Truman Doctrine

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In 1947, Soviet‐American tensions developed along the “northern tier” of the Mediterranean and culminated in the Truman Doctrine. The Soviet Union, recently rebuffed in Iran, seemed determined to stage a Communist takeover in Greece and wrest the Dardenelles Straits—connecting the Black Sea with the Mediterranean—from Turkey. Although it is doubtful that the Soviets were either directly involved in the Greek troubles or actually prepared to take military action against Turkey, the perception of danger distorted reality. The Truman administration feared that the Soviets sought access to the Persian Gulf, the Mediterranean, and ultimately the entire Middle East. Soviet hegemony in this oil‐rich region could promote the collapse of Western Europe.

The immediate concern was Greece. The British supported the restoration of the monarchy after World War II, but opposition came from numerous groups, including the Greek Communist Party. Fighting had broken out in Athens in late 1944, which resulted in an uneasy truce in February 1946; but in August, Greek guerrillas raided a number of villages and towns, and soon received assistance from the Communist regimes in Yugoslavia, Albania, and Bulgaria. By the spring of 1947, the U.S. government regarded Greece as the supreme test of the free world.

Turkey was also crucial. Located along the Soviet border, it controlled the Dardanelles and was vital to the Soviets' push for a warm‐water link to the Middle East. By early 1947, Soviet troops had amassed along the common border, causing a war of nerves that forced the Turkish government into military preparations.

The crisis in the Mediterranean became an American problem in February 1947, when the British government declared itself financially incapable of maintaining long‐standing commitments in Greece and Turkey. Secretary of State George C. Marshall had already instructed his undersecretary, Dean Acheson, to prepare an economic and military assistance plan for Greece. Congressional members from both parties received invitations to the White House to join the administration in halting a Communist drive allegedly engineered by the Kremlin. Because of traditional American isolationism, what lay ahead, President Harry S. Truman remarked, was “the greatest selling job ever facing a President.”

The result was the Truman Doctrine. Before a joint session of Congress on 12 March 1947, the president outlined the dangers in Greece and Turkey. “I believe,” he emphasized, “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.” To save Greece and Turkey, he called on Congress to authorize a military and economic aid program of $400 million.

Widespread resistance arose against this policy. Marshall and State Department adviser George F. Kennan thought the anti‐Communist tone of the message too severe. Isolationist Republican senator Robert Taft argued against assuming Britain's responsibilities, and columnist Walter Lippmann warned that the administration had not distinguished which areas were vital to U.S. interests and was heading toward a worldwide ideological crusade. Containment, Lippmann asserted, was a “strategic monstrosity.” Acheson insisted that the Truman Doctrine applied specifically to Greece and Turkey, and that the administration would consider aid to other countries only on their “individual merits.”

The arguments continued for weeks, but in May 1947 Congress approved the Greek‐Turkish aid bills by a wide, bipartisan margin, and American aid was soon en route to both countries.

The Truman Doctrine stabilized Greece and Turkey, thereby appearing to establish the credibility of containment. Nearly 300 U.S. military and civilian personnel provided advisory assistance to the Greek Army in its war against the guerrillas. American weaponry also proved essential to the government's victory, although the growing rift between Yugoslav leader Marshal Tito (Josip Broz) and the Soviet Union played an important role. A year after his defection from the Cominform in July 1948, Tito closed the border and effectively denied the Greek guerrillas further refuge and assistance. In October 1949, the royalist army scattered them into the northern mountains of Greece and into Albania, and the fighting came to an end. The crisis in Turkey likewise passed as America's military assistance and advice bolstered the country against Soviet pressure.

Containment brought mixed results. It yielded a monumental triumph in the Near East, and hence in the Cold War. Yet the administration's rhetoric and emergency tactics encouraged a Red Scare during the 1950s, known as McCarthyism. More far‐reaching, American policymakers later ignored the restraints implanted in the Truman Doctrine to launch the global crusade Lippmann had warned against. Indeed, containment became heavily military in orientation, as exemplified by the establishment of NATO in 1949 and the later U.S. involvement in Vietnam.

[See also Cold War: External Course; Cold War: Domestic Course.]

Bibliography

• John L. Gaddis, The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1941–1947, 1972.
• Bruce R. Kuniholm, The Origins of the Cold War in the Near East: Great Power Conflict and Diplomacy in Iran, Turkey, and Greece, 1980.
• Lawrence S. Wittner, American Intervention in Greece, 1943–1949, 1982.
• Howard Jones, “A New Kind of War”: America's Global Strategy and the Truman Doctrine in Greece, 1989.
• Peter J. Stavrakis, Moscow and Greek Communism, 1944–1949, 1989.
• Melvyn P. Leffler, A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman Administration, and the Cold War, 1992.
• Randall B. Woods and Howard Jones, Dawning of the Cold War: The United States' Quest for Order, 1991

A containment policy presented by President Harry S. Truman to Congress on March 12, 1947, during the Cold War, to protect Greece and Turkey from potential Soviet communist aggression. It proposed a military and economic aid program of $400 million. It was approved by Congress in May 1947, after much resistance and debate, and effectively stabilized Greece and Turkey.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

The so-called Truman Doctrine was enunciated by President Harry S. Truman in a speech to a joint session of the US Congress on 12 March 1947. In it he denounced the oppressive nature of the communist system of government and warned against the possibility that campaigns of subversion might bring even more countries under that system. He sought, and was given, Congressional authority to provide assistance to threatened regimes—initially those in Greece and Turkey. The ‘Doctrine’ was thus the starting point for the strategy of containment of communism developed by successive US Presidents during the Cold War.

— David Carlton

For more information on Truman Doctrine, visit Britannica.com.

The 12 March 1947 announcement of the Truman Doctrine marked the beginning of a new, aggressive American posture toward the Soviet Union. The administration of President Harry S. Truman abandoned efforts to accommodate the Soviet Union, which had emerged as America's principal rival after World War II. Now the two superpowers engaged in the Cold War. The doctrine called on Congress to approve $400 million in military assistance for Greece, which was fighting communist insurgents, and neighboring Turkey, also believed to be threatened by Soviet subversion. The doctrine was formulated after Britain indicated it no longer had the wherewithal to support the royalist Greek government. But during the previous year, the Truman administration had grown increasingly suspicious of Soviet intentions as the nations of Eastern Europe disappeared behind what the former British prime minister Winston Churchill had termed the "iron curtain."

Although it was specifically targeted to Greece, the Truman Doctrine was envisioned to have a much broader reach. Truman made this clear when he framed his request as part of a general policy to "support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." The doctrine was to be the first step in a strategy of containment of the Soviet Union, designed to prevent communist influence throughout Western Europe. The United States subsequently agreed to launch the massive recovery plan for Europe known as the Marshall Plan and entered its first peacetime military alliance, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. The eruption of the Korean War in 1950 prompted a further expansion of the Truman Doctrine and the containment policy. The United States was committed to fighting communism in Asia and around the world.

Bibliography

Gaddis, John Lewis. The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1941–1947. New York: Columbia University Press, 1972.

Harbutt, Fraser J. The Iron Curtain: Churchill, America, and the Origins of the Cold War. New York: Oxford University Press, 1986.

The Truman Doctrine was a proclamation by U.S. president Harry S. Truman on March 12, 1947. It stated that the U.S. would support Greece and Turkey with economic and military aid to prevent their falling into the Soviet sphere. The Doctrine shifted American foreign policy as regards the Soviet Union from détente to, as George F. Kennan phrased it, a policy of containment of Soviet expansion. Historians often use it to mark the starting date of the Cold War.

History

Harry S. Truman, supported by Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg and the Republican-controlled Congress, promulgated this doctrine after a visit from the Greek President. “At the urging of the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Tsaldaris of Greece visited Washington in December 1946 to plead for additional American assistance.”^[1] Aid was agreed by the United States government to be given to both Greece and Turkey. It was an early response to a perceived political involvement by the Soviet Union in Europe and Asia, as suggested by the Communist movements in Turkey and Greece. It has been suggested that covert military support was also provided, at least in the case of Greece.

Aid was given by the United States to Greece and Turkey for both political and military reasons. The political reasons the United States gave aid to Turkey and Greece was because they were still holding off the Communist threat, and could still be saved from communism. The situation was very important for the west, “If Greece was lost, Turkey would become an untenable outpost in a sea of communism. Similarly, if Turkey yielded to Soviet demands, the position of Greece would be extremely endangered^[2].” It was a regional domino effect threat that guided the United States' decision. The military aspect of losing Greece and Turkey were also a huge factor in granting the 400 million dollars. The United States was cautious of a third World War at this time, and needed military advantages over the Soviet Union if they were to win. Greece and Turkey turned out to be very important, “The failure of the West to prevent a communist takeover in Greece would not only put the Russians on a particularly dangerous flank for the Turks, but strengthen the Soviet Union’s ability to cut off allied supplies and assistance in the event of war."^[3] Between both the political and military benefits of assisting Turkey and Greece, the United States felt compelled to pass the Truman Doctrine.

The Truman Doctrine was the first in a succession 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. In Truman's words, it became "the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." Using a framing rhetoric that continues to have resonance today, Truman reasoned that because these "totalitarian regimes" coerced "free peoples," they represented a threat to international peace and the national security of the United States.

President Truman made the proclamation in an address to the U.S. Congress on March 12, 1947, amid the crisis of the Greek Civil War (1946-1949). Truman insisted that if Greece and Turkey did not receive the aid that they needed, they would inevitably fall to Communism with consequences throughout the region.

Truman signed the act into law on May 22, 1947. It granted $400 million ($300 million to Greece and $100 million to Turkey) in military and economic aid. The economic aid was to be used in repairing the infrastructure of these countries, and military aid came in the form of military personnel to supervise and help with the reconstruction of these countries while training soldiers. It should be noted that this American aid was in many ways a replacement for British aid, which the British were no longer financially in a position to give. The policy of containment and opposition to Communists in Greece for example was carried out by the British before 1947 in many of the same ways it was carried out afterward by the Americans.

The doctrine also had consequences elsewhere in Europe. Governments in Western Europe with powerful Communist movements such as Italy and France were given a variety of assistance and encouraged to keep Communist groups out of government. In some respects, these moves were in response to moves made by the Soviet Union to purge opposition groups in Eastern Europe out of existence.

In 1950, Truman signed the top-secret policy plan NSC-68, which shifted foreign policy from passive to active containment. The document differed from George F. Kennan's original notion of containment outlined in his "X" article, containing much harsher anti-Communist rhetoric. NSC-68 explicitly stated that the Communists planned for world domination. While this was likely an aim of Lenin, it may well have been abandoned by Stalin by 1950.

The Truman Doctrine can also be compared to the rationale for America's first involvements in the Vietnam War. Starting shortly after the outbreak of the Korean War, Truman attempted to aid France's bid to hold onto its Vietnamese colonies. The United States supplied French forces with equipment and military advisors in order to combat Ho Chi Minh and anti-imperialist and anti-colonial revolutionaries.

See also

• Domino theory
• Liberal internationalism
• Turkish-American relations
• Greek-American relations

References

1. ^ Freeland, Richard M. (1970). The Truman Doctrine and the Origins of McCarthyism. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., Pg. 90. 
2. ^ Spalding, Elizabeth Edwards (2006). The First Cold Warrior: Harry Truman, Containment, and the Remaking of Liberal Internationalism. The University Press of Kentucky, 64. 
3. ^ McGhee, George (1990). The US-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection: How the Truman Doctrine Contained the Soviets in the Middle East. St. Martin’s Press, Pg. 21. 

• Frazier, Robert. "Acheson and the Formulation of the Truman Doctrine" Journal of Modern Greek Studies 1999 17(2): 229-251. ISSN 0738-1727
• Gaddis, John Lewis. "Reconsiderations: Was the Truman Doctrine a Real Turning Point?" Foreign Affairs 1974 52(2): 386-402. ISSN 0015-7120
• Ivie, Robert L. "Fire, Flood, and Red Fever: Motivating Metaphors of Global Emergency in the Truman Doctrine Speech." Presidential Studies Quarterly 1999 29(3): 570-591. ISSN 0360-4918
• Jeffrey, Judith S. Ambiguous Commitments and Uncertain Policies: The Truman Doctrine in Greece, 1947-1952 Lexington, 2000. 257 pp.
• Jones, Howard. "A New Kind of War": America's Global Strategy and the Truman Doctrine in Greece Oxford U. Press, 1989. 327 pp
• Leffler, Melvyn P. "Strategy, Diplomacy, and the Cold War: the United States, Turkey, and NATO, 1945-1952" Journal of American History 1985 71(4): 807-825. ISSN 0021-8723
• McGhee, George. The U.S.-Turkish-NATO Middle East Connection: How the Truman Doctrine and Turkey's NATO Entry Contained the Soviets in the Middle East. St. Martin's, 1990. 224 pp.
• Merrill, Dennis. "The Truman Doctrine: Containing Communism and Modernity" Presidential Studies Quarterly 2006 36(1): 27-37. ISSN 0360-4918
• Offner, Arnold A. "'Another Such Victory': President Truman, American Foreign Policy, and the Cold War." Diplomatic History 1999 23(2): 127-155. ISSN 0145-2096
• Spalding, Elizabeth Edwards. The First Cold Warrior: Harry Truman, Containment, And the Remaking of Liberal Internationalism (2006)Aaron

External links

• Truman Library website with papers related to the Truman Doctrine
• Full text of the speech

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