The United States and the Soviet Union have been the subjects of a vast out-pouring of literature during the post-war period. While that literature has generated a number of memorable images, from the two scorpions trapped in a bottle to President Carter as the cowboy who got on his horse and rode off in all directions at once, it has not been so successful in other regards. Most notably, and perhaps inevitably, it has failed to produce any objective, or even consensus, overall view which might provide statesmen and scholars with a reliable guide to the motives and actions of the two super-states. What it has done has been to furnish us with a rich variety of competing perspectives and frameworks from which to choose when trying to understand the workings of the two puzzling giants.