Real Peace by Richard Nixon Page A

“Anaconda Plan.” Although it was derided at first, eventually it helped the North win the war.
    The Russians know that there are other ways to defeat Europe besides “On to Bonn!” or “On to Paris!” Theirs is an Anaconda Plan on a much grander scale. Like a giant octopus they might wrap one coil around the oil jugular at the Persian Gulf; another could reach into Africa and cut off the flow to Europe of key raw materials. The West depends on the resources of the developing world to keep its economies and its armies functioning. The Soviets know that depriving the West of these resources could injure it as mortally as a direct military assault.
    There are those who say that since the U.S. is the Soviet Union’s principal adversary, countering Soviet aggression, especially in the developing world, is Washington’s problem. This is a fatal delusion. The U.S. is far more self-sufficient in resources than Europe. While we could get along without the oil of the Persian Gulf, Japan and Europe, with the exception of Britain and the North Sea countries, could not. Europe and Japan have a far greater stake in what happens in Afghanistan, Ethiopia, Yemen, and other Soviet targets in the Gulf than has the United States.
    Recently, because of such programs as the rapid deployment force, the United States has improved its ability to act quickly in crises on the other side of the world. While the rapid deploymentforce is a good idea, too much such power would be too much of a good thing. It might encourage our allies in their tendency to think that the U.S. can do it all. The Europeans have generations of experience in dealing with the nations of Africa and the Mideast. If a crisis that threatens the alliance’s interests erupts in the Europeans’ backyard, they should be prepared to act on behalf of the alliance. France’s playing the lead role in Chad, for instance, is an indispensable factor in stopping the Soviets, through their Libyan proxies, from muscling into central Africa.
    The idea that the United States could or should act as the policeman of the world is obsolete. Peace is everybody’s business. And real peace will not be built unless everyone does his share in building it and keeping it in good repair.
    The United States, Europe and Japan must consolidate and learn to use their economic power . Together we could use our strategic economic edge in the same way the U.S. once used its military edge: to deter Soviet aggression around the world. Separately we are isolated nations the Soviets can deal with individually and even play off against one another. Together we out-produce the Soviet bloc by over three to one. Separately any attempt to deter Soviet aggression with economic power is doomed to failure.
    The pipeline fiasco proved this point. The United States’ trade with the Soviet Union in 1982 was $2.5 billion; Western Europe’s was $40.7 billion. Acting together, we could have had a massive impact on the Soviets. But when the Europeans refused to go along, we found that acting alone amounted to a woefully ineffective gesture.
    At present NATO recognizes and is beginning to repair the rips in the fabric of its military deterrent. By failing to unite on economic questions in addition to military ones, the West is denying itself the advantage in an area where it still has superiority over the Soviet bloc. To be united militarily but divided economically courts disaster. But by concerting the use of their economic power the U.S. and its allies can developa powerful weapon to deter Soviet adventurism, while forging an equally powerful instrument with which to encourage peaceful change within the Soviet bloc.
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    Economic power can be both our sword and our plowshare. Unfortunately, so far the profound differences that have existed between the members of the Western alliance over the use of economic power have made it a useless weapon in our