N ot since Pearl Harbor in 1941 has an American president gone to Congress to request a declaration of war. Nevertheless, since then, one president after another, from Truman to Obama, has ordered American troops into wars all over the world. Why no declarations of war? Why has it become so comparatively easy for a president to commit the nation to war? What is Congress's responsibility? Where is the press? In The Road to War, esteemed journalist and author Marvin Kalb explores these crucial and timely questions.
Rather than formally declaring war, presidents have justified their war-making powers by citing predecessors' commitments, private and public. Many have been honored, but some have been betrayed. From Vietnam to Israel, presidential commitments have proven to be tricky and dangerous. For example, presidents pledged the United States to the defense of South Vietnam; yet none saw the need for a formal declaration of war, and few in Congress or the media chose to question the war's provenance or legitimacy until it was too late. In the end, the U.S. lost 58,000 Americansand the war.
Given the extraordinarily close U.S.-Israeli relationship, based on secret presidential assurances, it is remarkable but true that a number of Israeli leaders feel that at times they have been betrayed by American presidents. Kalb, while explaining the origin of this sense of betrayal, raises a profoundly important question: Isn't it time for the United States and Israel to negotiate a mutual defense treaty? Wouldn't such a treaty help facilitate an Israeli-Palestinian agreement and provide American reassurance for Israel in the nuclear standoff with Iran?
The word of a president can morph into a national commitment, the functional equivalent of a declaration of war. Therefore, whenever a president commits the United States to a policy or course of action, with or increasingly without congressional approval or national debate, it is time to raise the yellow flagwatch out!
MARVIN KALB is the Edward R. Murrow Professor (Emeritus) at Harvard and guest scholar in Foreign Policy at the Brookings Institution. His distinguished journalism career covers thirty years of award-winning reporting and commentary for CBS and NBC, including a stint as the host of Meet the Press. His most recent book is Haunting Legacy: Vietnam and the American Presidency from Ford to Obama (Brookings, 2011), written with Deborah Kalb.
Cover photograph: REUTERS/Baz Ratner
Jacket by Sese-Paul Design
THE ROAD TO WAR
PRESIDENTIAL COMMITMENTS HONORED AND BETRAYED
MARVIN KALB
BROOKINGS INSTITUTION PRESS
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ISBN: 978-0-8157-2493-3 (hardcover : alk. paper)
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To Estelle Levine,
my little sister,
who in her advancing years
has set an example for us all
of courage, dignity, and class
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
THIS BOOK IS one product of my time at the Brookings Institution. It would be foolhardy to list all of my colleagues there who have been so generous with their time, support, and encouragement. They know who I mean. I must, though, name Vassilis Coutifaris, whose technological wizardry always dazzled me, and Melissa Wear, whose grace and intelligence eased my problems with interview transcriptions. I thank them both.
I want also to thank Strobe Talbott and Martin Indyk, who opened the door for me at Brookings and made my time there such a rich and rewarding experience. Brookings is truly an extraordinary place.
At the Brookings Institution Press, a class publisher, I am indebted to Robert Faherty, Chris Kelaher, Melissa McConnell, and Janet Walker for their professional support, and John Felton, who did a superb job of editing.
I am grateful as well to the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, run by Robert Satloff, for its help, especially on U.S.-Israeli relations, and I want also to express my deep gratitude to Michael Freedman, Heather Date, and Lindsay Underwood, my colleagues on the Kalb Report, a program I have done at the National Press Club for the past nineteen years. They were always there at the right time to say the right things.
Finally, no project of mine can ever succeed without the warmth, love, and encouragement of my family: my wife, Mady, who, for the past fifty-five years, has always been at my side, supporting the whole family with goodness, generosity, intelligence, and the sort of love that never dims; my daughters, Deborah and Judith, mothers of my precious grandchildren, Aaron and Eloise, the lights of my lifethanks to all of them for their good cheer, love, and constant support; my sons-in-law, David and Alex, whom I love and admire, both always there when I need help of any kind; David's son, Jeremy, my step-grandson and buddy, who shares with me a love of sports; my brother, Bernard, and his wife, Phyllis, whose passion for Vietnam is contagious; and finally my sister, Estelle, to whom this book is dedicated.
INTRODUCTION
OVER THE YEARS, presidential commitments have come in different shapes and sizes, suggesting honor and integrity, strength and determination, the word of a president backed by the military power of the United States. No trifling matter, in diplomatic affairs. And yet
Some commitments, such as America's to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, have been successful and durable, in part because they have been based on solemn treaties ratified by Congress. Another example is America's commitment to South Korea, also based on a mutual defense treaty, supported by the presence of 28,500 American troops armed with nuclear weapons until December 1991.
South Vietnam represented a very different challenge. It was war by presidential commitment, the United States sliding mindlessly, one administration after another, into a guerrilla war in Indochina, which cost more than 58,000 American lives. Few in Congress or the media questioned the war's provenance or legitimacy, until it was too late.
Finally, in this book, which focuses on American commitments to South Korea, South Vietnam, and Israel, the one to Israel is perhaps the most fascinating. Here we have an unusually close relationship, culturally, religiously, politically in alignment, more or less, yet one without any basis in a formal treaty linking the interests of one nation to the other. It is based primarily on private presidential letters to Israeli prime ministers, rich with American promises and pledges to Israeli security. Over the years many of the promises have been honored, but some were betrayed, leaving feelings of anxiety among Israeli leaders about the ultimate reliability of an American commitment.
