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The Origins of the Cold WarTerry Priest HST-10212-11-2010

Bad news played across American newspapers in 1949-1950. Russia had set off its ownatomic bomb. China was lost to communism. Alger Hiss was convicted of perjury and byinference a Soviet spy. Joe McCarthy began charging that Hiss was just the tip of theiceberg the State Department was loaded with communists. In June 1950, North Koreainvaded South Korea, and U.S. troops faced communist troops for the first time. Behindthe headlines was a growing conviction that America was in a global war withCommunism. Only 10 years before there had been a debate whether the U.S. shouldinvolve itself in a European war. Now, in 1950, the Truman administration committed tototal long-term military superiority and active participation in regional conflicts all overthe globe.

No war has ever destroyed so much, or changed the world so completely, as WW2. Fiftymillion people died. Much of Europe and Asia were in ruins. In a span of just 30 years,Europe had experienced the first world war, a depression, and now the most devastatingwar of all. Many of the worlds great cities were destroyed. Japan and Germany were inruins and it was unclear what form of government and what kind of country they wouldbecome. Two powers emerged, Russia and America.

Robert Payne, British historian, wrote in 1949, There never was a country more fabulousthan America...the decisions of the American government affect the lives.. of theremotest people. Half the wealth of the world, more than half the productivity... areconcentrated in American hands... She bestrides the world like a Colossus: no other

power at any time in the worlds history has possessed so varied or so great an influenceon other nations... (qtd in McCullough 733)

Russia in WWII had twenty million dead. The German army had destroyed cities, towns,roads, rail lines, electric plants, bridges, farms and livestock. Michael Forrestal, son ofthe Navy Secretary, went to Moscow in April 1947. He reported after touring thecountryside, the standard of living and mental attitude brought about by the worstdepression [in the U.S.] must be a kind of paradise unimagineable in comparison toofficial prosperity here.(qtd in Leffler 6)

Many of the men who made American policy after WW2 had been young men after

WW1. They had seen the toleration of Germany and Japan invading and controllingnearby countries. Appeasement, they called it. They had learned from WW2, thatrelatively small countries could control large areas by annexing the resources of otherlands. War required industrial ability, resources and skilled populations. Near the end ofWW2, American policy makers warned against any post-war entity controlling all theresources of Europe.(Leffler 11) This was at the heart of post-war American policy Russia must not be allowed to bring all of Europe into her sphere of influence. This is


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also what drove Roosevelt in 1940 a victorious Germany with all the resources ofEurope would directly threaten America at a time of Germanys choosing.(Leffler 22)

Sitting astride both Europe and Asia, Russia was a brutal totalitarian regime with aground army dominating eastern Europe and northeast Asia. In the political chaos after

WWII, leftist movements were on the rise in Greece, Italy, France, China, and Korea(Leffler 497). Communists might seize any of these countries by internal politics. Withthe colonial masters largely weakened, nationalist movements that might be attracted toMarxism were on the rise in Southeast Asia, the Middle East and North Africa.(Leffler497) The devastation of Germany and Japan left a power vacuum that could have beenfilled by extreme nationalists or economic agreements with Russia. American plannerswere both the most powerful group in the world and tremendously concerned aboutpossible scenarios. (Leffler 497)

Russia had been invaded twice by Germany in one generation, and feared a strengthenedGermany as much as America feared a strong Russia. Roosevelt had made the best deal

he could at Yalta. The Russian army was deployed across eastern Europe in superiornumbers and unlikely to be removed by any action short of outright war. In 1948, fearingthe loss of their buffer, the Russians sponsored a brutal overthrow of the democraticgovernment in Czechoslovakia. This shocked the American public and pushed forwardcongressional approval of the Marshall plan (Leffler 205).

The struggle with Russia was not just political, but for many it was a religious waragainst godless communism. When the iron curtain came down on eastern Europe, thechurch lost territory it had felt was its own for centuries. Cardinal Francis Spellman,Archbishop of New York, in his annual St. Patricks day speech, 1948, warned ofcivilization threatened with crucifixion by communism. (Spellman)

In his inauguration speech, Jan 1949, Truman spoke only of foreign policy (McCullough729). Communism is a false doctrine, he said. Communism believes mankind to be weakand unable to make its own decisions. Democracy believes mankind has the capacity andright to govern itself (McCullough 730). The NATO treaty, signed April 4, 1949, was thefirst peacetime military alliance since Washington had warned against entanglingalliances. In 1949 the act unifying the armed forces and creating the Central IntelligenceAgency was passed.

Chiang Kai-shek fled mainland China in December 1949, leaving behind the victoriousand communist Mao Zedong in the most populous country in the world. The so-calledChina Lobby in America was an alliance consisting of religious, military figures andprominent republicans that had fought hard to keep China from becoming communist.MacArthur had written an article warning if China fell to the communists, it wouldimperil half the world. In August 1949, the Truman administration tried to counter theconcern about losing China with a thousand page State Department report analyzing theentire record. The conclusion - China is a huge country with its own internal politicalreality. Despite more than $2 billion in aid, the Chiang Kai-shek Nationalist regime wasincompetent and corrupt. The civil war in China was beyond the control of the United


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States (qtd in McCullough 743). It caused a sensation. The less restrained criticismcalled it a whitewash of the pro-communists in the State Department. The chief targetswere Truman and Secretary of State Dean Acheson. McCullough says that Acheson wasthe target of vilification such as few in American public life had ever known.(756)

In September 1949 Truman received word that Russia had exploded its first atomicbomb. In October highly secret meetings were held in Washington to discuss a newtheoretical super bomb, the hydrogen bomb. When fully briefed to the feasibility andmagnitude, Acheson remarked, what a depressing world (qtd in McCullough 749). InJanuary 1950 the Truman administration announced they would develop this new bomb.Einstein went on TV and spoke of atmospheric poisoning and the annihilation of life. Afew days later the British spy Klaus Fuchs confessed to passing atomic secrets from theAmericans to the Russians.

Alger Hiss was an American-born, high respected official in both the Truman andRoosevelt administraitions, and charged with being a Soviet spy. The drama played out

on the front pages for a year and a half, from testimony before the House Un-AmericanCommittee, through two trials. During the first trial, Truman says to reporters, thecountry is not going to hell, read some history (McCullough 742). Because the statute oflimitations had run out, on Jan 21, 1950, Alger Hiss was found guilty of perjury. RichardNixon accused the Truman administration of deliberately trying to cover up the Hissconspiracy. (McCullough 759). Secretary of State Dean Acheson was a personal friend ofHiss and did not accept the slim evidence presented. He said at a press conference that hewill not turn his back on Alger Hiss. Joe McCarthy asked, will he not turn his back onother communists in the State Department as well? Richard Nixon called Achesonsstatement disgusting (McCullough 760). After decades of debate, historians haveconcluded that Hiss did indeed pass information to the Soviets (Uebelhor 241).

On Jan 7, 1950, Joe McCarthy had lunch with a Catholic priest, Father Edmund Walsh,dean of Georgetowns foreign service school. Walsh, who had a long history as an anti-communist, suggested to McCarthy, who was Irish Catholic, that he make communistsubversion in the U.S. an issue (McCullough 765). At a Lincoln day speech in 1950, justafter the Alger Hiss conviction, McCarthy made the first of his wild charges, waving alist he said of 205 known communists in the State Department. The next week it was alist of 57 card carrying communists, and later it was 81. McCarthyism, defined today asexaggerated unsubstantiated character assassination, would last until his censure by theSenate in 1954.

In 1950, McCarthy was not up for re-election, but he helped campaign against MillardTydings. Tydings had chaired hearings on McCarthy and called his charges a hoax.McCarthy circulated a faked photo of Tydings with Earl Browder, the head of theAmerican Communist party (McCullough 814). Tydings lost the election. McCarthy-"You have to play rough if you are going to root out this motley crew.(Time Magazine,Oct 22, 1951) Richard Nixon was first elected Senator in 1950. His opponent, HelenDouglas, he said, was pink down to her underwear. (McCullough 814) Republicanswould sweep the elections in both 1950 and 1952.
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The 1950 military budget was planned to be 13.5 billion (McCullough 759). More thanthat was set aside to pay WW2 bills. Truman still believed in balanced budgets, thoughhe was planning a 5 billion deficit. After the deluge of bad news - Hiss, McCarthy, theSoviet bomb, the Chinese victory, and the belief that Russia was committted toworldwide aggression - Acheson argued that the 13.5 billion defense budget was no

longer enough. Truman ordered a new review of military policy (McCullough 765).

National Security Council paper no. 68 (NSC-68) was given to Truman April 7, 1950. Itwas written by Paul Nitze, Dean Acheson and the Department of Defense. It wasdesigned to shock - the United States was in deep peril. The U.S. was far behind theSoviets in conventional power. Nuclear power could not make up the difference, andregardless, Russia would achieve nuclear parity by 1954. A tremendous miltiary build-upwas the only solution. Budget figures were discussed at 40-50 billion, 3 times the currentdefense spending. The survival of the world is at stake. The paper was set aside withoutaction. (McCullough 771-772)

Communist North Korean troops attacked South Korea in June 1950. The Koreans, eventhe Chinese, were seen as agents of the Russians. The Chinese Communist armies wefight in Korea, Life magazine said, are truly the armies of the Soviet Union as if theywore the uniform.(qtd in McCullough 825) . In Korea, Russia was testing the U.S(McCullough 778) Truman on July 19, 1950, Appeasement leads only to furtheraggression and ultimately to war. (qtd in McCullough 784) The line must be held, orJapan and Southeast Asia could also fall. Omar Bradley and the Joint Chiefs thoughtKorea might be a decoy in a larger Russian strategy (McCullough 789). Korea was justone battle in the worldwide struggle with the Soviets.

In the first week of July 1950, MacArthur asked for 30,000 troops. A few days later, heasked for twice that many (McCullough 789). The war goes badly, then goes well, thengoes badly again when the decision is made to chase the North Korean army to theChinese border. Chinese troops enter the Korean peninsula with overwhelming numbers.

NSC-68 had not been adopted before the Korean War. In late summer 1950, Trumanannounced plans to double the men in uniform to 3 million, telling the American peoplethis was the new reality which would have to be endured a long time. Congress raisedmilitary spending for 1950-51 to $48.2 billion, and 1951-52 to $60 billion (McCullough792). The cold war was on and America would never again see defense spending like the$20 billion of 1948, much less the $2 billion of 1940.

MacArthur was fired by Truman in April 1951 for criticizing Trumans conduct of thewar, for giving the Chinese ultimatums, for making his views known we should take thewar to China. In his penultimate moment, speaking before Congress after being recalled,MacArthur was unrestrained. The Washington politicians had brought a new conceptinto military operations- the concept of appeasement...to go on indefinitely, indecisive,fighting with no mission. There is no subsitute for victory.(McCullough 853)MacArthur if allowed to widen the war into China, said Bradley, would involve us in thewrong war, at the wrong place, at the wrong time, and with the wrong enemy.


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(McCullough 854) Russia was the enemy behind all the trouble, not China, and Europewas the most important region in the world to be protected.

After the dramatic firing of MacArthur, and during Trumans lowest popularity ratings,McCarthy made his most vitriolic attack on General Marshall and Dean Acheson in June

1951. They were part of a conspiracy so immense it surpassed any in history(McCullough 859). McCarthy said it was Marshall that created the China policy and themilitary strategy in Korea. Truman was no longer in control. He was a part of aconspiracy that was being guided from Moscow. He talked for 3 hours. By the end, only3 senators had not walked out. It would still be 2 and a half years before the Senate wouldcensure him. (McCullough 860)

Backed by military and religious factions, Democrat and Republican political doctrine,America never stood down after WW2. The American response after WW2 would havebeen appropriate if Russia was intent on world domination. There was a threat, butAmerican leaders overestimated the appeal of the Russian-Marxist system in a disrupted

and dysfunctional world. American leaders saw Russian influence behind every localuprising and every case of Marxist appeal.(Leffler, 508) Fearful of the bomb, fearful thatMarxism was a contagious disease, fearful of those who did not fear God, Americafought and spent its way to security, from a $2 billion defense budget in 1940, to nearly$1000 billion in 2011. For sixty years we have quartered troops overseas duringpeacetime. Eisenhower, the victor of WW2, warned the American people of the self-perpetuating nature of military spending. Truman also regretted creating a secret CIAagency empowered and energized to fight communism, where not even the Presidentknew what they were doing (Miller 391). It all began in the first few years after WW2.

Works Cited

Leffler, Melvyn. A Preponderance of Power: National Security, the Truman

Administration, and the Cold War. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992.

McCullough, David. Truman. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1992.

Miller, Merle. Plain Speaking: an Oral Biography of Harry S. Truman. New York:

Berkley, 1973.

Spellman, Cardinal Francis. Mankinds Moment of Decision. Vital SpeechesMarch 17, 1948

Uebelhor, Tracy. Presidential Profiles: The Truman Years. New York: Facts on

File, 2006

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