Letters to the Editor

Re: Capacity Building: Opportunity for Enduring Peace by Henry J. Hatch

Professor Baksay,

I admire your courage in publishing a piece by Henry Hatch on an Army point of view on international peace. It is interesting that the Army is developing a foreign policy for the United States, and  encouraging that the policy presented should be so thoughtful and apparently reasonable. I was, however, struck by the stated aims of this policy: "change... toward free and democratic societies and market economies." Are we to assume then, that free and democratic societies are not to be allowed to choose other than market economies?

Alwyn Eades


Hank Hatch responds:

Glad my piece stimulated a response.  First, the views I express are not the Army's at all but mine alone (although perhaps shared by others).  I am not aware that the Army is developing foreign policy -- that's not its role.  The whole point of capacity building (I used to call it nation assistance), is to assist sovereign states to freely achieve what they want.  I believe they stand a far better chance if they are democracies and have market economies.  If they want another form of economy, for example a demand economy such as the failed Soviet Union, so be it.