LETTER TO MR. EDWARD W. PROCTOR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80B01495R000600050007-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: March 9, 2006
• Sequence Number: 7
• Publication Date: June 11, 1974
• Content Type: LETTER

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Mr. Edward W. Proctor
Deputy Director for Intelligence
Room 7E44
Attached is a brief analytical essay, "What's Wrong With
Political Europe?" which seeks to explain the recent rapid
turnover in the governments of Western Europe. A final section
(page 8) suggests some implications for the US -- especially
with regard to intelligence collection and analysis in the area.
The paper was prepared in my office, which is responsible for
its judgments, but it does not necessarily represent an Agency
view in all respects.
Nat onal Intelligence Officer
for Western Europe
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MEMORANDUM TO THE D.: RECTOR OF CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE
1. The voters of Luxembourg have just turned out of
office the conservative party which has led the country for
half a century, Ordinarily, the event would be of very
limited passing interest. Coming in the middle of 1974, it
adds point to a question -- what is happening in European
political life?
2. The last six or eight months have seen incumbent
governments replaced in all the major and most of the
lesser states of Europe It is now nearly unanimous
The roll now includes the UKY France, Germany, Italy, The
Netherlands, Belgium, and Denmark, Sweden and Norway could
be named, with suitable qualifications, as could Greece, Spain,
and Turkey. Canada and Iceland could be added to the conti-
nental list- The change of regime in Portugal is, of course, a
more radical case-
3. Are there patterns in all this, with common denominators
of cause and effect? Or is it a series of accidents coinciding
in time? The best short answer is that it is something of
both. The past few months have been politically momentous for
Europe in part because of accidents. The death of Pompidou, and
even the assassination of Carrero Blanco in Spain and the
exposure of Guillaume in Germany could have happened at any
time; yet occurring close together, with their on-going
implications, they have contributed to a mosaic of accelerating
political change in Europe -- without themselves being part of
any chain of logical causation except as examples of human
mortality and fallibility setting traps for any historical
process.,
4- But if accident played an important role, it has done
so within a framework shaped by less whimsical forces. There
are political, security, sociological and economic circumstances
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which, to one degree-or another, are present in most of the
European states and which not only produce some broadly com-
parable political behavior but, when accidents do happen, help
condition the consequences in comparable ways.
5. One common denominator, variously manifested, is the
nature of most of Europe's political leadership. The heroic
qualities attached to the leaders of post-World War II Europe
seem notably absent everywhere. Depending on perspective and
philosophy of historical causation, this can be viewed as a
personal or a systemic phenomenon. One can argue endlessly
whether the personalities themselves are smaller or' the problems
bigger. Perhaps both are true -- with the qualification that
the problems are in a sense less manageable than the dramatic
questions of survival faced by Europe in the late 1940s and early
1950s. Today's problems are slower-fused, more complicated,
less dramatic. They permit longer periods of drift and
make-do. Since they are not primarily external threats,
they do not give rise to sentiments of national unity and
self-sacrifice so easily as the earlier challenges. They put
a premium on management and administration of infinitely
complex socio-economic matters more than on inspiring political
leadership on the grand scale. They occur amidst unprecedented
(if uneven) prosperity. For all these reasons, it is harder
for leaders to define national challenges and mobilize resources
to meet them.
6. It is observable that incumbent governments have been
steadily losing the confidence and support which carried them
to power, yet the conventional opposition parties are not
fundamentally responsible for the incumbents' loss of appeal;
nor are the conventional opposition parties gaining from their
rivals' losses in any direct and automatic way. Heath was not
replaced because most voters had any strong preference for
Wilson; manifestly a majority did not. But enough had lost
faith in how the Tories were coping to bring them down With
allowance for differences, similar observations would be made
about the demise of Gaullism in France, the sharp loss of
popularity by the SPD in Germany, the precariousness of the
Rumor government's hold on power in Italy, and so on. In
the Benelux states and Scandinavia, recent elections have
proven indecisive, dramatizing only how the electorate is
as split as it is in France and the UK.
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7. One common side effect is the spark of life given to
splinter parties and unconventional movements of other sorts.
The Liberals in England have hope that their hour is striking
again after a half-century; the Scottish and Welsh nationalists,
fantastic as it might seem, have acquired a degree of political
power in Britain's delicate balance. In Belgium and Canada,
ethnic and regional loyalties have become another outlet for
discontent with conventional or mainstream alternatives. In
Denmark, the rise to importance of Glistrup's anti-tax
Progress Party illustrates how dissatisfaction with the estab-
lished power, coupled with the absence of an appealing alter-
native, can push along a movement distinguished only for ir-
responsible and demagogic qualities.
8. The political eddies in Europe may have aided splinter
parties of various sorts, but they have not yet led toward radical
solutions of left or right. There is no general surge in
either direction. Such gains or losses for right or left as
might be claimed in one state are not only debatable on the
merits but, even if taken at face value, are offset by apparent
movement in the other direction elsewhere -- also inconclusive
or ambiguous.
-- Thus it has been suggested that Italy is moving
left because the divorce referendum was a setback
for the CD and the Church,'or because there is talk
of an accommodation between the CD and the PCI --
the "historic compromise" offer of the PCI leader.
But if the divorce referendum showed anything, it
was probably the irrelevancy of political labels.
To all Italian politicians' surprise, the question
which they tried to make into a political test,
was apparently decided by the voters on grounds
having little to do with standard politics.
And if the "historic compromise" should take form --
not yet a likelihood but increasingly being discussed -
it must be asked whether it would signify that the
dominant political party has moved leftward as much
as the PCI, the source of so many misgivings in
Moscow and other orthodox Communist centers, has
moved in the opposite direction. But terms.like
"left" and "right" are of increasingly questionable
significance in this context; the central reality
is that the problems of governing Italy in 20th
century style and conditions are challenging all the
familiar political formulas and none are looking
very satisfactory.
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-- The political prognosis in Germany is hardly more
clear. By some standards, it would seem to be
moving to the right. The SPD had been losing pop-
ularity rapidly for a year before Brandt's resignation.
In this case, the principal opposition, the Christian
Democrats, was gaining but the SPD's coalition partner
the Free Democrats, seemed to be gaining even more.
A straight-line projection of the trend would. put the
Christian Democrats in control of elections due in
1976, and it is too early to tell whether Schmidt
will prove able to alter this trend. But the
statement that Germany is moving to the right lacks
content and meaning. The point is that Brandt's
government was losing the voter's confidence because.
it was not coping with Germany's problems in a
satisfactory manner to them. It had slowed down on
some promised (and quite radical) reforms enough to
disillusion some supporters on the left, without
gaining compensatory support in the center. The voters
have no way of knowing whether the Christian Democrats
would do better -- the latter have put forward no clear
alternatives or specific plans, partly because
they have not agreed themselves on what should
be done and in many respects it may be questioned
whether they would do much differently.
-- The test of political forces in France brought on
by Pompidou's death shows the country evenly divided
between left and right when the choice is put in
such stark terms. The test further showed that
Gaullism has run its course; after 16 years, its
appeal has weakened fatally. But perhaps most
importantly of all for the future, the French voters
registered a demand for change in governmental
policies for dealing with their society's problems.
Those on the left obviously voted for change -- fairly
well defined and quite radical. To get it, they were
ready to accept participation in government by the French
Communist Party -- a prospect which did not attract
Moscow enough to overcome its obvious preference for
Giscard over Mitterand. Giscard was elected by those
who want less radical and less clearly defined change --
"change without risk" -- but he is making clear that
he takes seriously the need for change. What is wanted,
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and widely wanted, are some new approaches to problems
of inflation, the gap between rich and poor which in
France has continued to widen, and a host of other
matters having to do with managing French society and
the French economy in the complexities of the late 20th.
century. As in Italy and Germany, these issues have a
diminishing relationship to classic political contests
between liberals and conservatives or left and right as
conventionally defined.
9. The blurring of classic lines of political engagement may
be viewed with alarm or equanimity but it is taking place in
several ways. The possibility of accommodation in Italy between
non-Communists and the PCI, the inclusion of Communists in the
Portuguese provisional government, the recent near thing in
the French elections, the prospects that the pan European
trade union confederation will move to accept the Italian
Communist labor confederation and perhaps later the French
equivalent -- all would have appeared, a few years ago,
unlikely or impossible and certainly horrendous. To some,
they still do. But to a growing number of Europeans,
misguided or not, they seem logical evolutionary adjustments
to new realities and new imperatives in making governments,
economies and societies work. They appear to many Europeans,
in short, hardly more illogical or risky than the adjustments
between East and West known in foreign relations as detente --
adjustments which have helped bring about the domestic climate
in Europe in which Communist parties have gained respectability.
10. But while detente is having atmospheric effects on
European politics, questions of foreign policy have not played
a very important role in the political fortunes of European gov-
ernments. Brandt's Ostpolitik was central to his policies
and he no doubt suffered politically from the fact that Ostpolitik
seems to have run out of steam. But the opposition, by most
testimony, would have tried something not unlike it had they
held power, and are not likely to alter Schmidt's posture in
this respect very much when and if they do regain office (though
the Soviets believe and fear they might). In Britain, Wilson
made EC membership something of an issue, aware of its unpop-
ularity with a voting majority of the electorate. But it was
not critical to the electoral outcome and insofar as it is an
issue, it is the effect of this membership on the British
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domestic economy -- not its foreign implications -- that
matter. The essential satisfaction of the French voter with
the broad outlines of French foreign policy has been recorded
in many polls and was reflected in the relatively minor atten-
tion given to it in this election. In the pressing welter of
domestic difficulties facing Italy, foreign affairs are not
given much attention by any.party.
11. The main point is simple. European voters are not
very concerned with foreign policy except as it affects, or is
believed to affect, their domestic problems -- especially their
pocketbooks. With one notable exception, they neither feel
very threatened by the external world, nor very hopeful of
benefits from it. The exception arises, of course, when out-
side events threaten economic lifelines as with oil supplies.
But international affairs in their traditional political or
military aspects, are of relatively little interest.
12. In this connection, the distinction must be made, of
course, between voters and governments. The latter are, for
example, as apprehensive as ever over the Soviet threat to
Europe -- the more so as they sense the potential for altering
familiar relations of forces through MBFR and CSCE. But they
have a difficult time getting parliaments and voters to share
their concern and find it almost impossible to get them to
spend more money on this account.
13. Except for some government officials, then, Europe is
generally ambivalent about politics and indifferent about
security. What it is emphatically not indifferent about is
economics and some of its social implications. The unprecedented-/
ly high levels of prosperity have, in effect, created as many
new problems as have been solved. That some of these may be
problems of success rather than failure does not diminish their
potential for unsettling political equilibrium or frustrating
governmental programs. History has shown
over and over again that it is not the starving who produce
political turbulence but rather the relatively prosperous who
want to be more so, or who feel threatened in what they have.
14. And the omnipresent effects of inflation throughout
Europe -- as elsewhere -- raise serious questions about the
continued validity of prosperity. For some years, consumerism,
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benefiting almost everyone to one degree or another, has
provided a safety valve for dissatisfactions and a diversion
from deficiencies which might otherwise have called for
difficult remedial actions in more urgent terms. Now, infla-
tion threatens that outlet. And the expansion and liberaliza-
tion of foreign trade which has accompanied and fostered
Europe's prosperity in the last decade or so is also now under
threat. With France and Germany now being led by two skilled
former Finance Ministers, there are grounds for hope that these
problems are in capable hands -- the more so since neither
is as disposed as his predecessor to be diverted from the main
problem by political hangups over Ostpolitik or Gaullist aspira-
tions. But no one pretends to have sure answers about the main
problems. And even if Germany and France are in a comparatively
fair position to cope, modern economic Europe will perforce
have to live with the interdependent effects of British and
Italian and the other economic problems, including those of the
15. The sociology of modern Europe reinforces these patterns.
European integration has proceeded far enough, aided by modern
ease of communication and travel, so that national societies
are less and less isolated from what goes on around,them,
and currents of change in one state quite quickly and directly
affect others. The Portuguese revolution's goals of instant
de-colonization and liberalization surely owe much to the
effects of general European thinking on key elements of
Portuguese society -- most notably young military officers.
There is apprehension among Spanish conservatives over the
effects of Portugal on their own country for precisely this
reason -- just as there is hope among Spanish liberals that
the Portuguese experiment will help in a Spanish transition
from the Franco. era to something new. Not many years ago,
Italians probably would have voted against divorce by a com-
fortable margin (as Fanfani thought they would do last month),
and it is hard to resist the conclusion that the social norms
of the rest of Europe are having their effects on traditional
Italian attitudes. Travelers to both Germanies remark that
one notable distinction between the FRG and the GDR is the
extent to which the former -- particularly the younger gener-
ation -- has "joined Europe" in a social, cultural, and
psychological sense, whereas Germans in the East think and
behave more like those of previous generations.
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16. These conditions are not always politically comfort-
able or entirely reassuring. If a generation is coming up
that finds an intra-European war inconceivable, the same
generation is disposed to be skeptical about the need for
defense of Europe against the Soviets; and it tends to take
Atlantic security for granted while concentrating, when it thinks
of the matter at all, on how unsatisfactory it finds the foreign
and economic policies of its elders and of the US. Lacking
personal memoirs of World War II and the tenser crises of the
Cold War, innocent of experience with depression and rampant
nationalism in Europe, it sees what is deficient in the
present system without any vivid awareness of the defects of
foreseeable alternatives or the price that has to be paid to
avoid them. Finally, it is a generation with very high expecta-
tions about the need and feasibility of correcting defects in
society; having been conditioned by rapidly improving economic
standards, it is impatient with failure to do more, quickly, to
improve the quality of life. The pace of change has not assuaged
but whetted appetites for more.
Some Implications
17. If the foregoing line of argument is valid, there
follow from it certain implications for the US -- including
intelligence analysis and policy formation:
-- Political problems -- present and projected -- are
nearly all heavily dependent on where Europe is
headed economically. Questions of stability and the
staying power of particular governments and policies
are likely to be determined less on political
grounds than on success or failure in meeting
economic challenges of a largely unprecedented sort.
It has been noted that there is no surge toward
radical left or right in Europe, but the tendency
to mill around in the middle could give way to
more extreme impulses if inflation is indefinitely
uncontrolled.
-- The economic tests ahead may impel Europe toward or
away from closer integration among its members. And
they may enhance Europe's ties with the US or erode
them. These big questions must stand without confi-
dent answers for the present. What does seem certain
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is that no amount of political arrangements among
the governments of Europe or between them and the US
or other powers will matter much unless they
take into account economic problems in cogent ways.
--
This
suggests need for more emphasis
on estimating
where
Europe is going (or might go)
economically.
What
strategies will bring inflation
under control
that
are also realistic politically?
What are the
chances of success? The consequences of failure?
Until we get some line on these questions, most
political forecasting will not get near the heart
of the matter.
-- Conventional political labels and classic political
alignments are losing much of their relevance and European political leaders who don't appreciate
this have been suffering for it. The existing
political vocabulary is obsolescent, and there are
no neat new labels or agreed concepts to replace it.
At a minimum, familiar terms should be used with
wariness and European political processes looked at
with care to avoid misleading patterns of perception.
-- If Communist parties or Communist labor unions are
still inherently threatening to US vital interests
in Europe, the question then becomes why are such
historic anti-Communist elements as the Vatican, much
of the Christian Democratic Party in Italy, a large
segment of the French electorate, and many of the
Christian and Socialist trade unions elsewhere departing
from their own traditional positions on such questions.
The answers are doubtless not simple but either some.
of our most important and long-standing friends are
embarking on erroneous courses, or we need to adjust
some of our own perceptions. In either case,
intelligence has to examine carefully why contingencies
of this kind are opening up which would have been
unthinkable ten years ago, and what they would mean
in reality if they do materialize. Answers to these
questions seem essential to any decisions about
postures which the US might adopt.
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--- Without discounting the importance of governmental
politics, it would make sense to increase attention
to forces and organizations which underlie or transcend
the daily political life of the national governments.
.The latter can develop greater vitality and stability
only to the extent they reflect national needs.
These needs, in turn, are expressed by powerful
institutions not in the governments but critical
to their success or failure -- the trade unions,
the great political parties, the industrial
combines and associations, and others. If we look
only at governments and their official oppositions,
we may be overlooking forces at least as important
for determining future events as are the official
incumbent governments, Indications are that the
Soviets are quite alive to the importance of ties
with the European trade unions, the socialist
parties, youth groups, even some of the major
industrial organizations.
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