The Policies that Changed America: Truman Doctrine, Woodrow Wilson

Wilsonianism and the legacy of Woodrow Wilson

Woodrow Wilson was the 28th president of United States of America, serving from 1913 to 1921. His thinking was based under three main concepts: foreign policy should serve to broad human concerns rather than selfish interests, the objective was to reshape a world town by war by confronting revolutions (in Mexico and Russia) and the US should have a voice in peace-making (liberal peace program).

One of the most important aspects of his foreign policy affairs was the aggressive moral diplomacy he used against Mexico. Following, he appealed to the Americans to stay completely neutral in the World War I but after a few American ships were sunk and the open arrival of the Zimmermann telegram offended Americans, Wilson requested that Congress proclaim war on Germany. Wilson had proposed a program of military readiness as right on time as 1915. This helped the US Navy move rapidly to help the British army in annihilating the danger of German submarines to Allied sending by late 1917.

However, the most notable implication in the foreign policy is the creation of the “Fourteen Points”. Successful in war, Wilson would have liked to reform the lead of global undertakings at the peace table. He originally illustrated his vision in the 'Fourteen Points' discourse conveyed to Congress on January 8, 1918. It required 'new diplomacy' comprising of “open covenants openly arrived at.” Secret agreements, similar to the ones that had maneuverd the world into war in 1914 would never again be endured, and all regions involved amid the war were to be emptied. Wilson needed to disassemble the majestic request by opening up frontier possessions to inevitable self-guideline and every single European area of the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian domains to quick autonomy. He additionally proposed a general demilitarization after the war, with the Germans and Austrians surrendering their military first. Reasonable treatment of progressive Russia, he announced, would be the 'acid test' of the harmony. Different focuses included opportunity of the oceans consistently and organized commerce everywhere throughout the world.

But Wilson's most important proposal was the prevention of future wars by means of a new international organization, a league of nations, open to membership by all democratic states. This new world body would be in charge of disarmament and the dismantling of colonial possessions. Most importantly, the League would hold power over all disputes among its members. Wilson believed that this League would transform international relations and usher in a new era of world peace. In conclusion, he is one of the most important presidents in the history of USA reforming complete the ideology of the time with the change from a traditional American unilaterist view with a universalist view – interests of all nations are our own also.

The major contribution of Roosevelt with the institutions building of US Foreign Policy

Through his initial six years in office, Franklin Roosevelt invested quite a bit of his energy attempting to bring the United States out of the Great Depression. The President, nonetheless, surely did not overlook America's remote approach as he made the New Deal. As opposed to President Hoover, who trusted that the Depression emerged from global conditions, Roosevelt trusted that the country's financial troubles were to a great extent home-developed. Amid this early period in his organization, Roosevelt scored his most prominent outside arrangement accomplishment through his 'Good Neighbour' strategy towards Latin America and nations of the Western Hemisphere. In fact, Hoover started the 'Good Neighbour' activity and Roosevelt just pursued his antecedent's course. Roosevelt needed to check Japan's developing force in Asia by supporting China, despite the fact that this strategy had strict breaking points. Hitler started his ruinous triumph of Europe in 1936, walking his troops into the Rhineland, a neutral ground that circumscribed France, Belgium, and Germany. Roosevelt's feelings plainly lay with the British and French, yet he was hamstrung by the Neutrality Acts and a solid independent coalition in American governmental issues. Roosevelt's initiative amid this period was vital, albeit a long way from perfect. He and British head administrator Winston Churchill shaped a successful group, and made a joint proclamation of their countries' war objectives, called the 'Atlantic Charter,' in August 1941. The enormous difficulties that Roosevelt looked in the European clash were intensified by the declining circumstance in Asia, and especially by the downturn in U.S.- Japanese relations.

With the onset of global war, the making of foreign policy became more complex—and even more disorderly. To meet the rapidly expanding demands of a host of new global diplomatic and military problems, FDR created a huge foreign policy bureaucracy that would become a permanent fixture of American life. Even before Pearl Harbour, he concluded that the State Department could not cope with the exigencies of total war. Thus, as with New Deal domestic programs, he established emergency “alphabet soup” agencies. Some of them were given deceptively innocent names, perhaps reflecting the nation’s continuing innocence, more likely to obscure their purpose. An Office of Facts and Figures, later the Office of War Information (OWI),was responsible for propaganda at home and abroad; The Coordinator of Information, precursor to the Office of Strategic Services (OSS)—and subsequently the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)—was America’s first independent intelligence agency.

These new agencies assumed various wartime tasks: OWI censored the press and churned out posters, magazines, comic books, films, and cartoons to undermine enemy morale and sell the war and U.S. war aims to allies and neutrals; The Office of Lend-Lease Administration (OLLA) ran that essential wartime foreign aid program; Wallace’s Board of Economic Warfare (BEW) conducted pre-emptive purchasing to keep vital raw materials out of enemy hands and manipulated trade to further the war effort.

In conclusion, Roosevelt firmly believed in the superiority of American values and institutions. He was also certain that post-war peace and stability depended on the extension of those principles across the world and that other peoples would accept them if given a chance. The New Deal, in his view, pointed the way to the future, and he saw in the war an opportunity to promote world reform along those lines. He saw better than Wilson the limits of American power; he intuitively understood that diplomatic problems were not always susceptible to neat solutions that lead to the idea of pragmatic idealism. He moved his nation away from its unilateralist tradition toward international cooperation. However, unlike his mentor, who had insisted that the United States fight as an “associated” power, Roosevelt assumed leadership of the United Nations.

The Truman revolution in Foreign Policy

President Harry S. Truman defied exceptional difficulties in worldwide undertakings amid his almost eight years in office. Truman guided the United States through the finish of World War II, the start of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, and the unfolding of the nuclear age. Truman mediated with American troops in the contention between North Korea and South Korea and he upheld the production of the province of Israel in the Middle East. In entirety, Truman's outside strategy set up a portion of the essential standards and duties that stamped American remote approach for the rest of the twentieth century.

Truman acquired Roosevelt's national security group, however he would change it—as far as both staff and association—over the span of his administration. Truman likewise revamped the country's military and national security mechanical assembly with entry of the National Security Act in 1947. The enactment had three fundamental purposes. It brought together the Army, Navy, and Air Force under a National Military Establishment (NME) headed by a regular citizen Secretary of Defense.

Responding to the turmoil that was the new world “order” and to a perceived global threat from the Soviet Union, the Truman administration between 1945 and 1953 turned traditional U.S. foreign policy assumptions upside down. Unilateralism gave way to multilateralism. Through the policy of containment, the Truman administration undertook a host of international commitments, launched scores of programs, and mounted a peacetime military build-up that would have been unthinkable just ten years earlier. The age of American globalism was under way.

Policymaking changed dramatically under Truman’s very different leadership style: Truman saw a complex world in black-and-white terms. He shared the parochialism of most Americans of his generation, viewed people, races, and nations through he crudest of stereotypes, and sometimes used ethnic slurs. He assumed that American ways of doing things were the correct way and that the peace should be based on American principles. He preferred blunt talk to the silky tones of diplomacy. He was decisive, but this could also reflect his lack of experience and sometimes profound insecurity. One of the most important policies developed by him is the Truman Doctrine which meant “that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces.”

Under the Truman Doctrine, the United States plunged into the Greek Civil War, the first of many such forays. It was an especially savage conflict with atrocities on both sides. The United States focused narrowly on military success and did little to address the problems that had caused the rebellion in the first place. United States aid undoubtedly played an important role in the government’s survival and may have deterred greater Soviet involvement. The crucial factor in the outcome was the role of the Communist nations. Stalin responded to the Truman Doctrine by briefly aiding the rebels, but he hedged his bets by refusing to recognize them and within six months had cut off assistance. More important, he insisted that Yugoslavia’s Tito do the same, causing an irreparable split, the first fissure in the Communist “bloc.”

Another vital important developed by Truman is the so-called Marshall Plan. The Marshall Plan furnished $13 billion in economic assistance. United States funds performed a dazzling array of tasks, helping to rebuild Italy’s Fiat automobile plant, modernizing mines in Turkey, and enabling Greek farmers to purchase Missouri mules. The Marshall Plan provided the capital and imports essential to European recovery without sparking inflation. The import of American methods helped improve Western European budgeting and economic planning. Aid from the United States helped stabilize currencies, liberalize and stimulate trade, and promote prosperity. It started the process of integration that led to the Common Market and ultimately the European Union.

In conclusion, successes and failures aside, the Truman administration in the short space of seven years carried out a veritable revolution in U.S. foreign policy. It altered the assumptions behind national security policies, launched a wide range of global programs and commitments, and built new institutions to manage the nation’s burgeoning international activities. Perhaps most important, during the Truman years foreign policy became a central part of everyday life.