G. Kennan's Quote (was, Re: How to be a contortionist, by Michael Hardt)

["Gilles d'Aymery" <aymery@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

[Gilles wrote]
Is anyone aware of the full text of the Kennan's Policy Planning Study
23? I've read this ominous quote time an again. Would be interesting
and useful to read the full text.

[Lou Paulsen wrote]
It's here:
http://www.j-bradford-delong.net/movable_type/archives/000567.html

[Gilles]
Thanks Lou. Very interesting to read the quote in its context. Actually,
the quote used by Louis (Proyect) -- which is identical to that used by
Chomsky in "What Uncle Sams Really Wants" (see
http://www.zmag.org/chomsky/sam/sam-1-2.html) -- is a 'misquote'
or a collage of quotations. I am appending the exact quotes below.

In any case, this quote has been the object of quite a few comments
on the Web. See:
http://maxspeak.org/gm/archives/00000406.html   and
- http://www.j-bradford-
delong.net/movable_type/archives/000568.html  (scroll down)

[The Kennan's quote]
This being the case, we must be very careful when we speak of
exercising ?leadership? in Asia. We are deceiving ourselves and others
when we pretend to have the answers to the problems which agitate
many of these Asiatic peoples.

Furthermore, we have about 50% of the world's wealth but only
6.3% of its population. This disparity is particularly great as between
ourselves and the peoples of Asia. In this situation, we cannot fail to
be the object of envy and resentment. Our real task in the coming
period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to
maintain this position of disparity without positive detriment to our
national security. To do so, we will have to dispense with all
sentimentality and day-dreaming; and our attention will have to be
concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We
need not deceive ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of
altruism and world-benefaction.

For these reasons, we must observe great restraint in our attitude
toward the Far Eastern areas. The peoples of Asia and of the Pacific
area are going to go ahead, whatever we do, with the development of
their political forms and mutual interrelationships in their own way.
This process cannot be a liberal or peaceful one. The greatest of the
Asiatic peoples?the Chinese and the Indians?have not yet even
made a beginning at the solution of the basic demographic problem
involved in the relationship between their food supply and their birth
rate. Until they find some solution to this problem, further hunger,
distress, and violence are inevitable. All of the Asiatic peoples are
faced with the necessity for evolving new forms of life to conform to
the impact of modern technology. This process of adaptation will also
be long and violent. It is not only possible, but probable, that in the
course of this process many peoples will fall, for varying periods,
under the influence of Moscow, whose ideology has a greater lure for
such peoples, and probably greater reality, than anything we could
oppose to it. All this, too, is probably unavoidable; and we could not
hope to combat it without the diversion of a far greater portion of our
national effort than our people would ever willingly concede to such a
purpose.

In the face of this situation we would be better off to dispense now
with a number of the concepts which have underlined our thinking with
regard to the Far East. We should dispense with the aspiration to ?be
liked? or to be regarded as the repository of a high-minded
international altruism. We should stop putting ourselves in the position
of being our brothers' keeper and refrain from offering moral and
ideological advice. We should cease to talk about vague and?for the
Far East?unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the
living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we
are going to have to deal in straight power concepts. The less we are
then hampered by idealistic slogans, the better.

We should recognize that our influence in the Far Eastern area in the
coming period is going to be primarily military and economic.
[End quote]

Gilles d'Aymery

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