Word: all-out
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...history of military victories, and a general faith that peace is "normal" that it still does not realize the dimensions of danger in a world half-controlled by "an irreconcilably hostile bloc." The Communists, on the other hand, have exploited the U.S. desire for peace and its fear of all-out atomic war by playing with considerable skill their "strategy of ambiguity," i.e., by alternating belligerence with "peaceful coexistence," open repression (Hungary) with subtle infiltration (the Mideast). "What is striking [is] that essentially the same pattern of Soviet behavior should time and again raise discussion about its 'sincerity...
...military policy against Soviet expansion, says Kissinger, has been inhibited by "our notion of aggression as an unambiguous act [i.e., a direct attack on the U.S. or Western Europe] and our concept of war as inevitably an all-out struggle" resulting in the enemy's "unconditional surrender." Against indirect Communist aggression by "internal subversion, intervention by 'volunteers,' domination through political and psychological warfare," U.S. doctrine has no flexible alternative between total war and peaceful inaction, because it is geared to "total" concepts. Neither psychologically nor militarily has the U.S. been willing to take risks or properly shape...
Limited war, Kissinger maintains, need not lead either to all-out H-bomb war or to stalemate; linked with diplomacy, it strives for specific political gains. For every new Communist aggression, it promises a punishing limited setback, a setback that the enemy will reluctantly accept because the loss is not worth the risk of starting the all-out war. Thus the strategy of ambiguity and the burden of decision for risking total war are turned on the enemy; either he must settle for setback or risk the certain destruction that would come with all-out war. Thus the small inroads...
...however minor, which might extend the war to Europe. Unprepared for limited war, "we thought we could not afford to win in Korea, despite our strategic superiority, because Russia could not afford to lose." Kissinger contends that a decisive Red Chinese defeat in Korea would probably not have brought an all-out war; instead, the Soviet Union might have coldly reconsidered expending its resources to help a bungling ally. In any case, the Sino-Soviet alliance would have been severely strained. But during the long Korean stalemate, "our traditional insistence on divorcing force from diplomacy caused our power to lack...
...unless the U.S. is militarily, and above all psychologically, ready to use them-if deterrence fails. It takes a firm hand and steady nerves to face a small-war challenge, to resist the outcries against atomic weapons, and to confront the enemy with the choice of backing down or risking all-out war. Raising the prospect of such a challenge in advance is Kissinger's important service. At a time when public apathy, disarmament talk and budget-mindedness are being felt in the scales of U.S. policy. Auditor Kissinger has brought fresh ideas to weigh...