Cold War Foreign Policy
"Their [Russia's and America's] starting-point is different, and their courses are not the same; yet each of them seems marked by the will of Heaven to sway the destinies of half the globe," Alexis de Torqueville, late 19th century. De Torqueville's prophecy came true by the 1940s when the two super powers, the United States of America and the Soviet Union, had come head to head, swaying the "destinies of half the globe" and more. (de Torqueville, chapter 18) The United States had recently participated in the second World War resulting in an Allied and American victory. Europe, however, was devastated, economically, politically, and socially. "The United States [stood] at this time at the pinnacle of world power. It [was] a solemn moment for American democracy," former Britain Prime Minister Winston Churchill stated in a speech delivered at Westminster College in 1946. (Churchill, page 1) At that time, American and Russian tensions had evolved into a full-throttle push into the Cold War. The Cold War refers to the tensions that arose between Russia and America that became a strategic and political struggle that developed after World War II. It lasted for 35 years and it w
Surprisingly, Dulles was not a realist. He was a moralist. He was for the protection of democracy and human rights, even though his reactions to communism were hostile. (New York Times, par 4) NSC 68. In April of 1950, a top secret document was given to Truman by the National Security Council (NSC). It was declassified in 1975. The document was called NSC 68 written under direction of National Security Advisor Paul Nitze and it had was a amalgamation of all three proposals and both competing ideologies. as the battle that determined the fate of democracy and communism. The goal of containment was simple: prevent the spread of communism. In application it made nations completely dependant on the United States for reconstruction and stability, and called for European economic integration. According to Kennan, politics and economics were directly related, aiding the death of communism by promoting healthy economies, like the Marshall Plan. The National Briefs of the Charlotte Observer, May 16, 2000, stated: "The House (of Representatives) moved Monday to set up a 'Marshall Plan' for AIDS-devastated Africa." Like the Marshall Plan, many other doctrines of policy during the Cold War era are still used today. Realists had the upper hand in controlling the United States' foreign policy in the Cold War era. However it was the fusion of the two ideas that truly formed the blue print for that troubled era and for today. What emerged was a war that "entailed much greater activism and a correspondingly larger commitment of resources to foreign policy than the United States had previously undertaken in peacetime." (Ford, page 1) The United States was asked to form policies in to deal with its doppelganger's atomic power and communistic government. The Marshall Plan was the response to the faltering economies in Western Europe. It provided economic assistance to all European nations that would agree to United States to intervention. This plan was based upon Moralism ideology.
Some common words found in the essay are:
Soviet Union, Cold War, Marshall Plan, National Security, Iron Curtain, Gulf War, American Encyclopedia, Allied American, Western Europe, War II, cold war, marshall plan, foreign policy, soviet union, nsc 68, national security, war era, objectives programs national, security page, programs national, spanier page, united objectives programs, programs national security, nsc 68 united, national security page,
Approximate Word count = 2077
Approximate Pages = 8 (250 words per page double spaced)
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