Truman Doctrine

Last updated

Presidential portrait of U.S. President Harry Truman HarryTruman.jpg
Presidential portrait of U.S. President Harry Truman

The Truman Doctrine is an American foreign policy that pledges American "support for democracies against authoritarian threats." [1] The doctrine originated with the primary goal of countering the growth of the Soviet bloc during the Cold War. It was announced to Congress by President Harry S. Truman on March 12, 1947, [2] and further developed on July 4, 1948, when he pledged to oppose the communist rebellions in Greece and Soviet demands from Turkey. More generally, the Truman Doctrine implied American support for other nations threatened by Moscow. It led to the formation of NATO in 1949. Historians often use Truman's speech to Congress on March 12, 1947 to date the start of the Cold War. [3]

Contents

Truman told Congress that "it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." [4] Truman contended that because totalitarian regimes coerced free peoples, they automatically represented a threat to international peace and the national security of the United States. Truman argued that if Greece and Turkey did not receive the aid, they would inevitably fall out of the United States' sphere of influence and into the communist bloc, with grave consequences throughout the region.

The Truman Doctrine was informally extended to become the basis of American Cold War policy throughout Europe and around the world. [5] It shifted U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union from a wartime alliance to containment of Soviet expansion, as advocated by diplomat George Kennan.

Turkish Straits crisis

The Turkish Straits Turkish Strait disambig.svg
The Turkish Straits

At the conclusion of World War II, Turkey was pressured by the Soviet government to allow Russian shipping to flow freely through the Turkish Straits, which connected the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. As the Turkish government would not submit to the Soviet Union's requests, tensions arose in the region, leading to a show of naval force on the site of the Straits. Since British assistance to Turkey had ended in 1947, the U.S. dispatched military aid to ensure that Turkey would retain chief control of the passage. Turkey received $100 million in economic and military aid and the U.S. Navy sent the Midway-class aircraft carrier USS Franklin D. Roosevelt. [6]

Greek crisis

King George II of Greece (r. 1922-24, 1935-47), whose rule was opposed by a communist insurgency in the Greek Civil War Georgeiiofgreece.jpg
King George II of Greece (r. 1922–24, 1935–47), whose rule was opposed by a communist insurgency in the Greek Civil War

Seven weeks after the Axis powers abandoned Greece in October 1944, the British helped retake Athens from the victorious National Liberation Front (EAM), controlled effectively by the Greek Communist Party (KKE). This began with a mass killing of largely unarmed EAM supporters known as the Dekemvriana on December 3, 1944. [7] The left-wing attempted to retaliate, but was outgunned by the British-backed government and subjected to the White Terror. [8] With the full outbreak of civil war (1946–49), guerrilla forces controlled by the Greek Communist Party sustained a revolt against the internationally recognized Greek government which was formed after 1946 elections boycotted by the KKE. The British realized that the KKE were being directly funded by Josip Broz Tito in neighboring Yugoslavia. In line with the Churchill-Stalin "percentages agreement", the Greek communists received no help from the Soviet Union, and Yugoslavia provided them support and sanctuary against Stalin's wishes. [9] By late 1946, Britain informed the United States that due to its own weakening economy, it could no longer continue to provide military and economic support to royalist Greece. [10]

In 1946–47, the United States and the Soviet Union moved from being wartime allies to Cold War adversaries. The breakdown of Allied cooperation in Germany provided a backdrop of escalating tensions for the Truman Doctrine. [5] To Truman, the growing unrest in Greece began to look like a pincer movement against the oil-rich areas of the Middle East and the warm-water ports of the Mediterranean. [11]

George F. Kennan (1904-2005) proposed the doctrine of containment in 1946 Kennan.jpeg
George F. Kennan (1904–2005) proposed the doctrine of containment in 1946

In February 1946, Kennan, an American diplomat in Moscow, sent his famed "Long Telegram", which predicted the Soviets would only respond to force and that the best way to handle them would be through a long-term strategy of containment; that is, stopping their geographical expansion. After the British warned that they could no longer help Greece, and following Prime Minister Konstantinos Tsaldaris's visit to Washington in December 1946 to ask for American assistance, [12] the U.S. State Department formulated a plan. Aid would be given to both Greece and Turkey, to help cool the long-standing rivalry between them.[ citation needed ]

American policy makers recognized the instability of the region, fearing that if Greece was lost to communism, Turkey would not last long. Similarly, if Turkey yielded to Soviet demands, the position of Greece would be endangered. [13] A regional domino effect threat therefore guided the American decision. Greece and Turkey were strategic allies important for geographical reasons as well, for the fall of Greece would put the Soviets on a particularly dangerous flank for the Turks, and strengthen the Soviet Union's ability to cut off allied supply lines in the event of war. [14]

Truman's address

Truman Doctrine, 03-12-1947, Page 1 (5476286491).jpg
Truman Doctrine, 03-12-1947, Page 2 (5476286595).jpg
President Truman's 1947 Message to Congress, Recommending Assistance to Greece and Turkey

To pass any legislation Truman needed the support of the Republicans, who controlled both houses of Congress. The chief Republican spokesman Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg strongly supported Truman and overcame the doubts of isolationists such as Senator Robert A. Taft. [15] : 127  Truman laid the groundwork for his request by having key congressional leaders meet with himself, Secretary of State George Marshall, and Undersecretary of State Dean Acheson. Acheson laid out the "domino theory" in the starkest terms, comparing a communist state to a rotten apple that could spread its infection to an entire barrel. Vandenberg was impressed, and advised Truman to appear before Congress and "scare the hell out of the American people." [15] : 127–128  On March 7, Acheson warned Truman that the communists in Greece could win within weeks without outside aid. [2] : 545 

When a draft for Truman's address was circulated to policymakers, Marshall, Kennan, and others criticized it for containing excess "rhetoric." Truman responded that, as Vandenberg had suggested, his request would only be approved if he played up the threat. [2] : 546 

On March 12, 1947, Truman appeared before a joint session of Congress. In his eighteen-minute speech, he stated:

I believe it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.

I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.

I believe that our help should be primarily through economic and financial aid which is essential to economic stability and orderly political processes. [2] : 547 

The domestic reaction to Truman's speech was broadly positive, though there were dissenters. Anti-communists in both parties supported both Truman's proposed aid package and the doctrine behind it, and Collier's described it as a "popularity jackpot" for the President. [2] : 548  [15] : 129  Influential columnist Walter Lippmann was more skeptical, noting the open-ended nature of Truman's pledge; he felt so strongly that he almost came to blows while arguing with Acheson over the doctrine. [2] : 549  [16] : 615  Others argued that the Greek monarchy Truman proposed to defend was itself a repressive government, rather than a democracy. [16] : 615 

Despite these objections, the fear that there was a growing communist threat almost guaranteed the bill's passage. [16] : 616  In May 1947, two months after Truman's request, a large majority of Congress approved $400 million in military and economic aid to Greece and Turkey. [2] : 553–554  [15] : 129  Increased American aid assisted the Greek government's defeat of the KKE, after interim defeats for government forces from 1946 to 1948. [16] : 616–617  The Truman Doctrine was the first in a series of containment moves by the United States, followed by economic restoration of Western Europe through the Marshall Plan and military containment by the creation of NATO in 1949.[ citation needed ]

Long-term policy and metaphor

Historian Eric Foner writes that the doctrine "set a precedent for American assistance to anticommunist regimes throughout the world, no matter how undemocratic, and for the creation of a set of global military alliances directed against the Soviet Union." [17]

The Truman Doctrine underpinned American Cold War policy in Europe and around the world. In the words of historian James T. Patterson:

The Truman Doctrine was a highly publicized commitment of a sort the administration had not previously undertaken. Its sweeping rhetoric, promising that the United States should aid all 'free people' being subjugated, set the stage for innumerable later ventures that led to globalisation commitments. It was in these ways a major step. [15] : 129 

The doctrine endured, historian Dennis Merill argues, because it addressed broader cultural insecurity regarding modern life in a globalized world. It dealt with Washington's concern over communism's domino effect, it enabled a media-sensitive presentation of the doctrine that won bipartisan support, and it mobilized American economic power to modernize and stabilize unstable regions without direct military intervention. It brought nation-building activities and modernization programs to the forefront of foreign policy. [5]

The Truman Doctrine became a metaphor for aid to keep a nation from communist influence. Truman used disease imagery not only to communicate a sense of impending disaster in the spread of communism but also to create a "rhetorical vision" of containing it by extending a protective shield around non-communist countries throughout the world. It echoed the "quarantine the aggressor" policy Truman's predecessor, Franklin D. Roosevelt, had sought to impose to contain German and Japanese expansion in 1937 ("quarantine" suggested the role of public health officials handling an infectious disease). The medical metaphor extended beyond the immediate aims of the Truman Doctrine in that the imagery combined with fire and flood imagery evocative of disaster provided the United States with an easy transition to direct military confrontation in later years with the Korean War and the Vietnam War. By framing ideological differences in life or death terms, Truman was able to garner support for this communism-containing policy. [18]

See also

Related Research Articles

The domino theory is a geopolitical theory which posits that increases or decreases in democracy in one country tend to spread to neighboring countries in a domino effect. It was prominent in the United States from the 1950s to the 1980s in the context of the Cold War, suggesting that if one country in a region came under the influence of communism, then the surrounding countries would follow. It was used by successive United States administrations during the Cold War as justification for American intervention around the world. U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower described the theory during a news conference on April 7, 1954, when referring to communism in Indochina as follows:

Finally, you have broader considerations that might follow what you would call the "falling domino" principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dean Acheson</span> American politician and lawyer (1893–1971)

Dean Gooderham Acheson was an American statesman and lawyer. As the 51st U.S. Secretary of State, he set the foreign policy of the Harry S. Truman administration from 1949 to 1953. He was also Truman's main foreign policy advisor from 1945 to 1947, especially regarding the Cold War. Acheson helped design the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan, as well as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. He was in private law practice from July 1947 to December 1948. After 1949 Acheson came under partisan political attack from Republicans led by Senator Joseph McCarthy over Truman's policy toward the People's Republic of China.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">George F. Kennan</span> American diplomat, political scientist, and historian (1904–2005)

George Frost Kennan was an American diplomat and historian. He was best known as an advocate of a policy of containment of Soviet expansion during the Cold War. He lectured widely and wrote scholarly histories of the relations between the USSR and the United States. He was also one of the group of foreign policy elders known as "The Wise Men".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Containment</span> American Cold War foreign policy against the spread of communism

Containment was a geopolitical strategic foreign policy pursued by the United States during the Cold War to prevent the spread of communism after the end of World War II. The name was loosely related to the term cordon sanitaire, which was containment of the Soviet Union in the interwar period.

A United States presidential doctrine comprises the key goals, attitudes, or stances for United States foreign affairs outlined by a president. Most presidential doctrines are related to the Cold War. Though many U.S. presidents had themes related to their handling of foreign policy, the term doctrine generally applies to presidents such as James Monroe, Harry S. Truman, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan, all of whom had doctrines which more completely characterized their foreign policy.

United States Objectives and Programs for National Security, better known as NSC 68, was a 66-page top secret National Security Council (NSC) policy paper drafted by the Department of State and Department of Defense and presented to President Harry S. Truman on 7 April 1950. It was one of the most important American policy statements of the Cold War. In the words of scholar Ernest R. May, NSC 68 "provided the blueprint for the militarization of the Cold War from 1950 to the collapse of the Soviet Union at the beginning of the 1990s." NSC 68 and its subsequent amplifications advocated a large expansion in the military budget of the United States, the development of a hydrogen bomb, and increased military aid to allies of the United States. It made the rollback of global Communist expansion a high priority. NSC 68 rejected the alternative policies of friendly détente and containment of the Soviet Union.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">X Article</span> 1947 anti-communist article by American diplomat George F. Kennan

The "X Article" is an article, formally titled "The Sources of Soviet Conduct", written by George F. Kennan and published under the pseudonym "X" in the July 1947 issue of Foreign Affairs magazine. It widely introduced the term "containment" and advocated for its strategic use against the Soviet Union. It expanded on ideas expressed by Kennan in a confidential February 1946 telegram, formally identified by Kennan's State Department number, "511", but informally dubbed the "long telegram" for its size.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rollback</span> Strategy of forcing a change

In political science, rollback is the strategy of forcing a change in the major policies of a state, usually by replacing its ruling regime. It contrasts with containment, which means preventing the expansion of that state; and with détente, which means developing a working relationship with that state. Most of the discussions of rollback in the scholarly literature deal with United States foreign policy toward communist countries during the Cold War. The rollback strategy was tried and was not successful in Korea in 1950 and in Cuba in 1961, but it was successful in Grenada in 1983. The United States discussed the use of rollback during the East German uprising of 1953 and the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, which were ultimately crushed by the Soviet Army, but decided against it to avoid the risk of a major war.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greece–United States relations</span> Bilateral relations

Due to the strong historical, political, cultural and religious ties between them, Greece and the United States today enjoy excellent diplomatic relations and consider each other an ally. Today Greece is one of the United States's closest allies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">New Look (policy)</span> US national security policy

The New Look was the name given to the national security policy of the United States during the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower. It reflected Eisenhower's concern for balancing the Cold War military commitments of the United States with the nation's financial resources. The policy emphasised reliance on strategic nuclear weapons as well as a reorganisation of conventional forces in an effort to deter potential threats, both conventional and nuclear, from the Eastern Bloc of nations headed by the Soviet Union.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Loy W. Henderson</span> American diplomat

Loy Wesley Henderson was a United States Foreign Service Officer and diplomat.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bibliography of the Cold War</span>

This is an English language bibliography of scholarly books and articles on the Cold War. Because of the extent of the Cold War, the conflict is well documented.

<i>The Wise Men</i> (book) Book by Walter Isaacson

The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made is a non-fiction book authored by Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas. Published by Simon & Schuster in 1986, it describes the actions of a group of U.S. federal government officials and members of the East Coast foreign policy establishment. Starting in the immediate post-World War II period, the group developed the containment policy of dealing with the Communist bloc during the Cold War. They also helped to craft institutions and initiatives such as NATO, the World Bank, and the Marshall Plan. An updated edition of the book was released in 2012.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Presidency of Harry S. Truman</span> U.S. presidential administration from 1945 to 1953

Harry S. Truman's tenure as the 33rd president of the United States began on April 12, 1945, upon the death of president Franklin D. Roosevelt, and ended on January 20, 1953. He had been vice president for only 82 days when he succeeded to the presidency. Truman, a Democrat from Missouri, ran for and won a full four-year term in the 1948 presidential election, in which he narrowly defeated Republican nominee Thomas E. Dewey and Dixiecrat nominee Strom Thurmond. Although exempted from the newly ratified Twenty-second Amendment, Truman did not run for a second full term in the 1952 presidential election because of his low popularity. He was succeeded by Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greek Civil War</span> 1946–1949 civil war in Greece

The Greek Civil War took place from 1946 to 1949. The conflict, which erupted shortly after the end of World War II, consisted of a communist-dominated uprising against the established government of the Kingdom of Greece. The opposition declared a people's republic, the Provisional Democratic Government of Greece, which was governed by the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and its military branch, the Democratic Army of Greece (DSE). The rebels were supported by Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union. With the support of the United Kingdom and United States, the Greek government forces ultimately prevailed.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Turkish straits crisis</span> Cold War territorial conflict between the USSR & Turkey

The Turkish Straits crisis was a Cold War-era territorial conflict between the Soviet Union and Turkey. Turkey had remained officially neutral throughout most of the Second World War. After the war ended, Turkey was pressured by the Soviet government to institute joint military control of passage through Turkish Straits, which connected the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. When the Turkish government refused, tensions in the region rose, leading to a Soviet show of force and demands for territorial concessions along the Georgia–Turkey border.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Foreign policy of the Harry S. Truman administration</span> Review of the topic

The main issues of the United States foreign policy during the 1945–1953 presidency of Harry S. Truman include:

<i>Saving Freedom</i> AJjones38b,

Saving Freedom: Truman, The Cold War, and the Fight for Western Civilization, the fourth book by MSNBC Cable news host and former Congressman Joe Scarborough, recounts the historic forces that navigated Harry Truman to begin America's historic battle against the threat of Soviet Communism and how a little known president built an enduring coalition that would use the Truman Doctrine to guide American foreign policy for close to half a century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Greek and Turkish Assistance Act of 1947</span>

The Greek and Turkish Assistance Act was a bill enacted into law on May 22, 1947. This bill was introduced in the Senate by Senator Arthur Vandenberg of Michigan. This bill was the first of many foreign policy initiatives created through the Truman Doctrine, President Truman's foreign policy initiative introduced during the Cold War to combat Communism and the Soviet Union. The goal of the Greek and Turkish Assistance Act was to send aid to Greece and Turkey to help those countries fight back against the civil wars and Communist uprisings taking place in each country.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cold War (1947–1948)</span> Period within the Cold War

The Cold War from 1947 to 1948 is the period within the Cold War from the Truman Doctrine in 1947 to the incapacitation of the Allied Control Council in 1948. The Cold War emerged in Europe a few years after the successful US–USSR–UK coalition won World War II in Europe, and extended to 1989–1991. It took place worldwide, but it had a partially different timing outside Europe. Some conflicts between the West and the USSR appeared earlier. In 1945–1946 the US and UK strongly protested Soviet political takeover efforts in Eastern Europe and Iran, while the hunt for Soviet spies made the tensions more visible. However, historians emphasize the decisive break between the US–UK and the USSR came in 1947–1948 over such issues as the Truman Doctrine, the Marshall Plan and the breakdown of cooperation in governing occupied Germany by the Allied Control Council. In 1947, Bernard Baruch, the multimillionaire financier and adviser to presidents from Woodrow Wilson to Harry S. Truman, coined the term "Cold War" to describe the increasingly chilly relations between three World War II Allies: the United States and British Empire together with the Soviet Union.

References

  1. ↑ "The Truman Doctrine, 1947". Office of the Historian, Foreign Service Institute, United States Department of State. Archived from the original on May 16, 2017. Retrieved September 24, 2022.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 McCullough, David (1992). Truman . New York: Simon & Schuster. pp.  547–549. ISBN   978-0671456542.
  3. ↑ "The Truman Doctrine's Significance". History on the Net. November 10, 2020. Archived from the original on May 1, 2021. Retrieved November 10, 2020.
  4. ↑ Michael Beschloss (2006). Our Documents: 100 Milestone Documents From The National Archives. Oxford University Press. pp. 194–199. ISBN   978-0-19-530959-1. Archived from the original on June 30, 2023. Retrieved October 27, 2015.
  5. 1 2 3 Merrill 2006.
  6. ↑ Barın Kayaoğlu, "Strategic imperatives, Democratic rhetoric: The United States and Turkey, 1945–52." Cold War History, Aug 2009, Vol. 9(3) pp. 321–345
  7. ↑ Gerolymatos, André (2017). An International Civil War: Greece, 1943–1949. Yale University Press. pp. 100–111. ISBN   978-0300180602.
  8. ↑ Gerolymatos, André (2017). An International Civil War: Greece, 1943–1949. Yale University Press. pp. 194–203. ISBN   978-0300180602. Archived from the original on June 30, 2023. Retrieved November 3, 2020.
  9. ↑ Bærentzen, Lars, John O. Iatrides, and Ole Langwitz. Smith. Studies in the History of the Greek Civil War, 1945–1949. Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum, 1987. 273–280. Google Books. Web. 28 Apr. 2010. online Archived 2023-04-06 at the Wayback Machine
  10. ↑ Bullock, Ernest Bevin: Foreign Secretary (1983) ch 8
  11. ↑ Painter 2012 , p. 29: "Although circumstances differed greatly in Greece, Turkey, and Iran, U.S. officials interpreted events in all three places as part of a Soviet plan to dominate the eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East. Mention of oil was deliberately deleted from Truman's March 12, 1947, address before Congress pledging resistance to communist expansion anywhere in the world; but guarding access to oil was an important part of the Truman Doctrine. The Truman Doctrine was named after Harry S. Truman. This doctrine stated that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces."

    One draft, for example, of Truman's speech spoke of the "great natural resources" of the Middle East at stake (Kolko & Kolko 1972 , p. 341).

  12. ↑ Freeland, Richard M. (1970). The Truman Doctrine and the Origins of McCarthyism. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. pp. g. 90.
  13. ↑ Spalding, Elizabeth Edwards (2006). The First Cold Warrior: Harry Truman, Containment, and the Remaking of Liberal Internationalism. The University Press of Kentucky. p. 64.
  14. ↑ McGhee, George (1990). The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection: How the Truman Doctrine Contained the Soviets in the Middle East. St. Harry's Press. pp. g. 21.
  15. 1 2 3 4 5 Patterson, James T. (1996). Grand Expectations . New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0-19-507680-6.
  16. 1 2 3 4 Herring, George C. (2008). From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations Since 1776 . New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN   978-0195078220.
  17. ↑ Eric Foner, Give Me Liberty! An American History (2nd ed., 2008) p. 892
  18. ↑ Ivie 1999.

Bibliography

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.