徐復觀素負文名，其雜文中包括三百餘篇國際時論，涵蓋範圍自1950 年代至1980 年代初，與冷戰時代大致重疊。本文根據這些時論，討論他如何評價領導自由陣營對抗共產集團的美國，以了解冷戰時代新儒家看待世局的角度。徐復觀批評美國打壓各國民族主義、支持反共獨裁政權，但整體而言，他是站在「諍友」的立場上對美國求全責備。他認為蘇聯的侵略野心才是冷戰時期的禍源，而美國以雄大的氣魄領導自由世界對抗蘇聯，它本身不構成「霸權」。只是，為了避免第三次世界大戰爆發，美國對共產集團採取守勢而非攻勢，只求圍堵、不求勝利，以致最終在中南半島鎩羽而歸。就美國國內社會而言，徐復觀對它日趨物質感官頗有微詞，對60 年代反文化運動更不以為然；但從處理水門事件的公正、公開上，他看到了美國民主制度的光輝。曾經擔任蔣介石參謀的徐復觀深知國際政治講利害、重實力，但他更相信人類的良心理性在現實與歷史中發揮的作用。他觀察全球政治，在國家興亡、政權起落之際驗證中國傳統政治智慧，對儒家思想與民主政治的信心益發堅定。從他的評論中，我們可以發現新儒家強烈的道德的理想主義，使其主張有別於大多數國關專家的現實主義。

The famous scholar and polemicist Xu Fuguan wrote more than three hundred short essays on international politics during the Cold War era. These commentaries revealed a New Confucian perspective on the world order shaped by the confrontation between the USSR and the US in general, and the leading role that the US played in the Western Bloc in particular. Xu denounced the imperialistic Soviet Union as the major threat to world peace, therefore he never regarded the US as a “hegemony” while it engaging in the Korean War and Vietnam War. For fear of the outbreak of the third world war, the US adopted the policy of containment instead of a more decisive approach, to Xu’s disappointment. The prolonged war caused great upheavals domestically and internationally, eventually leading to its defeat in the battlefield of Vietnam. In addition to the discontent with American strategy in Vietnam, Xu was also critical of the US for its aggressive missionary activities and its support of anti-communist dictators in Asia. However, he did not challenge the world leadership of the US in the second half of the 20th century; he even admired the merits of American democracy for dealing with the Watergate Scandal transparently and impartially. Once a major general and Chiang Kai-shek’s staff officer, Xu fully realized how power worked in international politics. As a New Confucian, he nevertheless put more emphasis on the importance of conscience and morality in the political arena. His long-term observation of the ups and downs of different regimes globally strengthened not only his faith in democracy, but also his confidence in Confucianism. Such moral idealism rendered his Cold War discourses distinctively different from the realism of most international-relations specialists.