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NSC 68
United States Objectives and Programs for National Security, better known as NSC 68, was a 66-page top secret U.S. National Security Council (NSC) policy paper drafted by the Department of State and Department of Defense and presented to President Harry S. Truman on 7 April 1950. It was one of the most important American policy statements of the Cold War. In the words of scholar Ernest R. May, NSC 68 "provided the blueprint for the militarization of the Cold War from 1950 to the collapse of the Soviet Union at the beginning of the 1990s." NSC 68 and its subsequent amplifications advocated a large expansion in the military budget of the United States, the development of a hydrogen bomb, and increased military aid to allies of the United States. It made the rollback of global Communist expansion a high priority and rejected the alternative policies of détente and containment of the Soviet Union.
By 1950, U.S. national security policies required reexamination due to a series of events: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was operational, military assistance for European allies had begun, the Soviet Union had detonated an atomic bomb and the communists had solidified their control of China. In addition, a British sterling-dollar crisis in the summer of 1949 had brought home to U.S. officials that the Marshall Plan would not suffice to cure Western European economic ills by 1952, the Plan's scheduled end year, with the prospect that Western Europe would have no choice but to pursue autarky, as it had in the 1930s, with all the attendant difficulties that would pose for the world economy generally and the U.S. economy particularly. Similar problems were also plaguing Japan. With these threats to the U.S. and its allies expanding, on 31 January 1950 President Truman directed the Department of State and Department of Defense "to undertake a reexamination of our objectives in peace and war and of the effect of these objectives on our strategic plans." A State-Defense Policy Review Group was set up under the chairmanship of Paul Nitze of the State Department.
Nitze, an advocate of rollback, ensured that only the most severe claims about the Soviet Union were cited in the document. The analysis of top Kremlin experts like George Kennan, Llewellyn Thompson, and Charles Bohlen, were categorically omitted. The Kennan–Thompson–Bohlen group maintained that Stalin's principal goal was to secure tight control of the USSR and its satellites, but that he had no plan to seek global domination (an assessment shared by most historians today[weasel words]). Nitze however, contended that the Soviets were determined to conquer the whole of Europe and most of Asia and Africa. Dean Acheson, another hawkish adviser to Truman, wrote that the purpose of NSC 68 was to "bludgeon the mind of top government that not only could the president make a decision, but that the decision could be carried out."
The Defense Department representatives on the committee initially resisted proposals that would exceed the existing $12.5 billion ceiling on defense spending.
The report, designated NSC 68, was presented to President Truman on 7 April 1950, who passed it on to the NSC for further consideration on 12 April 1950.
NSC Study Group:
Originally, President Truman did not support NSC 68 when it was brought to him in 1950. He believed that it was not specific about which programs would be affected or changed and it also did not go well with his previous defense spending limits. Truman sent it back for further review until he finally approved it in 1951.
The document outlined the de facto national security strategy of the United States for that time (although it was not an official National Security Strategy in the form known today) and analyzed the capabilities of the Soviet Union and of the United States of America from military, economic, political, and psychological standpoints.[citation needed]
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NSC 68
United States Objectives and Programs for National Security, better known as NSC 68, was a 66-page top secret U.S. National Security Council (NSC) policy paper drafted by the Department of State and Department of Defense and presented to President Harry S. Truman on 7 April 1950. It was one of the most important American policy statements of the Cold War. In the words of scholar Ernest R. May, NSC 68 "provided the blueprint for the militarization of the Cold War from 1950 to the collapse of the Soviet Union at the beginning of the 1990s." NSC 68 and its subsequent amplifications advocated a large expansion in the military budget of the United States, the development of a hydrogen bomb, and increased military aid to allies of the United States. It made the rollback of global Communist expansion a high priority and rejected the alternative policies of détente and containment of the Soviet Union.
By 1950, U.S. national security policies required reexamination due to a series of events: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was operational, military assistance for European allies had begun, the Soviet Union had detonated an atomic bomb and the communists had solidified their control of China. In addition, a British sterling-dollar crisis in the summer of 1949 had brought home to U.S. officials that the Marshall Plan would not suffice to cure Western European economic ills by 1952, the Plan's scheduled end year, with the prospect that Western Europe would have no choice but to pursue autarky, as it had in the 1930s, with all the attendant difficulties that would pose for the world economy generally and the U.S. economy particularly. Similar problems were also plaguing Japan. With these threats to the U.S. and its allies expanding, on 31 January 1950 President Truman directed the Department of State and Department of Defense "to undertake a reexamination of our objectives in peace and war and of the effect of these objectives on our strategic plans." A State-Defense Policy Review Group was set up under the chairmanship of Paul Nitze of the State Department.
Nitze, an advocate of rollback, ensured that only the most severe claims about the Soviet Union were cited in the document. The analysis of top Kremlin experts like George Kennan, Llewellyn Thompson, and Charles Bohlen, were categorically omitted. The Kennan–Thompson–Bohlen group maintained that Stalin's principal goal was to secure tight control of the USSR and its satellites, but that he had no plan to seek global domination (an assessment shared by most historians today[weasel words]). Nitze however, contended that the Soviets were determined to conquer the whole of Europe and most of Asia and Africa. Dean Acheson, another hawkish adviser to Truman, wrote that the purpose of NSC 68 was to "bludgeon the mind of top government that not only could the president make a decision, but that the decision could be carried out."
The Defense Department representatives on the committee initially resisted proposals that would exceed the existing $12.5 billion ceiling on defense spending.
The report, designated NSC 68, was presented to President Truman on 7 April 1950, who passed it on to the NSC for further consideration on 12 April 1950.
NSC Study Group:
Originally, President Truman did not support NSC 68 when it was brought to him in 1950. He believed that it was not specific about which programs would be affected or changed and it also did not go well with his previous defense spending limits. Truman sent it back for further review until he finally approved it in 1951.
The document outlined the de facto national security strategy of the United States for that time (although it was not an official National Security Strategy in the form known today) and analyzed the capabilities of the Soviet Union and of the United States of America from military, economic, political, and psychological standpoints.[citation needed]