There is a feeling abroad today that Western civilization is on trial before history. One of the clearest signs of it is the increasing frequency with which we hear the word “challenge” in connection with the policies and progress of Soviet Russia and the Communist world at large. The challenge of the sputniks, of Soviet science and education, of Soviet economic development—these phrases, and variations on them, have recently grown all too familiar in America and Europe. We realize, of course, that the situation is not wholly a dark one for the West, that our Communist adversaries have serious internal problems of their own to contend with, that they too face some challenges. Still, nowadays few in the West find grounds for complacency in that fact.

The gestation, birth, and continuing life of the new states of Asia and Africa, through all their vicissitudes, are in large measure the work of intellectuals. In no state-formations in all of human history have intellectuals played such a role as they have in these events of the present century.

In the past, new states were founded by military conquest, by the secession of ethnic groups led by traditional tribal and warrior chiefs, by the gradual extension of the power of the prince through intermarriage, agreement, and conquest, or by separation through military rebellion. In antiquity, the demand that subjects acknowledge the divinity of the Emperor was no more than a requirement that the legitimacy of the existing order be recognized.

It is a distressing paradox of our time, when we are concerned as never before with military problems on whose solution may depend our national existence and even the survival of civilization, that we should turn our backs on history and deny that the lessons of the past have any validity for the present.

There are many reasons for this. The problems we face are enormously complex and highly technical; the weapons on which we must rely and which threaten our existence are so revolutionary in character as to make past experience seem highly irrelevant. And there are few to tell us that this is not so, for military history has never really been seriously studied in this country. The historian has stood on the sidelines while his academic colleagues, the political scientists, the economists, the physicists, and others, have become increasingly active, officially and unofficially, in the study of national security problems.

“The victory of communism is inevitable.” This claim has been made since the consolidation of the Soviet Union, and it has been restated with relish by the Kremlin's supreme spokesman during his recent visits abroad. It rests on the argument that Russian society, in accordance with the Marxist-Leninist doctrine, has advanced from feudalism to capitalism and socialism, blazing a trail along which all other countries are bound to go. Thus the superiority of the Communist regime is asserted not merely on the basis of operational successes, but with reference to historical considerations which are ascribed to the “classics” of communism, and ultimately to Marx and Engels.

There is every likelihood that future historians of the Russian novel will praise the Soviet period for the record number of volumes produced and blame it for an equally unprecedented decline in artistic standards. Yet one may hope that the twenty-first-century critic, in fairness to an unhappy past, will not overlook a redeeming feature of the Soviet novel, i.e., its considerable anthropological value. The present reflections about a few recent or fairly recent Soviet novels do not deal with their literary qualities. They are concerned exclusively with the light these novels cast upon various aspects of everyday life in Soviet Russia, including, it may be added, the life of the novel makers themselves.

In NATO's early days statesmen spoke glowingly about subordinating national military interests to a truly international “balanced collective force,” a goal similar to classic free trade in its promise of mutual gain secured at the cost of dependence upon foreigners. Naturally, in so nationalistic a field as defense, achievement fell far short of this sweeping aspiration. But we are ill-placed now to belittle either the slogan or the degree to which we realized an international division of military labor. Nowadays the slogan is “interdependence,” but in practice this seems to mean performance deviating still more widely from the goal of integrated defense.

Few if any Communist movements have been more energetic and successful than the Communist Party of China (CPC) in disproving Karl Marx's belief in the primacy of economics over politics. An adequate analysis of economic policy and development in Communist China therefore requires a consideration of their political dimension, which in turn is closely bound up with the problem of leadership and power within the largest political party and the most populous country on earth.

Most historians of the Weimar Republic, fully occupied with the domestic affairs of the Brüining government in its crucial place between democracy and dictatorship, show little interest in Germany's foreign policy of the early 1930's. If they do devote some attention to it, their evaluation tends to be highly negative, regardless of their political or national sympathies. Observers who can be classified as liberals, socialists, Nazis, and nationalists—at odds among themselves on virtually every other question—all voice strong criticism of the Brüning diplomacy.

During the past several years, the Western world has been treated to the arresting spectacle of a long-isolated Soviet power bloc emerging, slowly at first and then with increasing momentum, from its autarkic hibernation into the dazzling limelight of international economic competition. The most dramatic aspect of this emergence, no doubt, has been the Soviet adoption of foreign aid to less-developed countries as a useful and appropriate instrument of national policy.

Nothing pricks one's curiosity more than the inner operations of a power system. And in the case of Russia the incentive to speculate on “what really goes on” in the councils of the Kremlin is enhanced by the supersecrecy in which the highest level of Soviet politics is enveloped, by the dramatic shifts of policy and sudden displacements of leading personalities, and by a natural apprehension about the operations of a totalitarian regime which may at any moment threaten or transform our daily lives.

Two years have passed since Khrushchev launched his reorganization of Soviet industrial management, the most daring and politically risky venture of a dynamic administration studded with unorthodox and sweeping programs. The vertical ministerial system of industrial management was abolished virtually overnight and replaced by a territorial organization centered in 105 regional economic councils, or sovnarkhozy; thousands of officials scurried off to new jobs in an environment alien to their previous experience; and new command and control channels had to be forged in short order.

Widespread criticism and suspicion of the activities of businessmen have been a striking feature of public debate on economic and social affairs in India since 1947*. It has almost been a matter of habit with literate Indians to blame the commercial classes and the financial interests for the country's economic backwardness. In spite of the generous contribution of businessmen to the Congress Party funds, and the close association of Mahatma Gandhi with many prominent industrialists, the business community found itself under thick clouds of public hostility after independence.

It is customary to show that total assistance by the United States to the underdeveloped world by far exceeds that of the Soviet bloc; and since the comparison is invariably much in favor of the United States, one cannot help being puzzled by the alarm displayed about Communist aid “penetration.” Moreover, I feel that such global comparisons fail to impress individual countries, which either care little about aid given to others or resent it if it is given to unfriendly neighbors or to partners in military alliances disliked for political or ideological reasons. Even aid that is gladly received is not necessarily well remembered later.

In the underdeveloped countries—where live most of the world's people—the hope for economic progress now flames with great intensity. The new international capital facilities of the postwar period, the new programs for sharing modern science and technology, the new interest of wealthy lands in progress in the poor countries—all these present the latter with an opportunity to be rid of the poverty and squalor of their material existence. Their eyes naturally turn to the more developed countries for capital and technical knowledge, and for ideas.

Often as foreign policy may be the subject of partisan discussion in modern democracies, important international commitments are usually made only with support, or the expectation of support, from the great bulk of the political community. This has surely been the ordinary American and British pattern, labeled bi-partisan, non-partisan, or extra-partisan. We assume that political support extending well beyond the ranks of the party in office is essential for a successful foreign policy, and especially for a substantial military venture. Even the American decision to defend South Korea, while it was necessarily made by the Democratic administration before any apparent political consensus and while it eventually involved the United States in an unpopular war, was never in itself a partisan policy which Republicans as a group refused to support. The one outstanding recent instance of a truly partisan foreign policy is Britain's Suez action of 1956. As the significant deviant case, it provides useful insights into the process by which an alternative to the usual bi-partisan arrangement is developed and conducted. Specific questions concern the making of the Suez intervention decision, the nature of parliamentary support for this decision, the role of party loyalty in maintaining such support, and the significance of partisan opposition.

In a democratic society, the division of resources between the public and private sectors is roughly determined by the desires of the electorate. But because it is such a complex and time-consuming task to acquire adequate political information, the electorate is chronically ignorant of the costs and benefits of many actual and potential government policies. It is my belief that this ignorance causes governments to enact budgets smaller than the ones they would enact if the electorate possessed complete information. Yet these undersized budgets stem from rational behavior by both the government and the electorate; hence they are extremely difficult to remedy. Furthermore, the resulting misallocation of resources becomes more and more serious as the economy grows more complex.

In the four and a half years ending December 31, 1958, the United States exported close to $6 billion of surplus agricultural commodities under various foreign disposal programs, the most important being the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act, known commonly as P. L. 480. These P. L. 480 exports included the barter of American surpluses for imports of strategic materials, foreign relief shipments and donations and, most significantly, sales for the local currency of importers. This last type of transaction, which is without precedent in world trade, has enabled the United States to dispose of some 3.3 billion dollars' worth of surpluses in agreements made with 28 nations, and the major part of the foreign currencies generated—that is, some $2.1 billion—has been earmarked for economic development purposes in the receiving countries. Surplus disposal thus not only has become a primary means of promoting United States agricultural exports, but has acquired a major role in our foreign aid programs as well.

During the past five years the Social Science Division of The RAND Corporation has been developing a procedure for the study of foreign affairs that we call “political gaming.” This article gives a brief description of the technique and some of our observations about its utility.

Reflecting the general concern about international relations felt in this country, social scientists have written a great deal recently about the images of Americans and of the United States which are held by foreigners. It is generally agreed that the attitudes of foreigners toward us are important factors in the success or failure of American foreign policy in the struggle against the threat of world communism. The quantity of material which is now available is drawn from diverse sources, including the informed judgments of experts, content analyses of newspapers, opinions of foreigners who are studying in the United States, polls of students and of the general populations of foreign countries, and interviews with political and other leaders in various countries.

Though only a few years old, the Russian-American “space race” is in full swing and it is clear, even at this early stage of outer space technology, that it will present both countries with new opportunities and new dangers.

From the American viewpoint we are especially interested in these related questions: First, how will outer space activities affect the external situation within which the United States seeks to promote its security and welfare? Second, how can the United States manipulate space developments in order to improve its security and welfare? And third, how should the United States concert its space policy with other elements of its foreign, defense, and domestic policies