Thinking about Herman Kahn

Abstract

George Kennan once observed that when it comes to understanding Soviet Union there are no experts, only varying degrees of ignorance. He would not, presumably, dissent from proposition that skillful use of political and military power on our part was necessary to deter both Soviet adventurism and aggression. No one, of course, much likes having to deal with such doubt, ignorance, and uncertainty foreign policy, but most practitioners learn to accept these aspects as unavoidable and to develop ways to deal with unknown. Normally speaking, any confession of uncertainty about a foe's intentions and capabilities leads one to try to overcome these threatening potentials. In very simple terms, less we know about how powerful an enemy is, more we tend to increase our own power, just case. We are committed to search for power; we take pride skillful and prudent exercise of power; and we spend more rationalizing this process than we do examining its appropriateness. Suffice it to say that squeamish men do not win doctorates politics any more than they rise to power Department of Defense. The emphasis on being tough minded, on being prepared for any conceivable contingency, and on desiring always to negotiate from a position of strength are illustrative of our thinking about political life, and much more. The sum of what is taught our universities and practiced within and between nations is that power counts. But power is a very large concept with a good many variations. There is no one power theory of future; there are only various competing power theories concerning several alternative futures. Sorrow intensifies, however, as we recognize that our choices have been rigged. Even conceding multiplicity of power theories about tomorrow's world most striking differences simply concern when disaster will become master, not whether it shall. When it comes to future, then, there are not many optimists, only varying degrees of despair. This despair partially results from our uncertainty about kind of world we would like to create. We like to call this a crisis values. But it also stems from a recognition that probability of disaster long run has been increased by very ways which we have succeeded short run. How ironic that failures of future are being created by successes of past. Here one need not go beyond a discussion of the war trap or the population trap to understand these ironies. But there is one more giant sleeping our midst and his name is ecological collapse. The point is that some futures are more probable than others simply as a result of what we have been doing past. Where is evidence that in nick of time we shall change our ways significantly enough to permit an acceleration of evolutionary potential within man? No, our talk