Counsel to the President: A Memoir (review)

174 SAISREVIEW economic development. Critiquing the mystification offree-market economics as extolled by the U.S. Government and press, Chomsky demonstrates the terrible human costs of "economic liberalization" to the working and peasant classes. Drawing on case studies of Africa, Latin America, Asia and South America Chomsky shows that "policies [of] the Western powers . . . are guided by the selfinterest of those who hold the reins, not by any solid understanding of the economics of development or any serious concern for the human impact of these decisions." In this analysis Chomsky describes all states as "two-tiered" systems consisting ofone class ruling oppressively, the other toiling hopelessly. Chomsky uses a dualistic approach because he seeks to prove that the ruling class in the United States is establishing an oligarchic network—a supranational ruling class—throughout the world to secure mutual, elite interests. Here, though, Chomsky unnecessarily overdraws his case, resorting to a vulgar Marxian conceptualization ofstates that renders his work heavily polemical. The complexity of bureaucratic states precludes a binary class analysis, though it does not obviate a structuralist approach to U.S. foreign policy. In Brazil, Egypt, the Philippines and elsewhere poverty exists on a vast scale but at the same time a large, state-supported middle class prevails outside the two-tier society Chomsky describes, calling into question aspects of his thesis. Chomsky also oversimplifies the role of democracy in development. While he blames Brazil's economic failure on the overthrow of democracy twenty-five years ago, he attributes South Korea's economic success in the same period to the authoritative state. Chomsky inadvertently proves the uncertain role democracy plays in economic development. Despite these simplifications, Chomsky persuasively chronicles the U.S. pursuit of a reactionary "stability" that is hostile to liberty and workers but amenable to U.S. business interests in resource extraction from the Third World. Cautioning against a global politics bereft of a balance against U.S. power, Chomsky reveals the hypocrisy of the "new world order ... in which no nation must surrender one iota of its own sovereignty, an order characterized by the rule oflaw rather than the resort to force, the cooperative settlement ofdisputes rather than anarchy and bloodshed, and an unstinting belief in human rights," announced by George Bush so soon after he had ignored diplomatic initiatives and the American constitution to invade Iraq and kill 200,000 Iraqis. Counsel to the President: A Memoir. By Clark Clifford with Richard Holbrooke. New York: Random House, 1991. 709 pp. Reviewed by Bill S. Mikhail, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Government and Foreign Affairs, University of Virginia. Clark Clifford portrays and analyzes four decades of American foreign and domestic policies in Counsel to the President. The author was present at the creation of America's international commitments and its rise to globalism following the end of World War II. He presided over the Pentagon at a time BOOK REVIEWS 175 when America's involvement in Vietnam reached its nadir. He remained an influential consultant to both government and business. The book is an extensive survey ofthe author's involvement in presidential decision-making processes and the White House bureaucracy. Clark Clifford started his career as a trial lawyer in Missouri. He was recruited as a naval aide to President Truman. Gradually, he rose in the White House hierarchy to serve as Counselor to the President. From this relationship with Truman interesting details emerge about the origin ofthe Cold War, Winston Churchill's "Iron Curtain" speech, the Marshall Plan, the National SecurityAct, the "Truman Doctrine," the atomic bomb and the recognition of the state of Israel. Clifford provides insights into all these major policies. Having been a White House insider, the author is able to portray vividly the character and style of the prominent figures in the Truman administrations like Henry Wallace, George Marshall, James Forrestall, Averell Harriman and Dean Acheson. The origin of the policy of containment has been the subject of an endless debate among scholars. Along with George Kennan who wrote his "long telegram " from Moscow in February 1946, Clifford was asked to submit a report to the president analyzing the status ofAmerican-Soviet relations in September of 1946. The report, known as...