WHY IS THE WORLD SO DANGEROUS? AN ALTERNATIVE VIEW

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP87T00472R000200210028-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: December 21, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 14, 2009
• Sequence Number: 28
• Publication Date: December 6, 1983
• Content Type: MEMO

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The Director of Central Intelligence
wuhiepaa, U.C. tows
National Intelligence Council
MEMORANDUM FOR:
NIC 8784-83
6 December 1983
Director of Central Intelligence
Deputy Director of Central Intelligence
Herbert E. Meyer, Vice Chairman, NIC
FROM : Hal Ford
National intelligence officer At Large
SUBJECT : Why Is the World So Dangerous? An Alternative View
id sg he
1. I want to second some of the dlaboutHarlotaofsthedworldup disagree
larms, an with him about other of his
c conclusions. My differences are not just academic,
paints in arriving at
but relate professionally to how we should assess world developments most
for our policymaking consu
functi mers-
accurately
hink iece erforms some tsline projectionsninstimulating
2. belief
St aigh
intelligence officers a to avoid on about as it has; (b) to be alert to the
that the world will necessarily go lobal competition,
ble period of world
possibility of a Soviet-initiated rise in the nt nsity of
and hence to the prospect of an especially
to acknowledge that the USSR's world-
history immediately ahead of us; (c) s offers Moscow considerably
network of Cps, agents, client states and group reciated; and
disarray may
greater opportunities for creating trouble than is often app be
to entertain the idea that the USSR's vulnerabilities
substantially greater than has been generally
however, I disc ree fairl strongly
3. Apart from these considerations, it tends to pick and
with a number of the ro ositions of the memo. vera ee' the memo overstates:
data, those which happen to fit the particular arguments
choose only selected being advanced. As for specific areas where I disagree,
The uniqueness of present violence in the world. leaders
The possible degree of alarm on the part of Soviet 1
in 1983, as compared, say, with their probable world view
in 1979.
Soviet causation of various ills in the world.
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The likelihood that a significant number of Soviet leaders
believe that the
ill.
The according readiness of such Soviet leaders to "go for
it."
4. Is there a rise of lobal violence? In the first place, There it It can be
are,
questione whether thercationsain"trainlatianynone11time in the
certainly, always many violent situ
too
Secondly, is nothing
world, stemming from countless causes. ,
distinctive about recent m?heventsecouldehaveybeeneviewedhaspas?sharperise
number of disparate, dramatic
in violence in the world." Certainly variousoyearsecould so'qualif : f(r.e.,
example, 1948-1949, 1950, 1963, 1968, -- He own 1979 i
Iran, Afghanistan, Rhodesia, the Nicaraguan revolution, the Yemeni war, the
China-Vietnam war, etc.). And, Lebanon's self-immolation did not begin in
1983. Thirdly, in selecting only certain violent events, whatndioesSanerthink
about other continuing bloodshed now: in Iran-Iraq, Timor, Northern Ireland, the southern Philippines, Latin America, and many other
locales? Are all these, too, the product of Soviet impetus? Fourthly, 1982-
1983 could have been picked for making a case just opposite to that of Herb's
memo -- that is, a time of especially unique non-Communist violAncela,e.g.,
the Falklands; heightened resistance movements in Afghanistan,
Mozambique, Nicaragua, and Ethiopia; Israel's armed initiatives in Lebanon;
the invasion of Grenada; and US, French, and Israeli reprisals in Lebanon.
for Soviet leaders that
ca
1979
h
,
an
5. Is 1983 so much worse a year t
t -
, 111 the have become des ondent about t e course oo?rld revo u
P111 ''1 I
ionthatgdonn t
t t ere may
a
reader t
memo does not c ue the Soviet leaders almost certainly
True
t
'
.
s construc
happen to fit the memo
, have been frustrated by many developments in the last year or so, and
certainly most of all by the way the United States has stirred itself at home
and abroad. But are the Soviet setbacks smomentous as the memo
was
1979,
? yeaear then-recent
them? And are they so much worse, say, than in to
1979, was
9 exampl
itself no great shakes for Soviet leaders, ge' nn 9for 7
US recognition of China, and Sovie~hefears ertime of an ospect nreseng
alliance; NATO's INF decision and ghtmare p adverse worldwide
of Pershing II warheads ten minutes away; the sharply
reactions to the USSR's invasion of talks Afghanistan, ing off
of what had been somewhat promising
Soviets faced of having to repair their fortunes
hain th d goingoin SomaliaGaandftthe
having been deprived of the good th g they had lso, most beginnings of a sharp decline in efbZSnmemo listshforA1983 were alreadyfofets
Herb's
of Soviet domestic malaise that
great concern to Soviet leaders then, in 1979.
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6. Are the Soviets indeed the source of all this recent " lobal ~! to it rms
violence? Here me liis li tosrchest~ate,the worldbstgrief wGrantedtethe
orchestrate
a rickety USSR the cap Yto
Central American and Lebanon challenges to US interests are much the worse
because of the Soviet pressures back of the Cubans and the Syrians, and the
USSR certainly initiates ande~heoWas much ist activitiesathandweihavedyet
-- in my view -- much more in way of terror
been able to document. But it's quite another thing to see some brooding
Slavic malevolence behind kindss listingaofttherKALssho tdownoriwhy Tdhids
applies in particular to t
mindflight, theyboth
these clever Soviets so botcWha~edidresponses
putntheeNorth
havetinthat
and subsequently? And just
Did
Koreans up to the Rangoon bombing?
It Soviets atnthedSovietsl
North Korean fortunes a heavy blow? planned the murder of Aquino, but what happens to the giant causation thesis
if we learn some day, say, that some of Marcos' (or Imelda's) own thugs
mistakenly thought they swere Bserving their boss when on their own they did
away with their troublesome
7. The principal disservice the giant causation thesis performs however,
relate to these particular issues in debate between Herb and me, o
to the broad question of how can world'satroublesthe
d
true state of the world, and
Even if the USSR and the CPSU diAllokindssof peoplaetwoue killangoone
be experiencing much violence.
another: Arabs vs. Arabs, Shias vs. Sunnis, Gemayel Christians vs. Franjieh
Christians, Arabs vs. Israelis, Southeast Asians, Palestinians vs.
Palestinians, East Indians, Irishmen, Africans, Iranians - Iraqis, and so
on. The root sources of world violence would continue to reside chiefly in
the forces of historic antagonisms, unresolved territorial disputes,
dislocations of de-colonization, wide disparities in wealth, gross social and
political inequities, tribal and religious emotionalisms, distorted debt
the increase of
loads, the sharp rise in the number of political actors,
literacy and education but not opportunity, the
and reality, the instant awareness responsibility, the ready access to arms, and so on and so on. Certainly many
of these troubles are of greater danger to US interests because of Soviet
exploitation. But constructive US policy attack on the world's violence
root
requires that we address its
ousurces rselvesrmorerofthan ten, SeJustnwhere dortheg the
Soviet darkness, and that
Communists come from?"
8. Is the outlook of some Soviet leaders now wholl bleak, and do they
indeed consider that the October Revo ution is ooinladown t It Ile o drain of
Astor? Herb's memo once again raises on y a p
mention manycertainly
considerations. In many res~mosdothe es not future
issuesowhichpvariousg
to Soviet leaders. But the
Soviet leaders may feel will work to the disadvantage of the United States
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over the long term, and so prevent it from reversing "the inescapable logic of
historical determinism." Mistakenly or not, Soviet leaders may well consider
that such issues include: the weak political base for US objectives that
exists in Lebanon; difficulties the United States faces in increasing its
influence among Arab audiences; a United States identified with Israel but not
in control of its domestic and foreign initiatives; the strong hand the
Soviet-backed Syrians hold; the vulnerability of the US allies to any
diminution of Gulf oil supplies; the intimidating effect which the USSR's
strategic power and expanding military reach can exert in the world; the
security dependence of NATO on certain weapons which are becoming more
difficult political instruments for NATO; the growth of neutralism in Western
Europe, especially among the rising generation; the many difficulties the
United States faces in the Third World, and the existence of many Soviet
assets and intermediaries there; the not to be excluded possibility that
Central America and Mexico may constitute a long-term time bomb for the United
States; the absence of US foreign policy consensus; and the existence of
sufficient economic and sociological problems within the United States to give
Soviet ideologues confidence that a society with such "inherent
contradictions" cannot in the long run prevail over the more disciplined USSR.
9. US policy certainly must stay alert to the possibility that the USSR
is much weaker than has generally been acknowledged, and must develop improved
ways and means of exploiting such weakness to US and allied benefit. At the
same time, US intelligence and policymaking officers must keep that view of
the Soviet.condition in perspective, weighing it against the greater
possibility that the USSR -- rude, brutal, and crude -- is going to be with us
for years to come, continuing to present enormous challenges to US security
and policymaking. I would hazard the guess that the US-Soviet cold war may
still be confronting our grandchildren; that two world systems will still be
locked in competition a la earlier Islam-Christendom or the wars of religion;
that the Soviet challenge will not disappear as the result either of its own
folly or of the brilliance of this or that Republican/Democratic policy
initiatives; and that the reduction of that challenge will require a long
sustained effort; much acuity; much imagination; much consistent, measured
toughness; much diplomatic skill; much attack on the root causes of
vulnerability to Soviet and Communist exploitation; and -- not least -- much
in the way of taxes.
10. Will despairing Soviet leader "go for it?" We must of course keep
our watch up and our powder dry. But, the cruxes of Soviet -- indeed Russian
-- policy have been steady pressure, long-term outlook, and a fairly keen
sense of what the traffic will bear in risk-taking in each circumstance. The
bear is patient. His modulated pressures have paid off in many ways over the
decades. His leaders are not damn fools. Since Stalin the ponderous
bureaucratic necessity for consensus has prevented any leader or leadership
faction from getting too far out ahead on any dramatic new foreign policy
initiative. The Soviet leaders and the Soviet public know -- far better than
do we, for that matter -- what war on a large scale can bring to the
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homeland. And, if the bear doesn't like the present US Administration, the
surest way some Soviet leaders can rally the American people around another
term for that Administration will be to "go for it" in some way, or to pull
off a coup of sorts within the Kremlin and embark the USSR on a program of
greatly heightened aggressiveness in the world. In the near term at least,
the Soviets have got to sort out their troubling succession problem. In past
experience at least, such periods have not given birth to aggressive new
adventurism, although we must of course watch that succession with extra care,
to insure against the outside Ucontingencintha-- and t some ours. Strangelove faction
has not taken
11. What is the so-what of these alternative views of the world's
violence? The answer s one thing if the debate is just between two
intelligence
in ethefevent.senThe iorspolicymakerswshouldesuquite bscribehto many of the
opinion,
views Herb's memo advances.
Hal Ford
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 Approved For Release 2009/01/14: CIA-RDP87T00472R000200210028-1
SUBJECT: Why Is the World So Dangerous? An Alternative View
Distribution:
1 - DCI
1 - DDCI
1 - EXDIR
1 - SA/IA
1 - ER
1 - C/NIC
1 - VC/NIC (HM
1 - VC/NIC (CW
1 - All NIOs
1 - NIC/AG
1 - DDI Registry
1 - Chrono
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