resulting reconstruction of the world system generated dynamic new internationalism. That is just a provisional set we can think of a lot more. Roughly four of our fore internationalisms their internationalist orientations side to address the challenges of the most confirmationlobal and cuban experience, to not think about the 1920s and 1930s, but rather think about it as a postwar moment. See why so many of these internationalist actors coming out before world war i were committed to peace causes. Idealisticike naive utopian projects. They were generally undertaken with an attempt to restructure the International System itself. Will sketch out the four main arguments and then just get into some discussions. And International Scheme of moral legalism. I would argue american exceptionalism. A descendentbecame in the 1980s and partly crashed thereafter. As liz has talked about, the ghost of wilson haunts the period afterwords. Really crucial for thinking about this later period. Then we have to think seriously about this as a grand strategy. Strategy that comes out of this moment is black internationalism. Racist and imperialist western capitalism, lack internationalism was developed and directed by figures as but also figures like marcus garvey. In the longer paper i talk about the analysis of he tried to us issue eight to a situate enerally most notably he called for a closing of ranks. And an africanamerican attend at a better citizen project. We can talk more about that. Our black internationalist causes generated out of this moment. Egalitarian legal peace and internationalism was was given at springboard for the world war i moment. Advanced andwere applied by the settlement. Are someone deserving of at least a partial grand strategist it has to be jane adams. And the second American Woman to win the nobel peace prize. Particularly blind to race issues sometimes, it was a really Important Organization that soft to make the interwar years a postwar era. This doesnt work as neatly for internationalism. That strand comes together with peace internationalists to push for the impact. To outlaw war as an instrument of national policy, the goal was to make this a postwar era. And that was a nonbinding act of moral persuasion. The conditions shaped these faces of internationalism. It shaped a cohesive grand strategy. Into perfect lockstep. That is the theory of knowledge. Ofis a sort of set principles. It organizes around methods and means and large ends. I argued in my paper, expands our historical reach beyond military means and state act and state actors. That is my goal to reconceptualize what the term means. A range of cultural conditions and shape the perception strategists have on material conditions as well as the outcome they seek. Can go back to hamiltonians. They come out with a cultural say race to other relations, the other major powers, talking about the civil war in the same sort of way. If cap if Henry Kissinger is right, before reaching high office they will consume as long as they continue in office. These convictions relate import lead to the conception that has been argued for a security imaginary. Imaginary fits nicely with this classic argument. Is it better to have preparedness or friendly people . Taken together that an expanded an strategy nonstate actors and grass suits grassroots movements as we heard about from yesterday with farreaching objectives as well as programs that build on various security. Their actions can be historically analyzed culturally exploring structure of wellestablished meetings out of which representations of the world of International Relations are created. Not created only by policymakers, but created in a world in which policymakers operate. To the extent which these convictions of which kissinger spoke, we share inside and outside the policy communities and we contributed to a strategic culture of the sort described by the scholar colin gray. As they would in their ambitious aims for world peace or changing global imperialism as they would for the reformation of global materialism. I will leave it at that. Thanks, chris, we have time for q a, for questions. I really like the framing of your paper. I want to suggest further lines of analysis for you to consider as you move forward. I may call it george andof lloyd am want to doch i to return to the work of adam hughes. It is absolutely critical for explaining hitlers emergence and of elements in the 1930s during world war ii. I would encourage you to think about economics. When wilson talks about freedom of the seas, what he is talking about the rights of the united for hisn both sides Political Base to turn a profit. I think that is important. I think wilson is willing to give up all types of sovereignty. Is very consistent in putting the United States at the head of the Global Financial pack. Those are two that i would be interested in hearing more about. I think the atlanta schism is thatctly well taken area could indeed be a six, aggregating out some of the folks from some others who break off from that branch. In terms of the latter im not sure if it is with the and then going back to the paper yesterday, if you think about the development of what i like , unilateralism from the founders onward, the problems of neutrality that the u. S. Ran aground between 1914 with tradingto do at all sets. I do wonder about how i could to get that economic internationalism of that sort. This is a much longer standing kind of economic internationalism. This was going to go in the economics,tion about in sort of looking backward manatt working forward. We talk about the moment prefiguring and performing. Im thinking about, i thought one way you may go with that is the Gordon Leventhal book about in theand the 14 points ideological project. An sort of the specter of communism on the world stage, even in 1917, which was hugely significant in precold war, but hugely significant as in the perp as in the european political context. That playsear how into your sense of various internationalisms, what the Russian Revolution meant and how grinsense of International Strategies may be similar or more difficult. There has been a subsequent wave after wave of scholarships after this question. Much. W is he didnt care timing declarations coming ,ut of the new soviet state versus the declaration in 1918, is that a direct response . To what extent is wilson directly responding. The essence is a really good one. The war in is a piece of that. One argument i made elsewhere is as you think about the Global Dynamics of world war i, that is one of the consequences, russia becomes a communist state. What happens in europe and what happens in russia is in or mislead significant. Of the people has studied international liberalists. This herald new democracy of better allies for the u. S. . It may be a more Democratic State and not a monarchy. Will they tend towards totalitarianism . Hope that International Socialism was going to be this thing that mitigates against the bellicose nationalism. Here you get this argument from early world war i summer. Are new types of solidaritys that modern society and civilization is building up that will transcend what william ofes calls the ancient soul bellicosity. Is not bellicosity blowing cold air on a hot fire. The world war i moment or hard,ssives is just as may be harder when modern states go to war in a global cataclysm. A whole host of multiple overlapping types of citizenship to have a transnational america, transnational orientation in the u. S. That could effectively fight against these horrific solidaritys. Stephen has his hand and we have a couple more here. What you see as the cost benefits in using grand strategy as the label or the framework. What is that change the substance of our picture, of the Competition Among internationalisms . That is an interesting question. One piece of it, one piece of my response is i was shocked to find how little wilson comes up on grand strategy. It is a gaping hole in grand strategy literature. If every Foreign Policy class that teaches anything about the era will spend a lot of time on wilson. Most books, the vast majority is it because his ideas were perceived as not being effective, not having a large policy outcome . Theyve had all sorts of ideological impacts throughout the rest of the century. Is to say if we are going to use this term and it has a meeting of intellectual architecture on Foreign Relations, if we just limited it to the nation, then the constellation of thinkers advancing that. Door oropen up that window. Through that opening. Is whatstion for me would we want to continue to call this grand strategy . We could see some utility there. Talking about the big world of big world making. Or from foreign missionaries, that is from Woodrow Wilson. If we say wilson is the singular architect of grand strategy, then we have a problem. One piece of work it does is because this will get us past a little bit, idealistic arguments. When you jump into the ideological impacts and strategy that may be lofty and academic. That gets one of the obstacles that are thinking about this. Did you want to ask your question . Are important do you think the inquiry at the moment and u. S. Grad strategy . Ambitious,road, systemic attempt to try to chart the course. It strikes me as significant. Do you want to briefly say what the inquiry is . Yes. The collection of academics mainly drawn from americas universities. And how it should be constructed in the aftermath of the first world war. They are bringing in academic expertise to Foreign Policymaking. And convenes before the and of the war to help shape the postwar order. One lesson that policymakers this from us takes from book is they need to start the process way before, even before the u. S. Gets into the war. You see walters language very much in will sony and arguments in willsonian arguments. We want to attribute are sure. Ut to beat authorship the inquiries is really important. If you think about the development of International Architecture of American Foreignpolicy throughout the rest of the century, one of the is thei was alluding to new rule on expertise. Also in impacts public opinion. Wilson is the first and only phd president. Of his own sense of self, full of his own census sense of capacity. In just one night they redraw the borders. Taking in the advice of the inquiry but ultimately it is wilson. Parameters longterm , you can see this as a precursor to the National Security council. Help inform the policymaking and maybe bring an expertise that the president himself or herself doesnt actually have. Thanks for a great paper. To katesturn question, especially about economics. Thank you for avoiding the use of the term interwar. All terms like that basically help us it nor all the small wars that go on throughout the 20th century. A highlight and ecological issue that we have to think about. All seem to be defined in terms of ideas. The internationalism, the forms of internationalism are sort of different strands of thought so that studying internationalism is a history project. Economics,tion about arguably tied towards the if yous is in question, are not seen economics as a principal category in the ideas, that doesnt meet it is not an important part of policy and practices. How do we define eras and internationalism. Do we define it on the basis of policies and practices . Is the source of the criteria through which we come up with our categories . That is really helpful. We were talking about can section and execution. The execution part im not feeling too much with in here. As a historian of this era we have spent so much time on the that i am not especially in need. A couple of people shake their heads. They want to spend more time on it. To gerald you go back and i and relitigating who profited in world war i, the , i am veryivers resistant to introduce foreignpolicy. Sometimes this period is envisioned that way. Particularly when you teach it you get the sense that george involvement without commitment kind of vision works really lice lay that really nicely. Works really nicely. Leaders talk about the transitions of goods and throughout europe. Certainly that is a driver. Do we want to go to coolidge and harding, is this americas business . To a few of the other ways internationalism was being constructed in this area. I think you get back to economics. Black internationalism, peace activists, and getting American Marines out of haiti. Why are American Marines in haiti . Project ofsive uplift with as many problems. Can say we can integrate into this and my rough scheme doesnt do justice to the internationalism and inherent economic role of the u. S. In this area and before. I should probably think how to include it in each internationalism. What are the economic implications of nationalism . Did you want to ask question . Ok. This is sort of ill formed but im going to do it anyway. Thinking over the course of yesterdays talks and reading the papers were today we oftenstruck by how talk about grand strategy as if it is a plan to go forward, but how within that so much of that is a reaction, reacting to an event, so it feels like grand strategy is creating control or sort of order to pretend we had are not just reacting. Blackt actually think internationalism failed. You could think about the unfolding events that come after of 1920s, the strengthening colonial movements, the understanding of world war ii as the end of an empire. And then the emergence of new nationstates that are defining themselves, not necessarily as not aligned. Seems to me if we think about the black internationalist project, not necessarily as a project of american grand strategy, but a grand strategy for rethinking what the world may look like. You get a different narrative than the one that i think is assumed. In one of my footnotes, good to know where im heading. I totally buy that. Us thing you are encouraging to consider is if we want to use the label grand strategy and look at the forward looking components of it. Also looking at the way the grand strategic world is a holistic project. It is also a vision of a reconstruction of the past. Its a long genealogy of who has been involved in africa and how those kinds of competitions have led to the first world war. Reorganization of grand strategic knowledge in the past in order to react to an alternative version of the future may be a nice way of putting that. No way meant to imply the black nationalism had no success. We lose the longer trajectory, which is the whole idea embodied by these nationalisms. I think religion is crucial. You think about the way other moral reform projects, there is a worldwide effort for prohibition coming out of world war ii, to enact that not just because the u. S. Had but everywhere, and American Internationalist eat those, that goes nowhere. That is as transcendent as it gets. Do we have time for one more question . Thank you, very interesting. I want to build on adrians point. Internationalism you talk about makes sense. I was really trying to understand is the counterfactual. Why wouldnt this be grand strategy . Maybe we will stop using both of those. But the idea that this is a time when there were five minute role, whatmericas wilson was all about, always been a part of that. Would make you say this isnt a grand strategy . I had trouble understanding what makes a grand strategy or exclusive grand strategy. So much of the world war i literature has to do with british or french or other states, not the u. S. We were talking about it yesterday. Where the dominant focus has been. If we are thinking about u. S. Grand strategy or history and how it impacts grand strategic thought and action, that is where it is. If you look to the literature, they are not looking to muss at all. A lot of recent scholarship is beginning to do this work. You dont find that as much. What constitutes grand strategy or how to think about that . Main intervention is to try to expand those parameters. Structures of knowledge, the way it can be assessed. Of knowing they world and trying to reshape it to create alternative visions that match means to large ends that do have ways for us to launch area that seems to constitute a grand strategy that marginalizes people and grand actors that have not it into those kinds of narratives. That is why i wanted to be involved in this. To think about how people in the past have considered these to consider these groups in if they are going to take the way of understanding the past and tap into the present questions related to should the u. S. Have a grand strategy . Or should we choose some alternative language altogether . It is too bad for all of our branding. And i would not be against that at all. There may be a way that limits it. Also what are the limits of defining so many time summoning kinds of alternative visions as grand strategy . At some point everything becomes it. Think d like you to i would like you to join me in thanking chris. Is aext speaker coconspirator in organizing this conference. She was the inspiration for this conference. She mentioned it to me and mentioned it to chris. Liz is going to be speaking to us about human rights and the roosevelts. Welcome back to the room where it happens. Bit hoping to focus on i join everyone, people are thanking me for the conference and i say it is all chris. This talk has three parts and has actually left its title behind a little bit. There is a certain amount about fdr and human rights. The first part is a different origin story for this grand project, because everyone seemed to be so taken with personal narratives yesterday. The second is a discussion about theosevelt in document, 1941 Atlantic Charter, although it was developed jointly with strategyle as grand and human rights instrument. Very briefly, the link between , which wasnt aspirational, meaning Different Things to different constituencies and a specific policy debate in a particular , as it was being in the late summer and early fall of 1944. In the paper i discussed the Atlantic Charter as a benchmark in two policy contexts. The second one is mostly flowering after roosevelts death, but a context in which the Atlantic Charter was ignored or denigrated. That is in the decision to designate Pacific Islands that had been captured by the u. S. And japan, Strategic Trust territories. The tt pi, which sounds like a disease, which was Strategic Trust territory as a concept, a title that the u. S. And maybe just pulled out of its year collectively at the last minute for an area that may not be visited, that may not be held to various kinds of standards and where the benchmarks on the Atlantic Charter totally went by the wayside. And the hitting cost of that kind of strategic choice. Back to the origin story. A visit to traditional grand Strategy Program a few years ago was a little bit troubling for me. To speak andvited people were not just buying it that my work counted as grand strategy. To be on some level i wasnt grand enough, which may be meant i was short. And after reading steven war i realized there was just triple iteration of that perennially popular great man approached a history at work here. That the great man was simultaneously the object of study, the young scholar being groomed to take place at that elite table, and the instructor that all three had it that vision. If you even look at this table, we were saying that this is every grand strategy or national everity panel that we have been asked to speak on and looks pretty much like this. And we were saying last night, look at this conference as a whole. Women if you50 here and , who arent , that not only would it have all guys, it would have been all guys from texas u2 on the end. State,e to be from a big everything has to be big for it to be grand strategy. This is a critique way beyond gender. A critical review are back in the day of Henry Kissingers volume diplomacy, i sat down to his new book and was trying to put my finger on what was troubling me about that analysis. And i was very taken with the critique of the former chief of the state Department Policy saiding staff, where she what is missing from kissingers index . Human rights, women, health, multilateralism, various kinds of multilateralism. Occurred to me my take on grand strategy was also seen as nonconforming. Amountedt a nap it to an effect of a shadow syllabus. Thought i dont have a home monograph worth of things to say an essays, but may be or an edited volume, which i was calling the girlfriends guide to grand strategy, and that was my working title for some time. I was chatting with publishers at conferences and they said, i love it, i would totally publish this. Why is it funny or mildly amusing . Because of that jarring juxtaposition between the men and the great white fleet and anything calling itself girlfriends guide, which is chatty, personal, and by definition feminine. This was never seriously proposed anymore then all the titles i was thinking of yesterday, such as the unbearable whiteness of grand strategy, or something about the referenceof law, in to charlies acronym for diplomatic intelligence, military, and economic. How do we fold in law . Let me transition to biography. Something be grand strategy . Hes eclectic, hes a juggler, hes not particularly a deep thinker. His management style is ad hoc and reactive and he is just not this super reflective guy. It is noteworthy when he dictates a diary entry at the atlantic conference, which i am about to talk about a little bit. He has some sense this is a world historical moment, but that is not like him. Going to describe this document, the Atlantic Charter, and then im going to make three points about it. Is a 400tic charter word statement of war and peace aims. And it is negotiated as part of a three Day Conference between fdr and churchville and various members of their senior staff. That is why it is the Atlantic Charter. The conference is secret and roosevelt has eight e. Coli. The cape cod canal. It is a secret service man pretending to be roosevelt. This was an eclectic mix of provisions. Rehashng to basically a of will sony and is him. We are such a good pairing that i realized this is kind of a do over opportunity for roosevelt and his staff, mixed with references to various kinds of social welfare provisions, economic aspirations related to the new deal. The most interesting part about it is the date, august of 1941. And why would that be an interesting date for roosevelt to be making a statement about war and peace aims . Anybody . People have to wake up. Even though it is secret that roosevelt, it is still a risky thing for him to do. To make a statement of war and peace aims for what the post world war will look like fourmonth before pearl harbor is actually kind of out there. He has these isolationist constituencies although i realize that is a problematic term in many ways. So he is looking to the postwar world. I think some of the things interesting about the charter go to the point about being forwardlooking and yet shaped by reactions to the past. Is exactly what we are talking about with this document. How could it said to be a human rights in treatment . I would like to focus on the iconic sixth point, as the part that has any real poetry in it. The signatories will look forward to a time where all the men and all the land may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want. What makes this a human rights related provision are three things, that it combines traditional ideas about what we rightsvil call civil freedomivered at go for , freedom from want and fear, which incorporate various kinds of economic aspirations. Thirdly, the language, all the men in all the lands, it is not a treaty, it is just a statement. Still it places an International Instrument where you would if not attracting parties at least the signatories, sovereign entities. And there is a language about all the men. There is a suggestion that a national order, even legal border might apply to individuals on some level, skipping over the intervening level of a sovereign nationstate that may be oppressive. There is a reference to a collective Security Organization and that is where the legal institutional part comes in. The First International reference to what later becomes the u. N. , their planning documents among various kinds of allies that talk about collective security. Is the earliest end bag reference to what would become the u. N. Then thirdly this idea that it applies to everyone across borders and not exclusively americans. Document means Different Things to different people. Church hill intended it as an inspirational statement for this idea that michaela talks about, constructing an enemy where it defeated european allies who are under the nazi nazi not to yolk. Faireysan outcry of constituency saying does the Atlantic Charter apply to us . Pacific charter, maybe we need an african charter. Roosevelt is like, we called it the Atlantic Charter because we were meeting in the atlantic. But it applies all over the world. Is our icon of roosevelt pulling it around the world. We have a historical figure from saying, Nelson Mandela that she was so old he was already a lawyer in 1941 and he says actually we at the African National Congress Took this pretty seriously. Be we wrote the charter to more in line with the Atlantic Charter. A third take on this was this was a new iteration, a kind of reverse playbook, dont do it that way. And you can see our historical actors attempting to draw lessons from the past in real time. And that links to kates discussion yesterday about who draws lessons from the past . Are they legitimate . With the to leave image, the Atlantic Charter image. The second level policy planners working with this document, such as it was, it is like a really short oped. They would frame the Atlantic Charter. Where the woods charters are like the constitution. And that is the architecture of my first book to say that these policy planners at 30 or or below levels sort of frame their task as getting life to the Atlantic Charter through institutions. I will say a brief word about the plan as a ciccone and proposal. The most nuanced treatment is so im even embarrassed to be saying it in one sentence with her here. But perceived as too draconian. A plan designed around the economic fragmentation that would keep germany down the, the actual part the rise version of the plan was published by secretary of the treasury called germany is our problem. But the proposal was called economics were in its center. Labor forion, forced german war criminals. And basically the Atlantic Charter on some level brings it in that other cabinet members use it as a hook and says it violates the principles of the Atlantic Charter. It is giving freedom from fear to the german people. He said that Atlantic Charter was just was for everybody, not just allies. Popular opinion comes to attack the plan more and more. Probably not for these reasons, but because it is seen as stiffening german resistance at the battle of the bulge. So i conclude with the atlantic and ir as grand strategy, think it is a hook. It is a hook in three ways. Hook as in a song. Another little motif of this conference is a hook is emotional, it is memorable, maybe even manipulative as a propaganda hook. Coat hook that you can hang something on that is not terribly substantial. It will lend them persuasiveness. To bring them off the plan at one point, and finally a hook like an anchor. It goes to legitimacy. I would say the Atlantic Charters three kinds of hooks and this is true of other kinds of grand strategic visions. Thank you very much. It can be about anything. Wait for the boom mic. This is a response not to the paper but the prefatory remarks. I think of a new book called the hillary doctrine. Argument about hillary clinton, her important as tenure as secretary of state, reconceptualizing what we may call grand strategy and putting womens rights squarely at the center of it for the first time in american or human history. It is a useful addition to our understanding, especially if we are on a panel looking individuals and reflection points. Clinton may be an important person to include in the volume even going forward. If anybody could get her to write a preference, that would be awesome. It does link to a conversation we were having yesterday, which i could revise it some level. Hillary clinton being the pinnacle of foreignpolicy establishment, making this contribution that David Greenberg just articulated, and arewhen africanamericans at that pinnacle, as an obama or they make race related issues of justice and equality. , there is a sense of, okay. The visual is enough. It would be straining the american cultural imagination too much. This was a fascinating discussion. How did hillary feel that she not . Hat freedom or did she it could be a problem for her the way we would postulate it would have been a problem for someone like Powell Colin Powell or obama. We might have a chapter on condoleezza rice. There is a question in the back. I was wondering, the extent scr, or churchill, new of the Atlantic Charter at the time when they were making it or pronouncing it that it would be the hook for everything that would come later. That this would be the justification for the United Nations charter and the brentwood institutions, or is there more evidence that it was thought and just the immediate terms of the day and later on they realized we can use this to justify certain actions and constrained other actors and close off pathways where we do not want to go. Did they have foresight to the extent that it seems . That is a great question and i will give you a lawyerly answer. Kind of both. There was a sense of fdr in theng a diary entry historical approach the world historical importance that they were talking to each other and laying out this vision of the postwar world. In a part of the material i could not go through, i talk about how something that is this abstract and vague has to be anything at all. That it has to be metabolized through second and third tier officials. Those are the ones who start with the declaration of independence. It also metabolized on some level through more regional and andl war bond speeches posters, particularly the for freedom or bond drive and these homey images that Norman Rockwell drew. It has to be both to become anything. It has to be like a forwardlooking blueprints. I want to throw the question i give to students when i teacher book. We treat when i teach your book. If we treat the atlantic as a grant strategy what is the right word to use . Supplant the atlanta charter, does it reinforce . Or do you see the emergence of parallel grant strategies within the american official mind . Maybe this brings your argument in dialogue with some of the stuff we heard last night and yesterday. I was just thinking about this last night because i was so stimulated by the talk. I would like to hear what your students say about it. I think the Atlantic Charter was much closer to being a hook, like for a song, that is memorable and catchy. Containment is more likely anchor. None of them really literally dictate policies, like exactly what should happen. The containment of a doctrine comes much closer. Thats part of the argument about grant strategy. I hope to Say Something about that in my concluding remarks. Down thee to nail definition . If we consider truman doctrine. Nd the eisenhower doctrine you have given us a different variant of the onehanded clapping. Grant strategy as conception, as motivating vision. He spoke nicely about the second and third tier officials that have a framework or a hanger to hang things on. I am curious to hear you talk a little bit about the stereotype of fdr as a us get juggler. Of being mutually incomprehensible, contradictory, and geniuslike how he does it. Im interested in hearing more about fdr working to execute. His vision what is he doing in terms of politics to drive this vision and make sure that can actually work at the second and third tier level . The initial conceptualization of this panel is that it would be about individuals and their visions. Fdr, is a grand strategist i like that precisely because of the dissonance between that idea. Between forwardlooking, propulsive lay trying to control lsively trying to control and consistentlyas pretty reactive in a kind of anger to the wind type way. With his worldview was fromrized by a chum of his pal, childhood, herbert father of Herbert Claiborne pell, of pell grant fame. On the warl was Crimes Commission during what ultimately became nuremberg. Pell said, we do not have these grand visions. We think the world is made better by working for small changes. I think there are small changes in a particular direction. Policies that are seen as a betrayal by fdr fans, like his refusal to go along with antilynching legislation, the failure of any kind of holocaust rescue, japanese internment, you name it. I do not think he had a lot of sleepless nights about those tradeoffs. Feelingit was about that he was doing what he could and a lot of it was responding to people in front of him in terms of using the Atlantic Charter. The Atlantic Charter is like a magna carta and the 10 commandments. Its this telegram to press release it is this telegramm ed press release. It is physically unimpressive and he had it it is displayed. He wanted to partake in that fetishization of documents that sayicans are prone to and that it was a grand vision that emerged whole from his and churchills mind. A more permanent general security. Fdr struck out a reference to the text. He had a number of conversations with sumner welles, where he seems to suggest it is american and british power that need to undergird the world order after the war. Maybe sometime in the future, there should be a larger Security Organization, but that is not something we should talk about now. Ideaere a conceptual thats not just about their widezation variety of Foreign Policy think that the International Organization is not a good solution to the problem of how to maintain a world order and the post war world. On u. N. Is reconceived later the languages softened and fdr goes along with that readily because he is worried about his flank. That isolationist constituencies say,seize on that and another league. That is the last thing we need. Basically, fdr has no idea what he is describing at the time. He has widely varying visions of what that general system might actually entail. Effectively having a veto for every sovereign power and other fixes for the league model. He takes the point that the last ring that should be happening in august, 1941, is triggering these fears of, just a new league. Time for one more question. I would like to talk a little bit about the question of continuity and change. You defined the Atlantic Charter as a do over but adding social and economics provisions. Does it make sense to connect these two documents or do see it as more of a breaking point . It is an insightful question. I resist periodization debates. Our human rights from the 1940s or the 1970s or the french revolution . It seems to me sterile because Different Things are happening at these times. I think you get institutionalization of earlier ideas in the 1940s, and those institutions have a kind of stickiness to outlast the cold withthen they are infused more of a social justice 1960s on, from the with an emphasis in the wake of the and of the vietnam conflict. I have said it in a cynical way that the 1970s was a breaking point. White activists look around and say the vietnam is over and i have been kicked out of the civil rights movement, so how to fill the empty hours . I guess i will slap a Amnesty International Bumper Sticker on my car and call myself a human rights activist. Different things are happening in different eras. I like focusing on a particular document as a kind of trope, especially with teaching. I think it is a modern, or more modern, iteration of this older idea of the rights of man, or a civil rights oriented notion of human rights. I have a joke with manella that i have to pay him . 25 every time i call something a moment. He says, only . 25 . Good question. You can save your money. I dont think he came up with the idea of the moment. Mac of alien moment makkah achiavallian moment. Other moments. That is all the time we have. Forill break for 15 minutes coffee and refreshments. We will reconvene back here at 10 50. Ok everyone, were going to begin again. Where running behind schedule because of the weather and because academics like to talk. The weather the delayed our arrival here. We are going to take this session until 12 30 and then we will have lunch. We will juggle with the Program Schedule a little bit. Terrificauthor of a new book, the republic of spin. He will be speaking to us about strategy and bigotry and the undemocratic soul of george thank you andrew. Thank you for putting together this conference and for all of your work in organizing and conceptualizing it. I was struck the side of chris behind the wheel bringing us over in the rain. Pickup my kids from soccer practice at 3 00, that would be helpful too. When we think about grand strategy, or our theme for this conference, what america should do in the world and how it achieves that, we often think of George Cannon, who is my subject today. Is often one of the first names that come to mind. He is not just on the mind of scholars, but policymakers. He said in a famous remark, i dont even need a George Kennen right now. This was a remark that many used against him on the argument that grand but that he needs a strategy. It was interesting what he would do. How he would have a long telegram or a long tweet. In the obama messaging operation. Obamas strategy has been one other statements he has made. A Foreign Policy that avoids errors. You hit singles and doubles. Every once in a while we may hit a home run. I dont know if i can stay this say this on cspan, dont do stupid shit. It has come to the four again recently. We were discussing this with the New York Times magazine profile with ben rhodes who has risen to the pinnacle of Foreign Policy. Nfluence with all due respect, fairly unconventional credentials through strategic communication. Largely because he scares what he shares what everybody calls a mind meld with obama. A basic judgment about the iraq war that it was a mistake and we should avoid anything like it again. From last say fred night suggested this, h and this, have asked perhaps obama has the grand strategy and maybe that is a good thing. Grand strategy can lead to rigidity or dogma. David milne suggested there is a pragmatism, a principled pragmatism and obamas foreignpolicy thinking which puts me in the mind of sidney morgan. The only thing wrong with pragmatism is that it is completely useless. This absence rather than a grand strategy, there is a grand strategy. It is one of disengagement or avoidance of military exposure. There are many ways to think about what obama is doing and im generally sympathetic to the critiques of overvaluing or fetishizing an overarching doctrine. Nonetheless, we have to concede. There is merit in having principles and plans there are priorities and making sure the actions in one instance to not undermine those in another instance. Even in projecting American Leadership in the world. Thats a decision not to decide. My paper is not here to resolve the question of the inadequacies or the merits of obamas folic Foreign Policy but rather i want to talk about the case of George Cannon George Kennan. It shows the same kind of questions, dilemmas and the application of doctrine that are confounding both policymakers and journalists and intellectuals. They are very much present in the case of cannon and his group of kennan and his career. That if we look beneath it there are a lot of questions and inconsistencies there too. Occasionular i had the to review his recently published diaries a year or two ago and found in those diaries picking my own piquing my own interest a side of 10 and that i was not aware of it had not realized the full extent of. Riddle begin with a about kennans life. His policies and ideas were utterly central to the Foreign Relations United States in the 20th century and in many respects he had no real home in its political system. He was nominally a supporter of democrats for the presidency and other offices but he was profoundly conservative in his worldview. And is not the belligerent cultural populism that Richard Nixon has bequeathed to the Republican Party nor the happy hawkishness of ronald reagan. Both nixon and reagan were people that kennan abhorred. Rather his conservatism derived from edmund burke, from the decline is a month givens, from the social darwinism of herbert and above all i think it antimodernismng and the despair of henry adams ennanom not surprisingly, k likened himself. This policy was crafted in defense of a country that he the withh liked citizens whom he by and large despised. Kennan was aams, misfit in modern times. The achievements of science and modern Technology Left him completely cold. He saw only the defilement of by thewrought automobile, the corruption of the spirit brought on by consumer society. In 1978 he writes, with all due effort to avoid exaggerated estimate is over dramatization, i can see no salvation for the no over dramatization there. From urban decay to the decline of the schools to the crass commercialism in the media to axual libertinism, he saw decadent society much like late rome. Curmudgeon who thought so poorly of americas future yet who provided its leaders with the crucial guide rope to grasp as they lurched through the cold war question mark born in 1904 to a wisconsin presbyterian family, kennan attended princeton where he wallowed in his alienation from his fellow students. After joining the Foreign Service he lived abroad for two decades and became a russia expert with a keen appreciation need along thes border. For kennan, this meant at the end of world war ii forsaking polands wartime government and exile and fording polish hopes for selfdetermination. Of how his cold realism which shape his foreignpolicy. Serving in moscow after the war, he grafted his long telegram whi building on these ideas in his famous article, the sources of soviet conduct and the next year in Foreign Affairs. Enduring concept of containment which would guide the american policy for decades. Steering a metal course between the folly of war and the futile futile wallace site hope. He contained the soviet influence to the strategic application of american power. Washis point, kennan running the policy planning staff. Its a testament to his legacy that the department has since been treated. Truth be told, the most notable document to emerge from that office since kennans day is why womenslagers cannot have it all. Kennedy did not think that much of a planning office. He said it is clear it has been a failure i collect hamster bring foresight into the designing a Public Policy by a special institutional arrangement. For this reason the reason for this seems to lie largely in the impossibility of having the planning function performed outside the line of command. The Marshall Plan drew from his argument but the need to bolster postwar europe economically. He was right that his personal influence had peaked and he was soon put out to pasture by eisenhower. Containment should be credited with having largely served american policymakers well. The devil was in the details and that mde it that made it less than reliable in its specific application. I will skip the long quote, but he called for the application of counterforce at key political pressure points. Sayproblem was that he did where those points were and different policymakers defined him differently over the years. Kennan, contrary to what his theory might suggest, enthusiastically supported the korean war. We had to go through with our purpose in korea come what may. It was a question of our will and not our capability, a question of credibility that we discussed yesterday. Similar in 1950 61 burton in france tried to stop egypt from canal, heing the suez criticized him for capitulating. He never check much about israeli interests. He fear that the russians might dominate the area and use the oil as an instrument of blackmail against the west. Given his shifting advice depending on the geographic and political points at stake it would be hard to surmise that containment applied in egypt in korea but not Eastern Europe or vietnam. It would not be wrong to wonder if containment applied wherever George Kennan thought it applied at a given moment. What is absent from his rationale for intervention, whether in korea or the suez or any were else, is any concern for the people whose lands were invaded or freedom suppressed. He has long been known to be a bigot and a misanthrope, but the publication of several books for the end of his life and after, and especially the recent publication of these diaries revealed the astonishing depth of his prejudice. The ugliness cannot be written off as the norms of an earlier time. As late as 1998 he was still seeing jewishness as only an antisemite would. The scandal of mr. Clintons relationship with his jewish n one diary entry. As early as his years in princeton he entertained a theory advocating the extermination of the lower races saying, i cannot see why it is wrong in principle. As a Foreign Service officer he remains convinced that the worlds problems were biological. Neither did he grow more enlightened in his long career. At the age of 80, he was still confiding to his diary his enthusiasm for ending immigration and compulsive sterilization. Policy planning, indeed. Races,e these inferior as he called them, whose proliferation kennan deplored . It is hard to find an ethnic group that escapes his contempt. N italian is a typical dago, the people of georgia, he proclaimed, are a lazy, dirty, andky, fiercely proud, recklessly brazen people. They never work unless they have to. Zambians, he said, are wrecked by cockiness. In one lunatic rant from 1998, he envisioned all of humanity distance to melt into a vast polyglot mass with only the chinese, jews, and blacks standing apart. Could this mean there destined to subjugate and dominate as an uneasy but unavoidable triumvirate . The chinese, either combination of intelligence ruthlessness and industriousness. The jews by sheer determination to survive. The negroes by their bitter hatred of the whites. He also defended apartheid in south africa. For varioust peoples goes deeper than contempt for individual groups. Really to a general misanthropy. When it came down to it it is also part of a fundamental hostility which he can never seem to endorse. I believe in dictatorship, he writes. But not the dictatorship of the proletariat. The proletariat should be seen and not heard and should not be allowed to have anything to do with government. He continued to envision better alternatives including hereditary oligarchy which he believes history had shown to be a far more reliable custodian of the Public Welfare than selfgovernment ever was. This dim view of democracy and humankind is more than a working sidelight to a distinguished intellectual career like flat amanda buck of what what mcdonald like word dwightakov mcdonalds nudism. In making notes for an article for Foreign Affairs in 1853, he wrote, what i would like to show is the conduct of the Foreign Relations of a great country is a practical, not a moral exercise. This makes great sense in handling a rifle superpower, but it has real limitations for people whose interests are not represented at the bargaining table. Foreign policy should not be sentimental but neither should it be inhumane. Kennans realism, we may speculate, seems to have been tied to his distancing of himself from his fellow human beings and often a callous willingness to allow the to suffer. Obama, it is fair to say, is clearly not a bigot like kennan. Antidemocrat. Not i think obama shares some of the steely and unfeeling attitudes which justify his own water down Foreign Policy realism. I think that obama is correct, perhaps in an ironic sense, that he does not need a George Kennan, because he may have already absorbed too much of his decline is him, futility, and unconcerned with suffering. He certainly needs more than ben rhodes. Let me and a there and hear your let me end there and hear your comments and questions. [applause] thank you david. The floor is open for questions. The mic is coming. Great paper. Incredibly interesting and very provocative. I want to ask a question that is out there but maybe an application. Once some of the gets into the obama, or hip roll, kennan. Can we still eat humanely . How is that done still lead humanely . How is that done . Leaders in our history have shown a capacity for ideas of have kept human suffering of regard for in theles forefront of their considerations, even as they in a cold andork rational way to adjust interest as kennan said. His problem was not that he regrettably had to sacrifice those concerns but that he did not have the concerns in the first place. There is a body of thought that suggests that respecting these values, encouraging aspirations of freedom and democracy are in fact part of american selfinterest because this creates peoples and countries that will be less possible and antagonistic to us. There is also an argument from selfinterested realism that can elevate a more humane concern. Fred. A terrific paper and presentation. I wonder if you could talk more about the question of how important you think that kennan is the u. S. Foreignpolicy. I suggested that even if it was not called containment that the basic thinking and basic policy was well in place by midor late 1945. Certainly in 1946 and that absent kennan, we would have seen it similar approach, broadly speaking. When he becomes disillusioned with direction of the cold war, he is interesting to read and in some ways quite powerful to read on later miss adventures but it doesnt really change the direction of foreignpolicy. More you talk a little bit of having you go a little bit deeper on his role. Of to whate question degree do intellectuals influence foreignpolicy. Kennan himself was always despairing of his lack of influence. This is another sit this is another theme you see that even after he is out of office he is constantly solicited for his opinions by all kinds of president s and he despairs that he will not have any influence. I think you are probably right but some policylike containment was taking shape and probably would have without him but he still is the one who articulates it. Manyords are invoked at key moments, pointed to his authority rolled out even sometimes as he is protesting, that is not what i meant. Our words live beyond us and take on a life of their own. Out as the bearer, the vessel of tradition so even invoke, realism is not it is keeping alive a counter tradition and a critique that can be important to American Foreignpolicy. Instances where he is directly calling the shots may be relatively few. Theres the Marshall Plan which seems to have been something that his thinking influenced and a few other policies that we can point to but even when he is not, he is influential to the extent that individuals are and being the articulate her and. Earer of important ideas that was great. 1989, kennan testified before the senate Foreign Relations committee on the end of the cold war. During the q a, Daniel Patrick moynihan asked kennan, should we the approachrting to the world . With respect to two areas, one is Nuclear Proliferation and the second is Global Climate change. Two issues that pose great threat and require an toernational organization the magnitude and require an International Response to the magnitude of these threats. Vileness of his bigotry that you have amply demonstrated here, it kind of suggests that maybe the destruction of the ld is in the form of noah he is focused on these two issues, more so than it many. Can you talk a little bit about the aspects of kennan that were insightful. And how you view them in distinction with these the poor and fuse he held on race and other issues. Bringtainly in trying to to the forefront his bigotry and also his views on women and gays. Go down the list. I wanted to bring that to greater prominence and consideration in our general thinking about him because though it is sometimes acknowledged, it is never really put front and center. Broaderd to a worldview, this henry adams despair. I dont mean to suggest it is the totality or the only important aspect of his thought. Kennan was a precise thinker. Was unencumbered by too many sentimental concerns he was able to be coldly diagnostic which may account for some of the ability to highlight issues like Climate Change before others were. His realism containment showed that realism was not a purely nationalistic doctrine. It was within the understanding of international cooperation. I dont think there is anything deemed international. He was a diplomat. Is adjustment of interest something where he can see many nations sharing common interest over Something Like Climate Change. We have two more questions. I have two questions. How should we understand the relationship between kennan the man in the dimensions that you and grand strategy itself as an enterprise . Is it a quincy ands that the greatest grand strategist of the American Century was this person who is antidemocratic . How much of grand strategy itself is separable from these troubling aspects that you brought out . Second question is, can i paint you down . And grand pin you down . In the paper, you say two things that seem to be intentioned. Of theistic critique containment doctrine would argue that led the United States into terrible adventures, especially in vietnam, which you go on to note that kennan early and often opposed the vietnam war. But you note, however much he supported important actions early in the cold war, and then say, it would not be wrong to as georgecontainment kennan intended it applied pretty much whatever he thought it applied at any given moment. That latter part is the missed is the case. Why is it a simple vocation to blame containment or the cold war for vietnam . Part, throught different concepts we have been grandg about including strategy and some of the discussion has led me to look favorably on the belief of the analytic philosophers who arguelly think that to about many of these questions is that include so much semantic definitional work is pointless. We are talking across purposes and we can each use the term grand strategy in slightly different ways and look well or critically on it depending on some other point that we want to make. Does it start to lose meaning . I wonder about whether this weekend we are using grand strategy in too many different ways that allow us to talk in some respects across purposes. Kennan, is the problem grand strategy . Is the problem realism . What is interesting about obama, though not the subject of my paper, is that these things are at play. Is the problem hyper realism . Is the problem grand strategy or lack thereof . All that i need to do here is to suggest some of the neat equations that we are used to making about grand strategy with realism with kissinger being the other figure hailed as this Great American grand strategist and his holocene is associated with realism. Chriss reason why reminder of wilson is a grand strategist and lizs of fdr are useful in breaking the hard link or the tacit link that exists in a lot of conceptualization of grand strategy as having a realist bias. To what degree does this connect to kennan as a person . Its hard to say. He has a worldview that gave rise to his ideas about Russian National character that were important in his particular articulation of containment. I dont think it is necessarily present in all canaanite kennanite policy. Makingetnam, what i am is the same point in two different ways. Used, sometimes sincerely and sometimes opportunistically to justify or pursue a range of different policies in the postwar era. The way that he defined it and at times the imprecision of it, it became easy for people to interpret it in ways that he and many other people would not have intended. Orbecame sort of quoted and iny dueling parties some ways it was drained of some of its meaning. Possiblenow that it is to formulate a grand strategy that accounts for all eventualities down the road but certainly, we began to see some of the limits of kennans owner formulation, the later that we got into the postwar era. Last question. Thank you very much. I wanted to push back on your depiction as i understand it of kennan as cold and a moral. And amoral. Hero a passage that me as one of the most human i have read. Humane quotes i have ever read. Is the disintegration and weakening of the deeper fabrics of society. Itself, canhich of achieve no moral aims. We can have the courage to remind yourselves that major and National Balance is violence is in the it seems to me that there is actually a profound morality in his abhorrence of major interstate violence, of his refusal to engage in what i fight and morally revolting american triumphalism. He seems to realize here is that major interstate violence straight,y a sin for white man, but also hurts gay people, women and people of color. I want to ask how that review which is a tragic perspective on the world, how that would fit in your portrait . He certainly has a tragic view. I dont know if i would call him the glory and neborian, but he is a romantic. He is a wonderfully lyrical writer. Unsentimental business quite the right word because in some sense he is deeply sentimental. Is in his, he is quite unconcerned with interstate violence in most of the world. At that thats into it does not seem to trouble him. Perhaps as an abstraction it does. The notion of humanitarian intervention to stop suffering would be generally abhorrent to him. To me it is easy to say that war is terrible. We all agree with that but what is hardest to decide what kind occurughter should when. If slaughter is going to occur, how can america or the world conspire to stop or minimize it. That was not the question that troubled him. [applause] that was always kissingers defense. When people would did accuse him of being in laurel, he would sit of being immoral, he would say there is nothing more moral than trying to event nuclear war. It does not make it legitimate, but is perhaps something we could discuss further. This brings us to the final two speakers. The texas twostep that we will do. We will hear from William Bowden at the university of texas in austin where he heads up the clemency for National Security and teaches at the lbj school. He will be teaching a but the grand strategy, the nixonresolution at the national nixonkissinger resolution at the National Security council. Everyone has thank you for all sorts of things but not everyone has thank you for everything. I want to be the first of thank you for that wonderful bottle of pinot noir in our goodie bag. My wife will thank you even more. Very brief in my background. Only insofar as it is relevant for my comments today i was honored to be and do consider myself honored to be part of the nativity Program Since they first developed in there. It was a new concept for me at the time but its the continuation of a great tradition and a look back on my time there with much fondness. After that, i went back to washington, d. C. And i guess you could call me a recovering policymaker. I am still trying to atone for my years in the bureaucracy. During my time working at the state department and on the staff at the white house, i saw how hard it is for the president to get his government to do what he would like it to do. Or a secretary of state. I worked for powell and rice. To get the state Department Building to do what you want them to do. Here directors and orders would be disregarded, policy guidance would be shirked and avoided. It was fascinating to watch and frustrating at the time but it informs some of my scholarship now. It gave me a new set of questions for interrogating the archives and approaching projects. I came to appreciate that a successful strategy, if one can exist whether grand or otherwise isnt just getting the analysis right are getting the big ideas right, but it really depends on implementation. Is not just aligning means and ends, but ways and means and ends. The ways part is what i want to focus on today. This paper here, which is a micro look it is part of a larger book. First sense i will be the to say since it is obvious to everyone that this paper represents a pervasively traditional take. Two elite white men and it is about the exercise of political and military power. Trust that my paper fits into the conference theme of rethinking but because it takes up what i think is a largely unexplored question of how it is implemented. Question,that large my paper delivery takes a very small scope and focuses on two men in it period of two months. It tries to raise much bigger question it questions and points toward a method of inquiry which has been relatively neglected. What is the relationship between ideas and implementation . I hope that this paper can remind us of historys capacity to surprise, that hindsight can blind us as much as it can reveal. The expectations i had of the time are much different than how they look out to us through the lens of history. I note that nixon and kissinger seem to have devoted the entirety of their transition between the genuine november 1968 election and the january, 1969 inauguration focusing on how to organize the government. What kind of people will be will we be appointing and what authorities will assign different positions. The way that they organized their government was crucial to their success in implementing their ideas. If they had not done it this way, we would not talk about the nixonkissinger grand strategy today. I deliberately stay away from normative governments on the nixonkissinger policy. I am critical of them and a lot of ways, my first effort is to understand what they were trying to do. Even their fiercest critics would agree, why do we criticize them . Because they got what they wanted done. We can later decide if it was good or bad. Inside theet policies themselves, they set the template for every National Security Council System that has followed. Matt bundy gets a little bit of credit here. Security the national visor to a policy position, kissinger takes it one step further. We are now the state where the state department and Defense Department cant do anything without running it through an xt first. , what i think at the time did look like and understand is nixons very unusual choice,