Implications of involvement

America’s military withdrawal from mainland Southeast Asia is widely considered to mark a turning point in American foreign policy - that is, away from intervention in the internal affairs of Third World countries. This is how the Nixon administration’s policy of detente with Russia and rapprochement with China - following Johnson’s reversal in Vietnam -is customarily represented. ¹ This and the policies of subsequent administrations seem to denote an end to the ideological fervour and practical excesses of the era of containment, which had resulted in over-commitment to ‘unsound’ causes; and to mark the beginning of - in Europe terms, a return to - the ‘realistic’ management of balance of power. Yet the implications of managing the global balance need to be explored. They are by no means as reassuring as its advocates believe.