Ferdinand A. Hermens

Totalitarian Power Structure and Russian Foreign Policy

W A / HEN A SUBJECT is as complex as is the motivation of Russian foreign policy much depends on choosing the proper categories for its evaluation. Some of the categories which figure prominently in current thinking on the subject are not relevant at all, and the significance of others can be determined only if their mutual relation is borne in mind. The first category to be disregarded is that of geography. It causes us to speak of an East-West conflict, and this carries the subconscious implication that the complex of institutions, ideologies and policies characteristic of the two sides in the current world struggle bears an ultimate relationship to geographical location. Obviously, however, some of the countries involved do not fit into the lines of this division. Thus, while Japan is not Western geographically, her recent policies appear to be based on the assumption of a fundamental identity of her interests with those of the West. The political institutions of South Korea and Vietnam differ from those of Japan as well as from those of the major Western nations. Yet, these countries are strongly opposed to the foreign policy of the leading Eastern countries. It should be equally clear that the political values which underlie the policies of Russia, China, and the satellites are not indigenous to the East. Marx, Engels and Lenin were definitely Westerners. The goal of five-year plans has been to bring the East the results of the industrial revolution which had taken place in the West. This was not an innovation by Stalin, but the implementation of fundamental Communist policy. At one time Stalin said that Lenin had Americanized the Russians. The geo-political category, next to be considered, comes closer to reality, but it is also inadequate. Russian foreign policy has often been explained as an attempt to provide, by means of expansion, security for a country which lacks the protection of natural boundaries, and has wide open plains to defend. Similar features are,