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PARTISAN REVIEW
pressive in its subtlety and sophistication, the absence of overheated
polemics, and the freedom from ideological cant. There is a kind of
purity of thinking that, by comparison, makes one ashamed of the
inability of so many intellectuals in the West, some of whom one
counts among one's friends, to understand the issues.
What Havel says is not particularly original. But originality is
scarcely required to reply to disingenuous and sloganized politics.
Havel points out, for example, what every schoolchild should know :
that wars are the result not of arms but of fundamental conflicts of
interest, and that the peace propaganda of the Soviet Union, a na–
tion waging a brutal war in Afghanistan and intervening in other
areas, cannot be taken seriously . He also is quietly dismissive of
peace movements that are selective in their attitudes toward different
countries and different questions. His most telling observation is that
a country which enslaves its own people and those of its neighbors
cannot be relied on to keep the peace.
In
fact, it is not peaceful,
though it peddles the rhetoric of peace as part of its propaganda.
I find it hard to believe that in political matters Czech - or
Polish - intellectuals natively are so much more clear-headed than
American ones.
If
it is not in their natures, so to speak, then it must
come from the experience of being too close to the Russians and of
being deprived of their freedom by them. Should this be true, it is a
high price to pay for the ability to see things as they really are. But
maybe this is the sad lesson of our time.
* * *
As I write this, Reagan and Gorbachev are going into what is
ostentatiously called the summit, which is actually a public relations
ploy for both sides. The Russians, I assume, know what they want:
to get as many concessions as they can out of us, particularly for us
to cut down on the nuclear defense program, with themselves giving
up nothing, while pursuing their propaganda war by accusing us of
warlike aims and measures. But why is there so much confusion about
American policy both in the media and by our government spokes–
men? Is it the lack of clarity by our government, or an attempt to
soothe public opinion by pretending that we do not know what the
Russians want and that we will be bargaining in good faith? I suspect
it is a bit of both. The result is to spread an air ofmystery about Rus–
sian intentions and goals. We have become so accustomed to think–
ing of the left as being confused and soft on communism, that we
tend to overlook the political blindness and opportunism of the right,
which is made up of a conglomeration of conflicting ideas and inter-
