Page 4-Friday, February 1, 1980-The Michigan Daily
Ninety Years of E
SVol.XC, No. 100
Edited and managed by studen
Jimmy Cart
HE WOUNDED warriors from all
spectrums of the Democratic Par-
ty assembled at center stage in New
h York City to proclaim its renaissance.
Front the ruins of the 1968 party civil
War at the Chicago convention, a new
zited coalition emerged determined
tore-capturthe WhiteHouse.
The hero of the party's comeback in
1976 was, of course, Jimmy Carter. As
he lectured the cheering delegates, the
old '60s brand of Democratic
Siberalsm came gushing out. in the
:miliar cliches and symbols. He
outlined his commitment to the poor,
- derly, unemployed, and under-
.' privileged. Sounding like a modern-
day Robin Hood, Carter promised to
fake fromthe rich - the military-
idustrial complexes that make our
war machinery - and give to the poor,
the nation's lower classes which have-
suffered since the recessionary days of
the Ford administration.
The liberal wing of the party
delebrated; Jimmy Carter talked like;
a progressive.
"It's time for voter registration. It's
time for a nationwide comprehensive
iealth program for all our people. It's
ime to guarantee an end to
t scrimination because of race or sex
b'y full involvement in the decision-
making process of government by
those who know what it is to suffer
.from discrimination, and they'll be in
the government if I'm elected," said
"Carter at the convention.
° Jimmy Carter was elected.
But now, three years after his
:i1auguration, the promises of 1976 !
:have become the disappointments of
977 1978, and 1979. What had the
potential of a progressive and in-
.lnvative administration quickly
dissolved into wishy-washy, inept,
dhd naive leadership. From the fields
S3 inflation and energy to the foreign
licy blunders, the Carter ship
plunged to the lowest depths,
$ecalating inflation into double figures
. abd alienating past allies.
k A brief summary of the Carter
cord in both domestic and foreign af-
Zir easily explains) the numerous
fections of traditiohal Democratic
i-ogressives who waited patiently but
und out that Jimmy Carter was a
e iarlatan, full of lies and ambiguities.
,e was always the candidate no one
iderstood, but people preferred to the
$bhown quantity, Gerald Ford. On some
tisues Carter went left, and on others,
°he skirted right. Nobody quite could
predict where he'd go.
The suspense ended as Carter's list
- f errors grew steadily during his first
three years.
Item: Inflation. When Jimmy Carter
campaigned, he often grew very angry
with the Ford administration's han-
dling of the inflation rate. In a Septem-
ber speech, he said, "If there is one
. jfrogram the administration is flubbing
in a most ignominious manner, it is the
war on inflation. There is no.
program." At that time, the inflation
rate was a mere'4.8 per cent.
- Now, it's 13.3 per cent. For a
president who criticized the absence of
a program, it took hima long time to
develop his own. He waited 21 months
to set guidelines on wages and prices,
and once established, kept them in
place even though they .clearly were
ineffective.
As a candidate, he promised he
would balance the budget by the 1981
fiscal year. Just several days ago,
however, the president sent Congress a
budget with a $16 billion deficit.
Coupled with his three previous
budgets, the total federal deficit during
the Carter administration will go down
in the economic record book as the
largest deficit of any presidential term
m the history of America.
Item: Energy. In his famous speech
in April, 1977, when Carter called the
.energy crisis "the moral equivalent of
'ian taiIy
ditorial Freedom
News Phone: 764-0552
its at the University of Michigan
Motives behind Soviet's Afghan move
S
failures
intentioned, but misguided, proposal to
ease the oil shortage. The president, by
calling for de-control, tried to ration by
price, and not supply. The problem is
that the rich could afford the rising
gasoline prices, while the poor would
have'to conserve. A gas rationing plan,
however, would distribute the supply
more equitably, forcing the rich to
sacrifice as much as the poor.
Item: National health insurance.
Throughout his amazing climb to the
White House, Carter promised to in-
stitute a nationwide health care
program. But due to his staff's incom-
petence and Carter's unwillingness to
pressure Congress, his health plan fir-
st became modified, and now lies dor-
mant. In the meantime, Americans
continue to pay exorbitant health care
costs.
The foreign policy of the Carter ad-
ministration (one could say, Brzezinski
administration) has succeeded in
several departments. The president,
almost singlehandedly, completed the
Egypt-Israeli peace treaty. For the first
time, the U.S. established diplomatic
relations with the People's Republic of
China. And, a nuclear arms limitation
treaty with the Soviet Union was
finally signed.
But, throughout his term, his foreign
policy was never consistent. At some
points, he resisted relations with
nations ignoring huhan rights, while
at other times, courting them with
White House dinner parties. The
repressive regime of former Korean
President Park was first criticized,
and then appeased. Eventually, Carter
reneged on his promise to withdraw
American troops from that country. '
Amidst this dismal report card,
Jimmy Carter survives, and even
prospers. Never before has a president
profited so much from so little. Never
has an ineffective leader regained
popular support so quickly.' Jimmy
Carter emerged from his grave, and
now seems likely to win a second term
in the White House.
No doubt the Iran and Afghanistan
crises have been significant, and Car-
ter has done well to confront them. He
has exercised restraint when needed,
and firmness when it was called for.
But any president - with the
possible exceptions of Ronald Reagan
and John Connally - would have done
the same, and his rise in popularity
emanating from those two affairs has
overshadowed his poor performance in
domestic issues during the last three
years.
Since Nov. 4, when the hostages were
seized in Tehran, foreign policy has
dominated the headlines and the agen-
da of the Carter' administration.
Coupled with the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan, Carter has certainly been
justified in spending his time combat-
ting those crises.
With that strategy, Jimmy Carter
won Iowa. And now, he is planning to
stay in the White House while his
surrogates, Walter Mondale and
Rosalyn Carter, hit the campaign trail.
But the time to bask in his incum-
bency is over. Jimmy Carter is also a
candidate for the presidency, and he,
perhaps more than anyone else, must
answer questions. He must defend his
record, especially in the areas of
energy and inflation. He must travel to
the small towns of New Hampshire -
the primary is only four weeks away -
and stand before the voters.
Other candidates have begun to
discuss the domestic crises, but have
been greeted with silence from the
White House.
The perfect example of this attitude
came forth in last week's State of the
Union address to Congress. The
president outlined steps to counter the
crises abroad, but said nothing about
the problems at home. Only in a sup-
plementary booklet to Congress did he
Among the many questions being
asked about the Soviet invasion
into , Afghanistan, the most im-
portant is perhaps, whether the
Soviets will merely consolidate
their foothold in that country, or
press onward into Baluchistan, to
gain'access to the Arabian Sea.
The latter possibility is par-
ticularly frightening to Western
analysts, as it would give the
Soviets direct access to the
Straits of Hormuz, the bottleneck
for all oil bound for Western
Europe.
Various Soviet analysts, on the
other hand, diminish the wide-
ranging threats of the Soviet in-
vasion, contending that the
Kremlin wants only to secure its
foothold in Afghanistan, which it
felt was jeopardized by the un-
popular government of
Hafizullah. They point to the
historical patterns of Russian-
Soviet aggression to give a
slightly more optimistic picture.
As expansionism has been a
keynote of Russian policy since
Czarist times, Professor William
Zimmerman pointed out Satur-
day at a roundtable discussion
with several other University
professors, there is nothing
"novel" about the current Soviet
behavior.
WHILE THE far-reaching
security implications of the
Soviet 'invasion can not be
overlooked, we should remember
that the USSR has never invaded
a country that did not already
have a Socialist form of gover-
nment that it was trying to
preserve. Zimmerman pointed
out, however, that this is the first
time that the Soviet Union has ex-
tended its military power outside
of Eastern Europe.
Among the possible motives
discussed as causes for the in-
vasion, the two most important
appear to be: -the desire to
preserve a fledgling socialist
regime in a neighboring country,
and the goal of containing the
spread of Muslim fundamen-
talism before it affects the 50
million Muslims of Soviet Central
Asia.
The Soviet Union has three
republics which have counterpar-
ts in neighboring Iran and
Afghanistan: Tajikstan, Uz-
bekistan, and Turkmanistan.
Louis Dupree, perhaps the
premier American scholar on
Afghanistan, explains in an ar-
ticle for the American University
Field Staff (AUFS) in April, 1959,
that Soviet Colonialism in Uz-
bekistan and Tajikstan are
legacies of the Czars, who were
completed by the Bolsheviks.
From 1734 until 1896, Russia.
made steady encroachments into
Muslim Central Asia. During the
19th century, Afghanistan
became an unfortunate buffer
'between the imperialistic ten-
dencies of the Russian and
British empires. In the early
1880's, journalists sen-
sationalized the area as the set-
ting for the clash of the two em-
pires.
JUST BEFORE THE expected
clash nearly occurred in 1885, the
great powers cooled their heels,
upon realizing th dangers of
such a war. They convened in at-
tempt to diffuse the situation, and
in the words of Dupree, ex-
pressed their "genius for
drawing a boundary in the
wrong place." The boundaries
drawn at that time, and refined at
later. conferences were created
only to satisfy the great powers'
territorial demands. Cultural;
religious, linguistic, and tribal
entities were ignored to accom-
modate their imperialistic
designs, but as Professor Svat'
Soucek points out, these tribal
and cultural entities maintain
their coherent identity despite
the artificial boundaries.
By H. Scott Prosterman
In his monumental work
Afghanistan (Princeton; 1973),
Dupree states that "Afghanistan
is an artificial country, created
out of a tribal kingdoms as a buf-
fer state between Russia and
Britain in he 19th century. Boun-
dary commissions largely ignore
cultural entities. Trouble
naturally gravitates to such un-
natural frontiers."
The present conflict is as much
a product of the 19th century
great power blunders, as it is the
raw nature of Soviet um-
perialism. One of the most
sickening features of the current
situation is that native Uzbek and
Tajik tribesmen are enlisted as
Soviet troops to fight their
neighboring kinsmen. Prof.
Soucek points out that this factor
naturally sharpens the Muslim
identities within the USSR, and
contributes to the naturally
rebellious nature that all non-
Russian republics have against
the Soviet super-structure.
WITH THIS factor in mind, one
naturally wonders about the
strength of Republican
movements within the Soviet
Union, and whether they are a
legitimate threat to the Soviet
governrhent. Recent demon-
strations in Estonia indicate that
the sentiment for autonomy is in-
deed present in some areas,
though it is clear that such
movements would be suicidal if
they asserted themselves now.
The possibility of a Muslim
uprising within the USSR was a
primary factor in the decision to
invade Afghanistan, An uprising
against the Soviet state is cer-
tainly not a realistic threat right
now, but as the current
populations of 50 million con-
tinued to multiply, and as Muslim
identity strengthens within the
Soviet Union, they perceive such
a threat for the next generation.
The current revival of Islamic
fundamentalism is a product of
both Western and Soviet im-
perialism. It is a revolt against
the atterppt by the West to assert
its value system in place of
traditional Islamic and tribal
ones. Professor Richard P. Mit-
chell explained that, "Western
society and values are seen as
having corrupted Islamic values
and nations." Unlike other
Islamic nations, Afghanstan has
an equally profound hate for
Soviet and Western imperialism,
having been victimized by the
worst of both. Iran, on th other
hand, according to Profe or K.
Allen Luther, views the USSR as
an enemy, but the U.S. as the
"target of their struggle, and the
cause of their injury." The
Soviets nontheless sense their
part in having made a negative
contribution to the modern rise of
Islamic fundamentalism. Their
sensitivity to the spreading
Islamic revolt points this out.
There are other ancillary
reasons for the Soviet invasion.
'zimmerman adds: the increase
of the U.S. defense budget, the
introduction of short-range
missiles into Western Europe, the
presumption that SALT would be
defeated, and the closer ties of
the United States with China, to
the list of motives for the in-
vasion. Also The Brezhenv Doc-
trine, invoked in Czechoslovakia
in 1968 gives the USSR unilateral
license to invade, whenever a
satellite shows signs of breaking
away.
ANOTHER IMPORTANT con-
sideration is that the Soviets in-
tervene in countries only where
they are "invited". That is,
where they create the invitation
for themselves. The most impor-
tant weapon for expanding Soviet
influence, has been their con-
ditions for giving military aid to a
country. Both superpowers have
been dangerously indiscriminate
in the selling of arms for the past
20 years.
The U.S. can rightly be
criticized for contributing to this
practice. Paradoxically, while he
Dulles policy of "containment"
is the heir to the catastrophically
dangerous arms race, Dupree
and others hold this policy
responsible for setting the stage
for massive SovieT influence in
the late 50's. The Dulles system of
alliances in Asia intentionally
ignored Afghanistan for a num-
ber of poorly justified reasons.
Dupree reports in Afghanistan,
that they never really wanted to
join the Baghdad Pact, because
they wanted to preserve their
neutrality. However, they 'still
sought the security benefits of the
Truman Doctrine in the way of
military and economic assistance
until 1954. Included in the U.S.
reasons for ignoring Afghanistan,
was the rationale that we did not
want to risk facing the Soviets in
their own back yard, if they took
offense to our assistance. We
wanted to "contain" them, but
we weren't willing to face them in
a country of such a "minor
strategical importance." (Lying
between China, Russia, Iran, and
Pakistan). It appears that the
real consideration in not arming
Afghanistan was our fear that our
weapons might be used against
Pakistan, who, along with Iran,
opposed Afghanistan's member-
ship in CENTO.
The atmosphere of the Cold
War dictated that developing
nations align themselves with one
of the superpowers. The "Third
World" was an embryonic con-
cept for nations like Afghanistan
and India who wanted to refrain
from becoming dependent on
either superpower, and assert
their political independence.
AFTER BEING snubbed by the
U.S., Afghanistan sought and
received massive economic and
military aid from the USSR
beginning in 1955. Unlike
American aid, Soviet assistance
carries with it the acceptance of
Soviet adviserd and
technicians, and a commitment
to Soviet stands in foreign policy.
With 'tight control over the
economy and military through
their advisers and technicians, it
is easy for them to manipulate
the conditions for an "invitation"
to outright intervention.
The prevailing anxiety about
the invasion into Afghanistan is
that it is part of a larger strategic
design, to later encompass
Baluchistan and a port on the
Aabian Sea. Because Baluchistan
encompasses appreciable tracts
of land in Afghanistan, Palistan,
and Iran,,Soviet control of that
area would drastically disrupt
the balance of power in Central
Asia. Compounding this threat is
the fact that Baluchistan has
never beenn"comfortably incor-
porated" into Pakistan and the
contention articulated by
Professor John Broomfield that
the USSR would probably en-
courage a Baluchi separatist
movement in the near future.
For the time being though, it
appears that they will settle for
having solidified their hold on
Afghanistan, and stick to their
traditional pattern of gradual ex-
pansion. Their long-term goals on
Baluchistan hawever, can not be
overlooked. With this in mind, the
American strategy options in-
clude the strengthening of
Pakistan with support from
China, or an attempt to bring In-
dia into the Western dialogues, to
deal with the Soviets. Prof.
Bloomfield reasoned for the lat-
ter, pointing to the unstable
nature of the current Pak gover-
nment, with its narrow base of
right-wing support. Prof. Luthe.
concurred, saying that by sup-
porting Pakistan, we could find
ourselves in a situation similar to
the one we were in with the Shah.
A rapproachment between
Pakistan and India seems too
much to ask at this point, given
their long history of bitter
hostilities. Thus, we could
sacrifice a lot of our negotiating
room by supporting Pakistan
and ignoring India.
IN THIS MOST threatening
development in power politics
since the Cuban missile crisis,
the only optimistic analysis was
offered by Prof. Soucek: that the
Russians may be realizing that
they badly miscalculated the U.S.
reaction to the Afghanistan in-
vasion, and may be discouraged
from taking similar actions i
Iran, Baluchistan, anO
Yugoslavia, after the eventual
passing of Tito.
In planning our long-term
foreign policy, we must consider
the need to stabilize the rest of
Central Asia. The only feasible
way to strengthen the newly
drawn perimeter around the
Soviet Union, is to ally ourselv
with the surrounding Musliir
countries. To achieve this, we
must win theconfidence of the
more stable Muslim and Arab
nations. It has become all to
evident that we are not likely to
get any Arab support in world
politics until we pressure Israel
into changing its position on
Palestine autonomy. We are
the only party with the power to
force such a change.
Arab and Muslim nations view
us as having corrupted their
value system; therefore they
distrust us. Our unequivocal sup-
port for Israel and the Shah has
further tarnished our credibility
in dealing with the Arab world.
With the potential clash between
the USSR and the Muslim world,
the Palestinian issue has now
come to the forefront of world
security. As Prof. Mitchell poin
ted out, it is the roadblock to our
badly needed defense
arrangements with the Arabs.
Israel obviously can not be coun-
ted on to dfen1 the Persian Gulf
and Arabian Sea countries in a
time of crisis-the resolution of
the Palestine issue is now vital to
the security of the Persian Gulf,
Western Europe, and North
America. If the May deadline
passes without a constructive
resolution on Palestinian
autonomy, we could see a major
shift in U.S. foreign policy
priorities.
The strength of any powerful
lobby has its limitations when its
demands begin to jeopardize
national and world security.
Though the defense of the Israe
should remain an importaW
American policy consideration,
we can not guarantee this defense
if, it means condoning their
arrogant refusal to deal seriously
with the Palestinian problem. IN
doing so, we ostracize the sup-
port that we now desperately
need thorughout Asia and the
Middle East to stabilize Central
Asia, and to contain the new wave
of Soviet expansionism.
H. Scott Prosterman, a
graduate student in the school
for Near Easterh Studies, is
the Daily's analyst of Near
Eastern and Middle Eastern
affairs.
is. .
lqw
;
.'. .
i , -
,t-
, .
I
ANOTHER WUKE
~(3YLar4~uN al.5 PowmV. Co.
OF Mt4{ILAJ
GGSTING DA.Y'*
j* d ,, N R-
0
I j
'^O -6
50G' To Fe
AT A LST OF
.._..
.. ...
_ .: .
...
-- -
' _
1,
I ,
, II
EIt - I -