It is hard to take exception to Mr. Lukacs’ brilliant book, A History of the Cold War, which modestly claims to chronicle a brief period, yet brings to its thesis the qualities of a historical-philosophical treatise. Yet we must reject it because it lends intellectual respectability to the disengagement experts who think that the Kremlin is turning into another Madison Avenue and that its masters thirst for fellowship and coexistence. This comes as a painful surprise to the author’s friends, who would never expect Mr. Lukacs, a disciple of Tocqueville, to underrate the significance and power of ideologies, of Marxism.
It is true that his error is not of the Liberal-utopian kind which urges that politics be abolished and replaced by social engineering; in fact,he is exasperated by the simple-minded who seek the secret of world peace in space satellites and evenly distributed power over the earth under a benevolent, avuncular United Nations. But it is nevertheless a grave error, because amidst the vast historical perspectives he sketches, Mr. Lukacs ignores one of the most important political realities of the age. While the world-re-constructionists and other Utopians will not accept (will not even understand) his premises, they will cheer his conclusions.
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