Making the world safe for democracy: a century of Wilsonianism and its totalitarian challengers

422 Pages·1997·1 MB·English

by  Amos Perlmutter

Making the World Safe for Democracy : A
title: Century of Wilsonianism and Its Totalitarian
Challengers
author: Perlmutter, Amos.
publisher: University of North Carolina Press
isbn10 | asin: 0807823651
print isbn13: 9780807823651
ebook isbn13: 9780807863848
language: English
World politics--20th century--Case studies,
subject
Wilson, Woodrow,--1856-1924--Influence.
publication date: 1997
lcc: D445.P395 1997eb
ddc: 973.91/3
World politics--20th century--Case studies,
subject:
Wilson, Woodrow,--1856-1924--Influence.
Page i
Making the World Safe for Democracy
Page ii
OTHER BOOKS BY AMOS PERLMUTTER
FDR and Stalin: A Not So Grand Alliance, 1943-45
The Life and Times of Menachem Begin
Israel: The Partitioned State
Modern Authoritarianism
Political Roles and Military Rulers
Political Role of the Military (with V. Bennett)
Politics and the Military in Israel, 1967-77
The Military and Politics in Modern Times
Egypt, the Praetorian State
Anatomy of Political Institutionalization:
The Case of Israel and Some Comparative Analysis
Military and Politics in Israel:
Nation Building and Role Expansion
Page iii
Making the World Safe for Democracy
A Century of Wilsonianism and Its Totalitarian
Challengers
By Amos Perlmutter
The University of North Carolina Press
Chapel Hill & London
Page iv
© 1997
The University of North Carolina Press
All rights reserved
Designed by Richard Hendel
Set in Carter & Cone Galliard
by Eric M. Brooks
Illustration © 1997 Ed Lindlof
Manufactured in the United States of America
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and
durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book
Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Perlmutter,
Amos.
Making the world safe for democracy: a century of Wilsonianism and
its totalitarian challengers/by Amos Perlmutter.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-8078-2365-1 (alk. paper)
1. World politics20th centuryCase studies.
2. Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924Influence. I. Title.
D445.P395 1998
973.91'3dc21 97-9883
CIP
01 00 99 98 97 5 4 3 2 1
Page v
This book is dedicated
with love and affection to
Sharon Elizabeth Watts,
a wonderful human being.
Page vii
Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xv
Introduction. 1
The Age of Totalitarianism:
New and Old International Orders
Chapter 1. Radicalization, Mobilization, and the Post-1919 16
International Chaos
Chapter 2. Wilsonianism in Theory and Practice: 28
Its Rise and Demise
Chapter 3. The Communist World Order: 60
Leninism in the Disguise of a New Imperialism
Chapter 4. Nazism: 81
The Racial World Order
Chapter 5. Resurrection of Wilsonianism: 98
FDR
Chapter 6. Balance of Power, Balance of Terror, and the 111
Cold War
Chapter 7. The Kremlin's Cold War after Stalin 141
Chapter 8. A "New" New World Order? 154
Notes 167
Bibliography 175
Index 183

Page ix
Preface
This book describes, analyzes, and evaluates the three most significant
world orders of the twentieth century: the Wilsonian order, the
Leninist/Stalinist order, and the Hitlerian order. The major reason for
this choice is that world order can be set only by a hegemonial power,
an industrial, technological, and military power. The three world
systems were anchored in three hegemonial states: the United States,
the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany.
I further claim that the ambitions and orientations of these three great
powers were ideological. The ideology represented the motivations,
purposes, directions, and consequences of the three pretenders to
world order. Only these three states could organize and mobilize an
industrial, military, and political system to enable them not only to
establish a world order but also to influence the international system.
All hegemonial powers, by definition of being military, industrial, and
economic powers, are interventionist. The Wilsonian influence and
role in interventionism set the pattern for most American
interventions. These interventions were covert through the use of
agents and other diplomatic, political, and military means. U.S.
intervention in Mexico in 1913, America's "secret war against
Bolshevism," and its subsequent intervention in the Russian civil war
(1917-20) demonstrate the methods and steps of the American style of
intervention: the withdrawal of American diplomatic representatives,
the imposition of an arms embargo on the regime, the blockade of the
ports, the use of the marines, and the imposition of moral and
economic sanctions. The use of very limited military intervention, as
in the case of Mexico and the Russian civil war, and of intelligence
gathering and covert action was enhanced by Woodrow Wilson
beginning in 1914. The conspicuous use of covert action during