The Truman Doctrine Counters Communist Expansion

[Hawk1981]

In a speech delivered to the United States Congress on March 12, 1947, President Truman, set the basis of what became known as the "Truman Doctrine". The proposal was designed to counter the expansion of Soviet communism through the use of free financial aid to the Greek and Turkish economies. In the years immediately following the Second World War, Greece was fighting a civil war against communist insurgents sponsored by Tito in neighboring Yugoslavia and Turkey was being pressured to allow Soviet shipping access to the Turkish straits to the Mediterranean Sea.

Truman appealed to the Democrats and the majority-Republicans of Congress by making these points:

- "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."

The Truman Doctrine became the cornerstone that led to continuing free foreign financial aid and the foundation of American foreign policy that is still in effect. The precedent was set to give American aid to anticommunist regimes no matter how undemocratic, and to the creation of military alliances to counter Soviet expansion.

The Doctrine led directly to the establishment of the Marshall Plan and the founding of the NATO military alliance. By promoting the new policies of Soviet "containment" and prevention of the regional "domino effect" of losing Greece and Turkey to Soviet "aggression", the US foreign policy lexicon saw the addition of these phrases. The beginning of the 'Cold War' is often dated from the day Truman's speech was made.

 

[Hawk1981]

The British lobbied the United States to take over financing the counter-insurgency in Greece since they were broke after the Second World War. The Soviet policy had become increasingly aggressive and confrontational with the prevention of 'free' elections in Poland and Czechoslovakia and disagreements over the administration in occupied Germany. The 'Iron-Curtain' speech had been delivered by Churchill.

Truman became convinced by the unfulfilled promises made at the Potsdam summit and by his advisors that Stalin would only respect demonstrations of force. The financial aid approved by Congress turned the tide in Greece. If the aid hadn't been delivered in time, the Greek government would have fallen.

 

[Hawk1981]

The pressure on Truman to continue on from the Korean peninsula into China during the Korean War came, in part, from the “China Lobby” wing of the Republican Party that thought that the Chinese Communists could be ousted from power. The Chinese Communists had just won the civil war and driven the Nationalists off the mainland to Taiwan, and were still consolidating power. The “China Lobby” people always had unrealistic expectations about returning the Nationalists to power. Truman recognized that we couldn't win a major war in China and insisted on limiting the conflict to Korea.

 

[Meathead]

Truman was following Kennan's proposal of a policy of containment. It was crucial that the Soviet fleet be bottled up in the Black Sea. A port in the Med would have been catastrophic.

 

[jwoodie]

Nice to be reminded of when the NYT was a legitimate newspaper.

 

[Pete7469]

We may have contained "soviet communism" but let it run amok in our own country. We should have been killing commies here as much as we were everywhere else.

I wish Patton would have been turned loose to drive through Moscow and meet up with MacArthur on the flats of Mongolia in the summer of 1947.

The only good commie is a dead one.


.

 

[Picaro]

The pressure on Truman to continue on from the Korean peninsula into China during the Korean War came, in part, from the “China Lobby” wing of the Republican Party that thought that the Chinese Communists could be ousted from power. The Chinese Communists had just won the civil war and driven the Nationalists off the mainland to Taiwan, and were still consolidating power. The “China Lobby” people always had unrealistic expectations about returning the Nationalists to power. Truman recognized that we couldn't win a major war in China and insisted on limiting the conflict to Korea.

The Korean conflict was actually started by the Soviets; Stalin suckered Mao into it, and then got cold feet when Truman didn't run away and left Mao holding the bag. This caused a permanent rift between Red China and the Soviets; WW III nearly started over a border dispute between them in 1960-1962.

Truman was right to stand our ground there; it was necessary to keep other allies in the fight against Soviet and Red Chinese imperialism and keep Roosevelt's de-colonization program on track, not only in Asia but in Africa as well.

 

[Picaro]

We may have contained "soviet communism" but let it run amok in our own country.

We certainly need to be deporting several million of them and their pet deviants, as the Founders would have done without losing any sleep over dumping them somewhere overseas.

 

[whitehall]

HUAC (house un-american activities committee) was a direct result of Truman's anti-communist crusade but nobody blamed Truman for the Hollywood alleged "blacklisting". They blamed it on a republican senator.

 

[whitehall]

Truman was an illegitimate president the first go-round. Democrats dumped the politically independent sitting V.P. off the ticket while he was on vacation and hand picked a relatively unknown senator from Missouri when they knew their presidential candidate would not live to complete his 4th term. Harry Truman woke up on a morning in April 1945 and found himself president without a clue. The Generals were running the show late in the war and all Harry needed to do was sign off on using the Bomb and then take credit for VJ day. Thanks to the fawning media that never saw a democrat they didn't like, Harry Truman didn't have to take credit for much else when Korea went sour and the communist terror didn't seem so bad.