If the politics are defensive, vague, well-meaning but essentially non-committed, psychological warfare has to avoid making blunders. In World War II we could not say that we were against one-party states, because our largest ally (Russia) was a one-party state. We could not attack the ruin of free enterprise by the Japanese and German governments since socialism existed on the Allied side too. We could not bring up the racial issue, because our own national composition rendered us vulnerable to racial politics at home. There was a huge catalog of _Don'ts_ (usually not written down but left to individual judgment) in every propaganda office. Whenever we violated them, we paid the price in adverse opinion. =Promises.= Finally, psychological warfare must avoid promises that may not be kept. The Americans during World War II never promised much as a government, but individual American agents promised all sorts of things which could not be delivered. We promised the Dutch their homeland and empire by implication; we promised the Indonesians self-government, also by implication; and we promised everybody, including the Japanese, access to Indonesian raw materials. It is highly probable that individual Americans, off-the-record, stated that they "expected," "hoped," or "thought" that their government would fulfill each of these promises. The three are not compatible, especially the first and second. The New York banker, James Warburg, has written a book, _Unwritten Treaty_, pointing out that the United States promised just about everything to everybody during the war (he was in OWI and he ought to know), and that it is going to take a generous, wise, and intelligent foreign policy to fulfill--even in part--the promises which we made. The promises of the loser are forgotten; he can write them off and start international policies with a clean slate. But the promises of the victor remain, and have to be carried out or else repudiated.