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DIFFERENCES IN SOVIET AND AMERICAN PERCEPTIONS AND BEHAVIOR

On the other hand, there are profound differences between Soviet and American perceptions and behavior. In style and rhetoric these are fairly self-evident. In recent years U.S. disillusionment with the U.N. has been more severe and the American response at times more hostile. And yet the Soviet Union goes further in its own determination to take no chances to let the U.N. be used against itself or its friends. The United Nations is not prepared to assist significantly in the resolution of differences involving one or both superpowers. Its role, in this regard, is likely to be, at best, one of keeping the two apart or away from the foci of conflict, substituting its own presence. The U.N. can be expected to perform some constructive tasks in conflictmanagement as a buffer, a scapegoat, a broker, or a receiver-assuming the principals seek a peaceful way out. If either of the superpowers does not, the U.N. cannot stop it.

The enforcement of U.N. decisions relating to war and peace remains a divisive yet critical issue. Effective efforts for collective security require a mechanism for the enforcement of decisions, and such procedures have never been fully regularized. U.N. action, such as the dispatch of observers or the raising of peacekeeping forces, has been essentially ad hoc, with varying degrees of success and acrimony.

Action presupposes great power consensus on what constitutes a threat to peace and who is at fault. Soviet spokesmen candidly acknowledge that the struggle between the forces of progress and those of reaction still underlies their analysis of U.N. activities in a particular situation of conflict. U.N. decisions therefore must "assist national liberation movements and promote social progress without tak ing sides with reactionary forces as defined by the U.S.S.R."1

In doctrine, this gap is unbridgeable. In practice, however, the Soviet Union has at times acquiesced in U.N. peacekeeping missions, though it has usually refused to contribute to their costs. Efforts to formulate rules for the supervision, operation, financing, and direction of U.N. forces have been stalled for many years."

Soviet support of the peacekeeping operation in the Middle East after the October 1973 war may or may not be an indication of a change in outlook. Soviet commentators have in fact pointed out that the prior Soviet-American détente made possible the relatively rapid Security Council action ending the Middle Eastern conflict, which they remark, would have been far more dangerous at the height of the "cold war." 3 The adoption of ground rules governing the use of peacekeeping forces is a prerequisite for increased U.N. effectiveness in regard to conflicts not involving the permanent members themselves. Conditions for U.N. peacekeeping may be improving. Thus, not only the Middle Eastern precedent, but also the breakdown of the tight bipolar system of international alliances, and the reaction to the fighting in Indochina make more likely that in future local conflicts both the United States and the Soviet Union will prefer to stay out and

1 Gromyko, loc. cit., p. 9; also Prokof'ev, p. 75; E. S. Krivchikova, "Vooruzhennye sily OON" (Moscow, 1965); and Iu. Ia. Mikheev, "Primenenie prinuditel' nykh mer po ustavu OON" (Moscow, 1967).

2 One stumbling block is the relative role of the Secretary-General and the Security Council in the operational supervision of a peacekeeping force. See the letters of Soviet Ambassador Malik and U.S. Ambassador Bush to the Secretary-General, Mar. 17 and 30, 1972 (Documents A/8669 and A/8676).

3 See, e.g., Tomilin, loc. cit., p. 36.

use third parties such as the U.N. It remains true that even under such conditions the superpowers frequently back opposing parties or come to view the effects of U.N. action-as in the Congo-in opposite ways, leading to a drastic erosion of the original consensus that makes a U.N. mission possible. The attitude of the People's Republic of China may, in turn, make agreement more difficult if it suspects SovietAmerican collusion. In its entire history the U.N. has only rarely been able to constrain any combatant nation. It has never constrained any of the major powers. It must be recognized that it can do least where it would be needed most.

Moscow has exidently learned what may not be fully understood in this country: To turn one's back on the U.N. is precisely what one's worst enemies would wish. If the United States cannot control the U.N., it cannot afford to ignore it either, in a world in which interdependence has become proverbial.

Détente may have led both American and Soviet delegates to the U.N. sometimes-not always-to tone down their remarks and to avoid some rough edges. This has meant some sacrifice in playing to the galleries or the public back home. Essentially this is a question of tactics. The real work at the U.N. is apt to be done behind the scenes. Ultimately, what is needed is not grandstanding but effectiveness. Politics is the art of the possible, and it would be a disservice to expect more of the U.N. that its structure allows. It would also be foolish to use it for less than it can provide.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you.

Mr. Buckley let me ask you this question.

STATE DEPARTMENT INSTRUCTIONS TO U.S. DELEGATES

You made some reference to a speech that you were going to make and you were advised by the State Department that it was not the proper language, not the proper speech.

Did you go on and give it anyhow?

Mr. BUCKLEY. Oh, no, no.

The CHAIRMAN. You followed instructions from the State Department?

Mr. BUCKLEY. Public Law 357 of the 79th Congress says a public member is only authorized to pronounce those words that are authorized by the Secretary of State or whatever other representative the President designates. The only time that there is any room for extemporaneous commentary, as Senator Percy will confirm is during a right of reply when as an amicable matter there are no strings that attach you to the State Department. So that it is in moments like that, for instance, that Mr. Moynihan was able to address rather sharply 3 years ago some of the critics of the United States in an extemporaneous speech which almost certainly would not have been authorized had it been written out and sent in for validation.

The CHAIRMAN. I served as a delegate in the Fifth General Assembly. Yours was the 25th?

Mr. BUCKLEY. 28th.

The CHAIRMAN. I never received instructions from the State Department as to anything I should say.

Mr. BUCKLEY. They were probably frightened of you.

The CHAIRMAN. Maybe I just stayed in line.

Mr. BUCKLEY. Well, no doubt there has been an evolutionary process. My own wrong, looking back on it, is that when the original law was passed the President of the United States faced the awful prospect of Mrs. Roosevelt as a delegate to the United Nations.

The CHAIRMAN. She was a delegate while I was there.

Mr. BUCKLEY. Well, so he probably instructed the Congress to write as tight a law as could be written governing her tongue andThe CHAIRMAN. Let us see, Who was President then?

Mr. BUCKLEY. Truman. I think the same law would have been written if Mr. Roosevelt would have been President, but in fact it was President Truman.

The CHAIRMAN. I thought you said the 79th.
Mr. BUCKLEY. 79th Congress, that is right.
The CHAIRMAN. Truman was already President?
Mr. BUCKLEY. He had just become President.

The CHAIRMAN. Well, I was there in 1950.

I said I never did get instructions. It may very well be that things have changed since that time. However, I do not think we had so many urbane questions to discuss in those days.

I was on the second committee, the Economic Committee, and the thing I remember the most was trying to work out a land policy. One of the snags we had was the use of the word "tenancy." We found a great many nations did not know what we meant by "tenancy.

UNIVERSALITY OF MEMBERSHIP

We use to hear a good bit about universality of membership.
Do you subscribe to that idea?

Mr. BUCKLEY. I tend to do so because it becomes impossible to apply criteria of civilized behavior in a situation that begins with Soviet membership. That is to say, to strain at a gnat having admitted that beam is impossible even for a highly juridical State Department polemicist. Under the circumstance I am impelled toward universality even though I recognize that it is in violation of the Charter itself which is theoretically hospitable only to peace loving states.

The CHAIRMAN. That is right. What about the action of the present Assembly in forcing out South Africa?

Mr. BUCKLEY. Well, it is clearly unconstitutional viewed from the U.N. point of view. The General Assembly seized on a technicality on the basis of which it decided not to accept the Accreditation Committee's recommendations and, therefore, to exercise a de facto power reserved under the Charter to the Security Council. However, Mr. Chairman, we bear, I think Senator Percy would agree, a considerable joint responsibility for that perversion because it was we who induced the Uniting for Peace resolution on the basis of which we could gainsay the Security Council when the situation got tough and move on to the General Assembly, which at that time we clearly dominated when we needed some kind of ratification of American foreign policy.

Having opened that particular box, Pandora's box, it has stayed open and the General Assembly could very easily exercise the same techniques that were exposed by the Uniting For Peace Resolution, for

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instance, and vote respectively to expel Israel next year and might very well do so.

The CHAIRMAN. That I believe was the handiwork of Secretary Dulles.

Mr. BUCKLEY. No, it was Acheson. It was the worst mistake he ever made.

The CHAIRMAN. It was. Mr. Dulles was a delegate at that time.
Mr. BUCKLEY. That is right.

The CHAIRMAN. That happened during the time I was there.
Mr. BUCKLEY. Oh, it did?

The CHAIRMAN. Yes; and Mr. Dulles was a member of the delegation.

I asked Justice Goldberg when he was here recently about that. He cited the Charter and he was in full agreement with you on what you have said.

I also asked him about the action of the Assembly in admitting two Germanys and he thought it was the thing to do. Then I said why did you not admit two Chinas; they admitted one and expelled the other.

Mr. BUCKLEY. Well, I do not know what his answer was but I know what it should have been, which is that we voted to maintain Taiwan in the United Nations but were overruled.

The CHAIRMAN. That is correct.

Let me turn to Senator Percy first. Senator Percy, I may say, is the one who is primarily responsible for setting up these hearings. All right, Senator Percy.

Senator PERCY. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I certainly welcome our distinguished witnesses today. We had asked Ambassador Patrick Moynihan also to be here this morning. Perhaps he is sitting by the telephone waiting to get the call about his much-rumored appointment. Or maybe he was concerned about being here before receiving official word on the appointment.

I do regret very much that he is not here. We think very highly of him. He has been very provocative in things he has had to say about the U.N., and I am sure we will have the benefit of his judgments

soon.

Mr. Buckley, Mr. Chairman, I would like to reserve a part of my time for Senator Buckley to question Mr. Buckley.

The CHAIRMAN. I fully intended to call on him.

Senator PERCY. I thought that might be more interesting than our questioning.

The CHAIRMAN. It might give him a chance he does not have very much.

Senator PERCY. Before I became a delegate last fall I read a large amount of material about the U.N. In August I was in India and Ambassador Moynihan had an advance copy of your book, Mr. Buckley, and he lent it to me. Not only did I read it with great interest, but every member of my family read it.

MAYAGUEZ SEIZURE

I would like to ask you first if you feel that the U.N. has any role to play in the seizure of the cargo ship by the Cambodian Government? Senator Buckley has expressed himself very forthrightly

on the issue. What do you think we ought to do about this situation?

Mr. BUCKLEY. Well, it seems to me, Senator that clearly the United Nations has a theoretical role to play because the seizure of this ship is a threat to world peace and the U.N. is supposed to invoke the Security Council when there is a threat to world peace. We have, as I understand it, 800 marines landed in Thailand, obviously not as tourists, and under the circumstances the Security Council needs to be called. The probability, however, is, as we both know, that if it were summoned any resolution calling on Cambodia to free the ship would probably be vetoed either by the Chinese or by the Soviet member leaving us as usual to our own recourses.

You asked what would I do to prevent its happening. Forgive me if I answer that question ambiguously. The ship would never have been seized if we had followed a proper policy. *** It's very difficult having tolerated abuses both rhetorical and military against the integrity of the United States suddenly to react convincingly. We are going to have to start in my judgment sometime and this may or may not be the ideal time to start but essentially we need, I think, a foreign policy in which it would be unthinkable for a major state let alone a ministate to wander 60 miles at sea and seize an American ship without a scintilla of legal authority. They don't even have the excuse that the North Koreans had who were alleging we were violating those waters. That allegation has not been made but I think it shows the state we are held in that port of the world, humiliation, however, which we vigorously invited.

Senator PERCY. Mr. Buckley, if I may just assume the role of an interrogator on Firing Line, we are faced with the situation right now. If you were, say, the President's permanent representative at the U.N., sitting in a cabinet meeting or sitting in the National Security Council last night, what would you have advised the United States to do and what do you think the reaction of the U.N. and world community would be to such advice?

Mr. BUCKLEY. Well, I think any effort to retrieve our ship and our men would be met, however grudgingly, with the sympathy of the Third World. There is, I think, an unanimity of sentiment against the ill health of that act. How best to do it is a tactical question and I would hope that there are people in the Pentagon better equipped than I to tell you how we can simultaneously capture the ship and not get our men killed.

I do know that if I were in the White House in charge of policy I think I would probably call up Comdr. Lloyd Bucher and ask him what he thought we should do.

STRONGER U.S. POSITION AT THE U.N.

Senator PERCY. I would like to move on to another area where there has been a great deal of discussion. What should our posture be at the U.N. with respect to actions taken which we feel are contrary to our national interest?

It's being suggested by Ambassador Moynihan that we speak out in much stronger terms against loose accusations and destructive rhetoric.

Do you share this view and how far could the U.S. delegation go before its own rhetoric might be somewhat counterproductive?

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