The US foreign policy was drastically changed due to the Cold War and Communist controlled countries. The Communist controlled Soviet Union wanted nothing more than to take over and convert neighboring countries and states into likeminded socialists governments. Through the events of the Truman Doctrine, NSC 68, and other anti-communist forces and ideals, the US constructed a completely different approach to how they dealt with world issues.
It all started March 1947 when President Harry S. Truman announced his famous plan for a new US foreign policy. This speech has since then been called the “Truman Doctrine.” In this speech, “Truman officially embraced the containment of Soviet communism as the foundation of the American foreign policy.”
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(“Voices of Freedom” p.213) The countries of Greece and Turkey were being “bullied” by the Soviet Union who was demanding control over a large portion of their lands. Neither countries were democratic but Truman we determined to establish freedom and independence for Greece and Turkey regardless of their government type. The Truman Doctrine was a rallying cry to all anti-communist countries and a “world wide struggle over the future of freedom.” (“Give Me Liberty!” p.710) Truman wanted to make it known that no matter the circumstances, America was ready to build a global military and economical alliance with any country that needed help against the powerful and harassing Soviet Union. The Cold War progressed rapidly the following years after the Truman Doctrine. Many Soviet-American conflicts arose in Europe, China quickly grew into a communist powerhouse and the Soviets developed an atomic bomb to compete with the America’s Manhattan project. At this time in 1949, the United States, Canada and many other European nations founded the North Atlantic Treaty Organization often known as NATO. This organization promised to aid each other from any future Soviet attack. Due to the substantial progresses made by communist nations, the “National Security Council (NSC) in 1950 approved a call for the United States to peruse a global crusade against communism.
(“Voices of Freedom” p.216) This manifesto named NSC 68, explained what a “free society” should look like and claimed that the Soviet Union was compelled to dominate the world and suck the freedom right out of it. NSC 68 believed that individual freedoms should not be interrupted or bothered by the freedoms of other people. We experience freedom in society when we accept diversity and we give others the chance to experience their own importance and meaning in life. NSC 68 believed their idea of freedom was being constantly challenged by the Soviet Union and quickly decided to increase military spending to protect free men from the “idea of slavery under the grim oligarchy of the Kremlin.” (“Give Me Liberty!” p.715)
I personally believe that President Truman was just in preparing America for future communist issues at home and abroad. The Truman Doctrine set a solid foundation and game plan for how America’s policy with foreign nations will combat egregious evils. The years following Truman’s famous speech set the course and prepared NSC 68 to take a stand against the rapid growth of communist nations. The Truman Doctrine and NSC 68 had one important similar vision, protecting the humanitarian freedoms of all anti-communists nations and their
inhabitants. After the Cold War, President Jimmy Carter expressed that he didn’t agree with how American was handling their foreign policy. Carter “criticized his predecessors’ tendencies to ally with Third World dictatorships in order to pursue the policy of containing communism.” (“Voices of Freedom” p.308) Carter wanted a policy based on democratic principles which would show the world the power and care that comes from a democratic government. For the first time in American history human rights were welcomed in America’s foreign policy. Carter was wanting to help other countries deal with social and economic issues and get away from the communist vs. anti-communist feud that had been raging for decades. “Carter believed that in the post-Vietnam era, American foreign policy should de-emphasize Cold War thinking.” (“Give Me Liberty!” p.822) Promoting human rights, combating poverty/hunger and limiting the amount of nuclear weapons worldwide should be more important than fighting against the fear of a communist uprising. Carter’s new foreign policy was put to test when in 1979, the Iranian government was overthrown and turned into an Islamic republic. Carter teaming up with Iran for many economical and human rights agendas and the opposition began to grow hateful of American involvement and presence. Following the events of the government being overthrown, the American embassy was seized and sixty-six hostages were taken. These hostages were not released until Carter ended his presidency some three years later. The US as been through quite a bit of foreign policy changes within its lifetime. Being controlled by the British Empire for many years has given our founding fathers the knowledge of what it means to be controlled and manipulated against ones will and by tyrannical force. The United States will forever stand up and fight against nations and groups that are determined to enslave and rip the freedoms from the innocent.
Influenced by the fear of communism by American society and containment beliefs of people like George Kennan, who advocated that the US should use diplomatic, economic, and military action to contain communism, Truman established the Truman Doctrine, which stated that the US would protect democracies throughout the world, pledging the US would fight it around the world. This doctrine was an extension to both the Monroe Doctrine and the Roosevelt Corollary. In dealing with foreign policy, Truman did everything to protect nations of being consumed by communism, such as the Berlin Airlift, in which Truman decided to avoid the Soviet blockade of West Berlin and flew supplies directly over to the people in need. In Asia, Truman decided to use limited warfare, meaning the lack of atomic weapons, and was highly criticized by Douglas MacArthur, commander of the army, who he later dismissed for not following US policy.
The alliance formed between the US and USSR during the second world war was not strong enough to overcome the decades of uneasiness which existed between the two ideologically polar opposite countries. With their German enemy defeated, the two emerging nuclear superpowers no longer had any common ground on which to base a political, economical, or any other type of relationship. Tensions ran high as the USSR sought to expand Soviet influence throughout Europe while the US and other Western European nations made their opposition to such actions well known. The Eastern countries already under Soviet rule yearned for their independence, while the Western countries were willing to go to great lengths to limit Soviet expansion. "Containment of 'world revolution' became the watchword of American foreign policy throughout the 1950s a...
To start off the Cold war, Russia had lost twenty-seven million soldiers in World War II. Stalin was not going to allow the Germany to attack Russia again . To make sure of this , Stalin made East Europe his buffer zone.The United states could not allow the this to contunie to happen. The first example was the Truman Doctrine, that declared the the Untited States would support “free people”. The Doctrine was followed by the Marshall Plan which gave 12 billion dollars in aid European democracies so that communist ideas would not be so attractive. These were some of the long term , patient policies the United States did to
During the Cold War, the United States engaged in many aggressive policies both at home and abroad, in which to fight communism and the spread of communist ideas. Faced with a new challenge and new global responsibilities, the U.S. needed to retain what it had fought so strongly for in World War II. It needed to contain the communist ideas pouring from the Soviet Union while preventing communist influence at home, without triggering World War III. With the policies of containment, McCarthyism, and brinkmanship, the United States hoped to effectively stop the spread of communism and their newest threat, the Soviet Union. After the war, the United States and the Soviet Union had very different ideas on how to rebuild.
Russia, as a communist state, wanted to spread communism. This is seen through Document 6, where Stalin is portrayed asking the question- who should be freed from freedom next? In other words, who should the Russians free from democracy, or spread communism to? America felt a communist world is dangerous, and thus stood obstacle in the Soviet Union’s path to spread communism. Just as the Soviets wanted to spread communism, the United States wanted to contain communism. Document 4 effectively portrays this policy. The Document is the speech where President Truman is explaining the Truman Doctrine in which the US is to protect any nation battling communist pressures. The speech splits the world into communist and democratic camps, intensifying the nations’ thirsts for more power and stifling the other’s power. Within Document 3, Kennan states that the only way to influence the Soviet Union is through force. One way this force took form was through international organizations. The democracies of the world, fearful of communism’s spread, created the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Those who made up the organization were to aid each other if attacked. In this way, they could fight the spread of communism through force, in turn, influence the Soviets. The US, as a part of NATO, was now taking direct steps against the Soviet Union, and thus steps toward the Cold War. To counter NATO, the communists formed the Warsaw Pact. This had same purpose as NATO, and hence was also a step toward the Cold War. The different beliefs of the Soviet Union and the United States incited the Cold
The Soviet Union began to view the United States as a threat to communism, and the United States began to view the Soviet Union as a threat to democracy. On March 12, 1947, Truman gave a speech in which he argued that the United States should support nations trying to resist Soviet imperialism. Truman and his advisors created a foreign policy that consisted of giving reconstruction aid to Europe, and preventing Russian expansionism. These foreign policy decisions, as well as his involvement in the usage of the atomic bomb, raise the question of whether or not the Cold War can be blamed on Truman. Supporting the view that Truman was responsible for the Cold War, Arnold Offner argues that Truman’s parochialism and nationalism caused him to make contrary foreign policy decisions without regard to other nations, which caused the intense standoff between the Soviet Union and America that became the Cold War (Offner 291)....
The Truman doctrine was to stop the spread of communism and it was used to stop the south part of Vietnam becoming communists like the north So America sent in money and all the help they could to stop Vietnam becoming a communist country. Vietnam was part of the French empire. However, during World War 2 the Japanese took over .The Vietnamese communist movement Vietminh was formed to resist the Japanese. France tried to repossess Vietnam at the end of the war but the Vietminh fought back. With the United States lending its financial support to France, when the Japanese defeated France, the United States sent money and military consultants to the non-communist government of South Vietnam. ~ Other advisors however doubted that such an action could reverse the disastrous course of the war and warned the president that it could lead inevitably to deeper involvement in an Asian land war the United States couldn't win. (The Debate over Vietnam Page, 30)
foreign policy. A year after the Truman Doctrine started the Cold War, in 1948 the Soviets blockaded Berlin forcing the U.S. to airlift supplies to the distressed country. This effort conducted by America was a way for them to establish their dominance over the Soviets and proving that they cannot be stopped. In 1949, the communists took over China and was able to detonate their first atomic bomb. This created a setback for America as they were no longer the sole owner of a functioning nuclear weapon. This began the war against the communists and the capitalists, as demonstrated by the Korean War in 1950 and the Vietnam War in 1954. During these wars, communism was battled by fighting with efforts to contain the advancement of the Soviet’s efforts. The wars shaped U.S. foreign policy because they were able to determine which alliances could benefit America and help them to remain the strongest superpower in the world.
In addition to the prevention of communism, President Truman’s decision was also influenced by the apprehensive environment during The Cold War. The Soviet Union was able to ruin the United States as the monopoly of nuclear bombs in 1949 when they successfully detonated their firs...
The report drafted alongside recommendations for the military strategy was to be issued to President Truman following the socialists (communists) over the nationalists' movement triumph in China and the Soviet atomic bomb detonation. The U.S did not want communism to be spread into the western region since the USSR was there enemy and people could be turned against themselves if they took over. The NSC-68 as it is commonly known, after it being disseminated all over the U.S, it became a foreign policy and all the country’s economic and diplomatic containment strategies were all converted to one involving the military. With the growth of the Soviet Union at the time, Cold War had made the Americans believe that the USSR had outsmarted the U.S. And with the tension growing and the communists infiltrating the U.S government slowly, if the USSR had attacked the U.S, they would have won and Communism will have ruled the U.S. The diplomatic and economic strategies that the U.S was using in order to make peace with the Soviet Union could not have borne any fruits. This is the reason why the National Security Council (NSC) Report 68 helped in turning all these strategies into military involvement and making the report a blueprint for the U.S's foreign policy. The NSC-68 proved to be of great importance and after militarizing all the strategies, the Cold War eased and ended by 1950’s when the USSR and U.S joined forces. It was also the NSC-68 Report the ended McCarthyism in the U.S brought along with the Cold
In April of 1950, an announcement to the President of the United States was made, expressing the unavoidable plan of the Soviet Union to assume control over the world by its aspiration to wind up the single overwhelming politically influential nation by growing communism and Soviet expert to non-Soviet zone's of the world, popularly known as NSC 68. Furthermore, NSC 68 was a document handed to the president for the betterment of the United States’ Military when Soviet Union was highly influential. The Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union was as its exponential peak after the world war II. Numerous nations in the Europe endured tremendous misfortunes and the conditions at that point, saw the two
President Truman distinguished his policy of dismantling communism, not through military means, but through the form of economic aid to countries under communist threat (Document B). However, while Truman may have preached universal funding for nations in need, American financial commitments exemplify otherwise. Between 1948- 1952, American provided billions in assistance to traditional allies, including the United Kingdom and France; conversely, many weaker nations received a fraction of the funding allocated to America’s closest allies (Document C). The hypocrisy of the United States, coupled with underfunding, were indicative of a failed strategy to contain the future spread of communism. First, the basic issue here is the lack of funding provided to countries who desperately needed U.S. aid. By providing minuscule amounts of funding, democratic countries were destined for failure. Without the economic aid of the United States, countries would continue to fall to the sheer enormity of the communist movement. Therefore, the misallocation of funds was a fundamental misstep of the government in their efforts to combat communism. Secondly, the United States was portrayed as a betrayer across the globe. Publically, the leader of the United States promised money to countries combatting communist insurgencies; however,
America’s Policy of Containment was introduced by George Kennan in 1947. This policy had a few good points but many more bad points.Kennan's depiction of communism as a "malignant parasite" that had to be contained by all possible measures became the basis of the Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan, and National Security Act in 1947. In his Inaugural Address of January 20, 1949, Truman made four points about his "program for peace and freedom": to support the UN, the European Recovery Program, the collective defence of the North Atlantic, and a “bold new program” for technical aid to poor nations. Because of his programs, "the future of mankind will be assured in a world of justice, harmony and peace." Containment was not just a policy. It was a way of life.
The Truman Doctrine became the basis of American foreign policy aimed at stopping the spread of communism. The USA was prepared to send economic and financial aid to Greece and Turkey. Soon after the Truman Doctrine, President Truman sent General George Marshall to Europe.
Although the United States and Soviet Union were allies during World War Two they were soon faced with many opposing views soon after the war ended. Joseph Stalin the leader of the Soviet Union had wanted to gain complete control of Eastern Europe most importantly Germany and make it a communist society. Here in the US Truman started to worry about the spread of communism in Eastern Europe. The anticipation of the spread of communism was concerning Truman as if it did proceed to happen it would be greatly affecting the United States economy. It would limit trade with other countries and it opposed everything the United States system of laissez-faire economics believed in. In the meantime the people in the Soviet Union were barely surviving, and it did not seem that it was Stalin’s major concern at the time; he was more interested in taking over Eastern Europe then taking care of the people in his own country. This continued fight over who was to control what parts of Eastern Europe put an even farther wedge between the Unites States and the Soviets.