San Francisco: 50 Years On - Part Two

Buckley describes how Britain took the independent step of recognizing the People's Republic of China, a step which led to problems about China being invited to the San Francisco conference. After China's entry into the war in Korea, Hong Kong's trade was squeezed through trade embargos imposed by the United States and its exposed security system was vulnerable, had it not been for the presence of the US 7th fleet in the Taiwan Straits. Ferretti shows that the leading ideas of Yoshida Shigeru on relations between Japan and the People's Republic of China did not change after the failure of the Dulles-Morrison Agreement as he continued to pursue normalization with the PRC. He had the idea of joining the Colombo Plan and entering the markets of Southeast Asia by establishing a preferential bilateral axis with Britain but this was ultimately rejected by Britain at the time of Yoshida's visit to Europe in 1954. Meaney describes External Affairs Minister Percy Spender's views on the need for a Pacific Pact. When it became clear from discussions with Dulles early in 1951 that the treaty with Japan would not be punitive or restrict her rearming, Australia called for some sort of security agreement with the United States. This came to fruition as the ANZUS Pact which was signed and ratified more or less simultaneously with the San Francisco treaty. Trotter discusses New Zealand's reaction to the Australian initiative over the need for a security pact. While she had considerable reservations, most notably over relations with Britain, she appreciated the need for security guarantees and joined the ANZUS Pact.San Francisco Peace Treaty, Peoples Republic of China, Korean War, Hong Kong, US 7th Fleet, Taiwan Straits, Colombo Plan, American-Japanese Security Pact, ANZUS Pact, Yoshida Shigeru, Percy Spender, John Foster Dulles, Herbert Morrison, Southeast Asia, Japan, Britain, Australia, New Zealand, United States.

San Francisco: 50 Years On - Part One

Dingman argues that the San Francisco settlement signaled the emergence of a new Pacific maritime order in which the United States Navy is the dominant naval force relying on significant bases in Japan. In particular, he focuses on the Yokosuka naval base whose retention was called for by the navy and became an important element in Washington's approach to the peace negotiations. Tozawa deals with the attitudes of the Yoshida government and the opposition parties to the peace negotiations and later to the ratification of the San Francisco Peace Treaty and the United States-Japan Security Pact. The points of difference were: whether Japan should negotiate with all the victors or with individual countries; whether Japan should observe disarmed neutrality; whether amendment to the Constitution was necessary. Cortazzi presents the perspective of a junior official in the United Kingdom Liaison Mission from October 1951. He gives an account of the activities of the British delegation to the San Francisco Conference and the conversations of Herbert Morrison and Robert Scott, especially with Prime Minister Yoshida. Lowe argues that British ministers and officials looked backward, influenced by economic, strategic and public opinion factors, the last referring to prisoners-of-war who had been treated harshly in Southeast Asia. The Labour government was worried over a probable revival in Japanese economic competition, referring particularly to textiles, shipping and the potteries. The British views of the treaty were much more critical of Japan than the USA. Foreign Secretary Herbert Morrison, anxious that the British contribution to the ultimate treaty should be properly acknowledged, agreed to be in San Francisco at the last moment for the signing of the peace treaty.San Francisco Treaty, Attlee Government, Herbert Morrison, Robert Scott, John Foster Dulles, Yoshida Shigeru, USA, Japan, United Kingdom Liaison Mission (Tokyo), United States -Japan Security Pact, British delegation to the San Francisco Peace Conference, Ratification, new Pacific maritime order, United States Navy, Yokosuka naval base.

George F. Kennan’s strategy of Containment: an assessment of Kennan’s coherence and consistency

This thesis examines George F. Kennan’s coherence and consistency when he formulated the strategy of containment. Kennan’s work went through different stages which depended on the political context it was set in as circumstances evolved and the position he held. The aim is not to criticise Kennan but understand whether he remained consistent and coherent and why changes occurred. When Kennan sent the Long Telegram and delivered lectures at the National War College, the strategy had not been structured. In 1946 and early 1947, containment was not a strategy, it was still an idea. The Long Telegram provided him with the opportunity to move to the National War College to develop and structure a strategy. The invitation in 1947 to enter the official bureaucracy as the Director of the Policy Planning Staff did not demand that Kennan create a strategy but he was able to use it as an opportunity to build the strategy he had been advocating which was to contain Soviet expansion through the economic rehabilitation of Western Europe, Germany and Japan. Kennan remained consistent with his recommendations for a political-economic containment, specifically avoiding any military intervention. Kennan became trapped by the X article, as it distorted his views, making it appear that he was contradicting his original approach to containment. Kennan attempted to fight back against the misunderstanding of this article by focusing on political-economic policies, but it became clear that he was losing his influence and struggling to implement a coherent strategy. The extension of the containment strategy beyond strategic areas, the rejection of Program A, along with the continued division of Europe and the more militarized tone of the containment strategy stopped Kennan from implementing a coherent containment strategy. By 1953, Kennan and his containment strategy had been defeated

Beyond the American century: Walter Lippmann and American grand strategy, 1943-1950

As the United States became a world Power, journalist and intellectual Walter Lippmann feared that it would become its own worst enemy. During and after the Second World War, he tried to steer the country towards coherent statecraft, to define the national interest and the limits of power, and give geopolitical expression to the role of the United States as the core of an Atlantic strategic system. But in response to world war, the Truman Doctrine, and the Korean War, he became pessimistic about the country's ability to conduct strategy effectively. In the prophetic tradition, he believed that a fatal symbiosis between America's growing strength and domestic politics led it towards crisis. Though at times ahistorical, Lippmann's concept of strategy deserves attention for its dialogue between power and identity, for its questioning of “ends” as well as means, and for its focus on the danger of self-defeating behaviour

The national security debate and the Truman administration\u27s policy toward China, 1947-1950

After World War II, the United States faced a new enemy: the Soviet Union. However, U. S. armed forces were rapidly demobilized after the war, which hindered the U. S. military’s capability to thwart the Soviet threat. Even though, Communism never had been an extreme threat to U. S. national security. World War II had leveled and destroyed much of the European and Asian economic infrastructure, which contributed to the appeal of this ideology. Therefore, many observers felt that international communism was now a threat to U. S. national security. Significantly, only the United States possessed the power to confront the challenge of communism. However, officials inside and outside the administration of Harry S. Truman were divided on how to respond to the menace of communism. One school of thought believed the Soviet Union was an economic and political threat. Therefore, it promoted the rehabilitation of economic infrastructures and political institutions as a deterrent to communism. Economic aid and trade, such thinkers believed, could diminish the political temptations of communism. This school of thought insisted that the communist threat was not a far-reaching international problem, but an internal economic and political problem for individual countries devastated by war. Another school of thought believed the Soviet Union’s military structure threatened U. S. national security. It advocated building up not only the economic and political structures of countries threatened by communism, but also these countries’ military and defensive capabilities. It insisted that communism was part of a far-reaching global scheme led by the Soviet Union determined to dominate the world. It believed both economic aid as well as military aid would eliminate communism in other countries

MANSFIELD, MARINES, AND MOTHERS: THE POLITICS OF RESISTANCE TO THE AMERICAN INTERVENTION IN NORTH CHINA FROM 1945-1946

At the conclusion of World War II, American citizens, including millions of deployed servicemen, reasserted the democratic freedoms they sacrificed to win the war. The American intervention in North China during the Chinese Civil War presented a ripe opportunity for civic restoration in late 1945. Controversial and seemingly at odds with the stated goals of the Second World War—namely the “Four Freedoms” and the Atlantic Charter—the US military presence in North China faced formidable domestic political obstacles. This thesis explores the nexus of domestic politics and foreign policy in the post-World War II era. Focusing on 1945-1946, this project steps beyond the oft-studied foreign service personalities to examine the important role of Congress, the military, and public opinion in constraining US participation in the Chinese Civil War. As the title suggests, Mansfield, Marines, and mothers are important political characters anchoring this research. I argue that Representative Mike Mansfield, from Montana’s first congressional district, served a vital role in elevating the dangers of the North China intervention in the public consciousness. With speeches critical of the Truman administration’s China policy in the House of Representatives, Mansfield’s words resonated with deployed Marines, their families, and with organized citizens’ groups. The lifting of wartime censorship also allowed Marines in China to write congressmen, newspaper editors, and their families expressing opposition to direct participation in the Chinese Civil War. Marine leadership also skillfully interpreted opaque orders and carefully avoided an expanded role. Marines’ families, and in particular mothers and spouses, crafted sophisticated arguments against expanded US military intervention in the language of self-determination, freedom, and democracy. Finally, I conclude that the deluge of public opinion at the outset of the North China intervention was an important factor in constraining American participation in the Chinese Civil War and in the genesis of the Marshall Mission

Rethinking War Powers: Congress, The President, and the United Nations

The division of war powers between Congress and the President has never been free of ambiguity or tension. The Constitution grants Congress the power to declare war, to raise and support armies, to provide and maintain a navy, and to make rules for the regulation of those armed forces. The President, on the other hand, is the Commander in Chief of U.S. armed forces. Most scholars agree that the framers sought to strike a balance: the President alone could not commence war, but he could use force to repel sudden attacks on the United States or its armed forces. Reacting against the unilateral power of kings to go to war without the consent of the people, the framers desired a democratic check on the power of the President to initiate armed conflict. Disagreement rages, however, over what the sparse words of the Constitution should mean today, when wars are hardly ever declared in advance, U.S. forces are stationed on foreign soil on a semipermanent basis, and the country\u27s security interests are intertwined with those of other states in an increasingly interdependent international system

Before Vietnam: Understanding the Initial Stages of US Involvement in Southeast Asia, 1945-1949

The Vietnam War, widely considered the worst foreign policy debacle in American history, remains the most controversial event of the twentieth century. Much criticism for Vietnam involvement stems from two sources: 1) disapproval with how American leadership conducted the war, and 2) disagreement over the reason for the conflict in the first place. Few historians, if any, dispute the first criticism. The historical community remains divided, however, in terms of a definitive position on the basis or origin for the conflict. For a holistic approach to the origin of the Vietnam War, one must first elucidate the conception of American intervention in the region, including “why” and “how” it arose. Any analysis of American involvement in Vietnam must begin with President Truman and his administration following the conclusion of the Second World War. This can only be accurately accomplished viewed in the context of US foreign policy during the Cold War. The initial American involvement in Southeast Asia in the context of the developing Cold War must be thoroughly examined to more fully understand the origins of the Vietnam War. Considering the increasingly complex situation in Southeast Asia following the Second World War, Truman and his administration acted consistently, bearing in mind the vested interests of the United States, their Allies, and the people of Southeast Asia, in light of the threat of Communist expansion in the region and across the world

The Truman Administration and China, 1945-1950 :

Over the past several years the release of many new government documents made it necessary to take another look at the question. The initial intent in undertaking a survey of these documents was to determine more precisely to what degree and in what ways domestic public opinion influenced the decisions of the Truman Administration toward China after World War II. As research progressed, however, it became clear that at no time in the period from the end of World War II to the beginning of the war in Korea did decision makers seriously entertain the option of cutting off American support to Chiang and the Nationalist regime and for reasons which had virtually no direct relationship to public opinion. As a matter of necessity, therefore, the study began to shift away from being concerned primarily with the question of the effect of public opinion and toward the general problem of identifying, to the extent possible, the full range of those factors involved in the Administration's formulation of its China policy.Until fairly recently, existing interpretations of United States policy toward China in the period between 1945 and 1950 contended that some form of public opinion and congressional pressure constituted important, even decisive, factors in the Truman Administration's formulation of that policy. And, prior to the availability of documents bearing on the subject, the most compelling assessment in this regard argued that strong American public sympathy for Chiang Kai-shek in general, and his congressional backers in particular, forced the Truman Administration to continue to aid the Nationalist government after 1946 despite the Administration's better judgment and policy preferences to withdraw support from what it considered to be a losing cause. This view further proclaimed that in 1949 and 1950 Chiang's American supporters kept the Administration from severing its ties with the Nationalists on Formosa as a necessary prerequisite to the official desire to recognize the newly formed Chinese Peoples Republic on the mainland.The study begins with a survey of the essentials of United States wartime policy toward China after 1943. It starts here because decisions made in the last two years of the war go a long way toward explaining the Truman Administration's commitment to assist in resolving China's internal problems in the immediate aftermath of the conflict. Subsequent to this initial commitment, the basic contention of this study is that, for military and strategic reasons arising out of the concern about Soviet expansionism, the Truman Administration never seriously considered withdrawing from China prior to the Korean War.The study terminates with the beginning of the Korean conflict despite the fact that increasing numbers of previously classified documents concerning China are now open for all of 1950 and 1951. This is because Korea appeared to confirm Administration officials in their earlier decisions, again based on military and strategic considerations, to support the rump Nationalist government on Formosa and to refrain from recognizing the newly established Communist regime in Peking. The North Korean attack, in sum, eliminated flexibility and set in place the basic elements of American policy toward China for the following two decades

I had always been opposed to colonialism : President Harry S. Truman and the end of European colonialism.

This thesis is a biographical and historiographical examination of Truman\u27s rhetoric and handling of colonialism. Truman\u27s position regarding European colonialism is a worthy topic since it facilitates the study of the United States\u27 treatment of people in underdeveloped countries and allows insight into Truman\u27s beliefs. The research methodology and references used for the paper include primary sources drawn principally from the Truman Presidential Library as well as numerous secondary sources relating to Truman\u27s Presidency. The focus of analysis is on Truman and his administration\u27s oratory and diplomatic decisions regarding colonial issues. The findings show that Truman demonstrated through both his public and private communications that he opposed colonialism. Furthermore, the bulk of the foreign policy decisions made by Truman\u27s administration showed a tendency to oppose colonialism. Nonetheless, Truman aided French efforts to reestablish control over former colonies in Indochina and this deviation undermined his otherwise anti-colonial legacy for future generations