Document created: 20 September 04
Air University Review, November-December 1971

 Reflection from Harriman

Ambassador W. Averell Harriman has published a compilation of his observations concerning fifty years of U.S. relations with Russia and other countries.* Using as a basis a series of lectures he gave at Lehigh University, and adding explanations, amplifications, additional thoughts, and anecdotes, he has produced a fairly complete personal memoir of his long experience with Russian-American affairs and related activities. It is a valuable record which otherwise might not have been preserved, because of the active life Harriman continues to lead at age eighty.

* W. Averell Harriman, America and Russia in a Changing World (Garden City: Doubleday, 1971, $5.95), 218 pages.

For many people who identify Harriman with his anti-Vietnam war views, it will be a revelation that he has consistently advocated a firm stance against Communists on issues of vital interest to the United States. He first became involved with Russia after the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, as a 26-year-old Republican international banker with a manganese concession in the Soviet Caucasus. He soon realized that the revolution was not a passing thing but would have a long-lasting influence on world affairs.

After his first visit to Russia in 1926, he became convinced that the Bolshevik Revolution was in fact a reactionary one and not “the wave of the future”; that it denied the basic tenets of America—the rights and dignity of the individual and the belief that government should express the will of the people. Although Harriman switched political parties in 1928 to support Al Smith for President and subsequently became a devoted advocate of Democratic Rooseveltian policies, he has never altered his basic conviction that the Bolshevik Revolution, for all its manifest achievements, has been on balance a tragic step backward in human development. In 1945 he was actually criticized for saying that Stalin’s objectives and ours were irreconcilable.

Harriman gives many previously unpublished details of his negotiations with the Soviets and his positions during the Roosevelt, Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson administrations. Presently, he is particularly concerned about the dangerous effects which the strategic arms race and the U.S. fighting in Vietnam are having on U.S.–Soviet relations. As to the future, he foresees continuing changes in U.S.–Soviet relations and hopes for a steady mutual understanding of the economic, social, political, and military areas where the two countries can coexist; but he certainly sees no convergence between the two countries as long as the Communist attitude remains basically antipathetic to American ideals.

Yet Harriman, during his long experience with the Russians, has seen them our allies at one time and our enemies at another and that their temperament and experiences make them volatile and easily suspicious. Therefore, the U.S. must be patient, flexible, persistent on matters of principle, and constantly on the lookout for the smallest steps whereby the two nuclear superpowers can cooperate rather than have tense relations. On the one hand he decries the old cold war warrior who sees no change, who still thinks in terms of the Stalin era, with the monolithic structure of international Communism looming as the immediate threat it used to be. On the other hand he decries those who believe that now the only difference between us and the Soviets is a matter of economic theory and that all we have to do is show love and affection for them and everything will be all right.

His driving realization seems to be that, since the Soviet Union and the U.S. have the capacity to destroy each other and the better part of the world, they have a serious responsibility to find a way to get along on this small planet in spite of their differences. He pictures the problem as confused by misunderstandings, rigid prejudices, and unrealistic hopes that exist in this country and by blind suspicions, misinformation, and inhuman ideology within the Soviet Union.

The Vietnam problem, Harriman believes, must therefore be put in a proper perspective, since it is but one of the significant international issues we face today. The only satisfactory solution he can envision is for South Vietnam’s President Thieu to broaden his government. He should rally the non-Communist forces of South Vietnam and form an alliance representative of the majority of the people. “Big” Minh, who was once the most popular of South Vietnamese generals, is willing to do this; the Buddhists, the Cao Dai, Hoa Hao, the labor unions, and other non-Communist groups could be brought in, with Thieu himself representing the Catholic faction. All these non-Communist groups are anxious to end the war and remain in their country. They know that a military victory cannot be won, and they are ready to make a political settlement. But they need to organize themselves so as to be able to win the political contest that will come after the end of hostilities.

Thieu must bring these people in and field a team in Paris that wants to negotiate. The result may be a nonaligned, neutral government in South Vietnam; but that is the best we can expect and is in the long run compatible with our interests. Furthermore, Harriman believes this solution will entail a separate U.S. agreement with Hanoi. The North Vietnamese are nationalists and want to be independent of Peking, from whom they must now import three hundred thousand tons of rice a year. They are satisfied with the relations they have established with France and also want to have normal relations with us, so they can have access to our technology and miracle rice.

Throughout this book, one discerns that Harriman’s chief concern, from the very beginning of his diplomatic career, has been economic and social progress and that he believes political and military means are to be used discretely, with human progress constantly in mind. Harriman could be labeled a pragmatic humanitarian. His decisions to be conciliatory or intransigent have usually been dictated by whether he believed one attitude or the other would best further these overriding goals. He believes that, in the past, good as well as bad decisions were made; but in any case speculation about them will not change them, and we must go forward from here, doing our best to improve the economic and social status not only of the U.S. but of other nations of the world whose condition inevitably has an effect on ours.

Finally, one is impressed by Harriman’s genuine patriotism and optimism for the future of his country. He rejects the rock-throwers and the burners because they destroy and play into the hands of the most reactionary. On the other hand, he praises students and other antiwar dissenters who are taking constructive action against the tragedy of lost American lives, the division of the country, and the wartime diversion of resources that are urgently needed elsewhere. He concluded his Lehigh lectures with this eloquent advice to his student audience:

This country has symbolized man’s highest hopes and principles. It has achieved the greatest production the world has ever seen. Use all this well. Learn from past mistakes and try to improve on the past. I am utterly impatient with some who talk about overthrowing this whole nation. Put it in the right path, make America live up to her highest principles, even improve the traditions if you will. But don’t decry the past. Understand the past. Build on it for a better America. My guess is you will.

Fairfax, Virginia

Dr. Joseph W. Annuziata (Doctorate, University of Paris) is Chief, Research Branch, Research and Analysis Division Office of the Administrative Assistant to the Secretary of the Air Force. His research, writing, and lecturing cover a wide variety of national defense issues. At Air University he held an academic position with emphasis on West Europe and Southeast Asia. Dr. Annuziata was a Fulbright scholar in Paris for three years, teaching and studying at French schools.