Richard C. Thornton

The Carter years : toward a new global order

Although Jimmy Carter came to office fully prepared and willing to carry forward the new global order initiated by Henry Kissinger in 1973, his administration immediately encountered a Soviet Union which had embarked on a multi-pronged geopolitical offensive, backed by a major advance in strategic weaponry, and which threatened to undermine Americas global position. Recognition of the Soviet offensive forced a reconsideration of American strategy, splitting the new administration.Secretary of State Cyrus Vance insisted that the strategy of a new global order, requiring a detente between the two nations, was still a viable option. However, National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski argued that a return to some form of modified containment of the Soviet Union was necessary. President Carter, caught between these diametrically opposed positions, went neither one way nor the other - a wavering attitude that came to characterize the foreign policy of his presidency.

Russo-Chinese Detente and the Emerging New World Order

As the new world order emerges from the Cold War, Russia’s detente with China is one of the least remarked of a number of important developments of the past decade, yet it is arguably one of the most important. It is the thesis of this chapter that in the context of major change in American strategy, Russo-Chinese cooperation could be the engine of positive fundamental, structural change in Eurasia, but Russo-Chinese competition could, on the other hand, lead to the renewal of conflict on the Korean peninsula.

Strategic change and American foreign policy: Perceptions of the Sino-Soviet conflict

ConclusionComparing U.S. policy behavior toward China in the two instances raises some apparent contradictions. For example, why did the United States support Beijing against Soviet pressures in 1969, but not in 1979? This would appear to invalidate the thesis set forth in the introduction of this essay that the United States moved to improve relations with China when it appeared that the U.S.-Soviet strategic weapons balance was becoming adverse. But a broader focus indicates that U.S. policy behavior was in fact consistent with the thesis, for Washington did move to improve relations with Beijing—through normalization—prior to the Sino-Vietnamese war. It was only after normalization and during that conflict, when Moscow threatened Beijing’s advance in Vietnam, that Washington declined to support the People’s Republic. Yet that, too, was consistent with the general structural objective of attempting to maintain a stable equilibrium of states on the Eurasian landmass. U.S. support for the People’s Republic during the attack on Vietnam would only have encouraged Beijing’s march on Hanoi in disregard of the Soviet threat, increasing the probability of a Sino-Soviet conflict, which the United States sought to avoid. Thus, the Carter leadership chose to decline support to Beijing in order to further the larger objective of regional stability, although at China’s expense.