well or as long as our problems seem clear and finite and manageable. But... when some event or leader of opinion has aroused the people to a state of high emotion, our puritan spirit has tended to break through, leading us to look at the world through the distorting prism of a harsh and angry moralism. Fulbright also related his opposition to any American tendencies to intervene in the affairs of other nations: Power tends to confuse itself with virtue and a great nation is particularly susceptible to the idea that its power is a sign of God's favor, conferring upon it a special responsibility for other nations—to make them richer and happier and wiser, to remake them, that is, in its own shining image. Power confuses itself with virtue and tends also to take itself for omnipotence. Once imbued with the idea of a mission, a great nation easily assumes that it has the means as well as the duty to do God's work. He was also a strong believer in international law: Law is the essential foundation of stability and order both within societies and in international relations. As a conservative power, the United States has a vital interest in upholding and expanding the reign of law in international relations. Insofar as international law is observed, it provides us with stability and order and with a means of predicting the behavior of those with whom we have reciprocal legal obligations. When we violate the law ourselves, whatever short-term advantage may be gained, we are obviously encouraging others to violate the law; we thus encourage disorder and instability and thereby do incalculable damage to our own long-term interests. Cold War and communism Like his friend Adlai Stevenson II, Fulbright was regarded as a "Cold War liberal." Fulbright viewed the Cold War as a struggle between the United States and a new imperialist Russia. To that end, he advocated vigorous aid and armament for Europe as opposed to a global anti-communist policy, which would include opposition to the People's Republic of China. Fulbright additionally believed that conflict with the Soviet Union would almost certainly lead to nuclear war and potentially global annihilation. He initially favored the policy of containment of the Soviet Union, instead of the more aggressive rollback policy. Fulbright saw the Cold War as more of a political struggle than a military struggle and criticized excessive military spending