INNOCENCE ABROAD: JIMMY CARTER'S FOUR MISCONCEPTIONS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000100200035-4
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 15, 2007
• Sequence Number: 35
• Publication Date: May 1, 1980
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Approved For Release 2007/06/15: CIA-RDP99-00498R000100200035-4
ARTICLE AP?..,
01i Pt1C1^.,_Zo
REAB'S DIGEST
MAY ].980
STAT
4
Innocence Abro
' rs
MisconcepiOflS
Tough rhetoric from the President
followed the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.
t
i
s
Yet questions pers
BY ROWLAND I VMI and ROBERT NOVAK
Vance's resident . oviet expert.
The only dissenter within the Ad-
ministration was National Security
Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, who
? harbored no illusions about the Cold
War being ended. But he was sur-
rounded : by adveraries, and he
lacked both bureaucratic skill and
Oval office backing. Brzezinski did
not even control the critical function
of naming his own National Security
Council staff.
Meanwhile, Carter was develop- ?'
ing a peculiar empathy for Soviet
? President Leonid Brezhnev. He
seemed to view Brezhnev as a fel-
low politician harassed by pressure
groups, rather than as the master of
Russia who had sent his legions roll-
N JANUARY tz, 1977, eight I him that his agile mind had mastered I ing into Czechoslovakia a decade f
~
I earlier.
days before his inauguration the great game of diplomacy.
as president Jimmy Carter Others were not so sure. The Nor was he prepared to dwell on I
v , r
was briefed by \Vashington's lead'sng { trouble with Carter, I lenry Kis- Soviet violations of deiente. When a
military and national-security ex-
April seized power
one in t e
perts. Carter asked if studies had '.singer
Carter Administration, iwas not that': glianistan n in junta
been made on how a rnajor reduction lie did not understand foreign af- President's national .security aides
of long-range missiles would affect fairs, but that he did not understand handed a reporter highly confiden-
the US.-Soviet military balance. tl, he did not understand. "tial information about close ties be-
Gen. George Brown, chairman of ` Jimmy Carter is by no means the tween the Soviet Union and the
about 2400 to perhaps zooo or so.. _
`
responded, "Oh, yes, Governor." he.
referred to studies that . analyzed
a reduction of long-range" missiles
from the proposed SALT II level of .
back. "I'm .not talking about zooo, 1 Nevertheless, our increasing vulner- afraid the Soviets might not accept
General," Carter replied in his* soft I ability derives very substantially from our next concession."
S
solitary author of the present weak- 1 leaders of the junta. It proved that
foreign policy.;-[ rivers of blood had flowed in their
S
of U
t
d
.
.
e
sta
ene
Toward the end of the Vietnam war seizure of power. The -reporters
and in the years that followed, Demo question was obvious: "Why doesn t
resses began slashing the State Department publicly reveal
n
ic C
o
g
crat
! away at the defense budget. Republi- these facts?" "Because," the bureau-
cut can Presidents timidly accepted this. crat replied with bitter sarcasm, "it is
This. was considered a radical
Brown, tarter s uuuaritrrg y 1
Mzrcorrception No. 1: he cola equi a e s ,
of Defense, pointed out. that such an but key Carter aides insisted that the
imm I tii/aris over. The pronouncement was. y `~
immense reduction in America I. '
' made four months after the inaugu ,process',. must be maintained. I
strategic arsenal would pose a funds- t ,
mental risk 'to the nation's security, ration in Carter. s commencement would like to say to you, Carter told t
all but destroying the US. nuclear address at Notre Dame' University: a joint session of Congress on June
"shield." It would also. expose Eu- "Confident of our own future, we 18, 1979, following the signing of
rope to the Soviet Union's vast supe are now free of that inordinatefearof SALT u, "that President Brezhnev
riority in conventional arms..: communism, which once led us to and I developed a better seise of
Carter's pre-inaugural interest in embrace any dictator who joined. us cacll other as leaders and as ir_ea..:'. l
radically reducing the US. arsenal set in our fear." believe that together we laid a foun-
a pattern that persisted until the In giving voice to this innocence' dation on which we can builds more
Soviet military takeover of Afghani- he was merely endorsing the-then' stable relationship between our two
Stan last December. It was born of a popular sentiment that ideological countries."
:peculiar innocence, coupled with conflict between democratic Ainer The Soviet sweep iris Afghani
genuine self-confidence. His expe- ica and totalitarian- Russia was no' Stan was only six months'aw'ay::.
rience as a junior Naval officer, Car-. longer relevant. That view prevailed'.'
T
ter felt,. established his. military ex among such foreign-policy advisers d
pertise; in the two years lafter his as . Secretary of State Cyrus Vance,
single term as governor of Georgia, chief disarmament negotiator Paul.
his membership on the newly formed Warnke and Marshall Shulman,?
Trilateral Corr--:-' r^nv;nrerl
Approved For Release 2007/06/15: CIA-RDP99-00498R000100200035-4
,1
C;Ienr - fntlnwtrl_ Finally Harold I him' '^bGdV oretenucu that this was an ,
Georgia accent. "I'm talking about.
200 or 300."
the steady reinforcement of four ba- Those ."concessions were being
! t
? rL r 1-after c r- made ;n the SALT negotiations. No-