Why did President Carter abandon his anti-nuke pledge to embrace nuclear war fighting capability by the end of his Presidency? Was this due to developing strategic clarity or was it a sign of political division within his administration? Can realpolitik advocates claim that knowledge is power, that successful political manipulation uses knowledge to wield power; thus objectivity is self-promoting because it pays a straightforward dividend? Did the advent of the atomic bomb forever change the nature of warfare and therefore the science of strategy? Or, perhaps, can it be argued that nuclear anxiety provided the conditions for the possibility of endorsing a new mindset rationalizing hegemony and escalation dominance as the surest means to obtain security? This paper draws on newly available documents in Carter’s Presidential archive which indicate that Carter’s team came into office with a plan to out compete the Soviets in using economics and culture, but left office admitting that the capacity and intent to threaten brute force trumps. I investigate whether bilateralism and liberalism are casualties of rigorous strategic science; or whether a new view of rationality articulated in game theory and systems analysis incorporated the assumption that violence is a de facto, measurable and non-negotiable currency of nature. The stakes of this debate are over whether one views communication as a means of organization superseding the cause and effect deployment of force, or whether communicative efficacy is epiphenomenal to causally intervening in the world to realize interests.
Location: Science Center Building, 2nd Floor, Room 252
Lunch will be served. Please RSVP to Deborah at valdovin@fas.harvard.edu.
