The Truman Doctrine - Assignment Example

The Truman Doctrine a. Introduction The Truman doctrine paved the way for changing the policies of the international relations policies of the UnitedStates. The Truman doctrine effectively changes the outlook of the country when it comes to foreign policies by radically changing from the isolationists stand espoused by the Munroe Doctrine1 that has served the country for more than 150 years to a more open or internationalists approach. However, although there were sectors that welcomed the Truman Doctrine, there were also some sector that were critical of this approach to foreign policies that they begun to question as to whether or not the Truman doctrine is an exaggerated response to an imaginary threat. History tells us that the Truman doctrine stem out from the conflicting views of President Truman and the Russian leader Joseph Stalin at the end of World War II as to how to deal with Germany. The primary reason for the conflict of ideas is rooted on the difference between the ideals of communism, which governs the Soviet Union at that time, and the democratic system espoused by the United States. The bitter conflict of ideas prompted Truman to believe that the spread of communism must be contained and proves the superior strength of the American government by containing the expansion of the Russian territory. During his speech in March 6, 1946 at Waco, Texas, Truman said that “the United States was ‘the giant of the economic world; and would therefore determine the pattern of economic relations.”2 The speech in Waco, Texas became the springboard of Truman’s campaign on serving as the watchdog in the foreign arena. His first move to fulfill his self imposed task of policing the international community is to ask Congress for a $400 million budget to make sure that there will be no communist take over in the countries of Greece and Turkey. Soviet-supported rebels who wanted to put these countries under communist regimes threatened these countries at that time. The Soviet army coveted several naval bases along the Straits of Dardanelles3 in Turkey and had encouraged the insurgent leader Markos Vafiades4 in Greece through support in terms of weapons and allegedly funded their operations5. Truman believes that the United States, as the only super power that can match the Soviet Union has the responsibility to protect the ideals of democracy. According to the Truman Doctrine “ It must be the policy of the United States to support free people who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressure”6 . There were two pints raised by Truman why the United States must adhere to the Truman Doctrine. First, the Middle East is of strategic importance to the Soviet Union since this will mean that the US will now be within the range of an air attack and second the US must be “prepared to wage atomic and biological warfare 7. b. Effects of the Truman Doctrine Although the Truman doctrine may be based on some noble ideals, there have been some negative effects and repercussions brought about by its declaration in March 12, 1946. The Truman doctrine heralded the start of the cold war8 between the United States the Soviet Union. In fact the declaration of Truman led some sector to panic and denounce the declaration of Truman as an exaggerated response to the situation. According to Parenti in his book Inventing Reality, “No one was more instrumental in creating a crisis atmosphere than President Truman himself.”9. Yet, the question still stands as to whether or not there was a clear and present danger that warrants such aggressive intervention on the part of the United States in the affairs of other sovereign nations. Was the declaration of the Truman doctrine justified? An excerpt of the Truman doctrine says “it is only necessary to glance at a map to realize that the survival and integrity of the Greek nation are of grave importance in a much wider situation”10. The argument presented in the doctrine is that there is a clear connection of events that will follow in the event where Greece would fall into the hands of communist regime. According to the Truman Doctrine, the fall of Greece to the control of the armed minority led by Markos Bafiades would eventually have an effect on Turkey. The Truman doctrine sees the fall of the Greek Government as having such negative impact on its neighboring countries that “Confusion and disorder might well spread throughout the entire Middle East”11. History would tell us that there was really no clear evidence that the Soviet intended to take over the Greek Government. Instead, what triggered the great concern about Greece being overtaken by the Soviets is the assumption that when Great Britain would pullout their economic and financial support to Greece, this country will not become vulnerable to Soviet invasion. In other words, the bases for the arguments on the Truman doctrine and the approval of the $400 million aid to Greece and Turkey is the mere probability that the Soviets will take advantage of the momentary weakness of these countries. The Truman doctrine banked on the moral need to protect other nations from grave threats, saying, “At the present moment in the world history, nearly every nation must choose between alternative ways of life. The choice is too often not a free one.”12. The doctrine effective narrowed down the choice of alternative ways of life into mere two categories. According to the Truman Doctrine “one way of life is based upon the will of the majority…the second way of life is based upon the will of the minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. 13. The doctrine actually tried to paint a picture of subjugation through arms struggle as the second category for ruling a nation. The doctrine therefore seeks to “support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressure.”14. The doctrine continued to appeal to the sense of righteousness on the American people by saying that “ the seeds of totalitarian regimes are nurtured by misery and want. They spread and grow in the evil soil of poverty and strife. They reach their full growth when the hope of a people for a better life had died.”15 Note that the doctrine was release in 1946 right after World War II devastated the European countries. Poverty and strife was the prevalent picture at that time that it would indeed be easier to convince a people that threats of subjugation is real. After the declaration of the Truman Doctrine and the way the media picked up the story, a sense of impending danger gripped the people of the United States16. The constant feeding of the media of information about impending dangers made these dangers seem so real on the hearts and minds of the people that most Americans would tend to support the Truman Doctrine. Yet, how real was the danger? Were there really concrete manifestations that a certain event such as a world take over by the communist group would happen to warrant such preemptive policies as the Truman Doctrine? Contrary to the assumptions made by President Truman that by merely looking at a map one could already see the Soviets intend to expand its territory by conquering other nations contiguous to its existing territories, then Senior Soviet Expert of the State Department George F. Kennan17 reported that “Turkey had no indigenous communist problem”18. In effect, although Greece may be having internal problems with local rebels who want to topple the Greek government, Turkey does not have such impending threats that would warrant such support that the Truman Doctrine have in mind. According to Coates in his book the Ethics of War, he said “Offensive war may be admitted as a corollary of the right of self-defense”19. However, in the case of the Truman Doctrine where it seeks to make a preemptive move to prevent the Soviets from invading Greece and, eventually, Turkey, “it is a question of responding not to a completed act of aggression but to an anticipated one”20. According to Coates, “the line between anticipatory defense and an act of naked aggression is often very much more difficult to draw”21. Was the United States overly reacting on a hypothetical situation or is it merely responding to an imminent threat that could have a devastating effect on the international level? Furthermore, the Truman Doctrine did not take into consideration the nature of the government structures of Greece and Turkey22, which is actually authoritarian. When we talk about Greece and Turkey in the year 1946 when the Truman doctrine was conceptualized and declare as the governing rule for international policies of the United States, we are not talking about “free people” in Greece and Turkey in the real sense of the word. The understanding of Americans about “freedom” and “free people” would run contrary to the nature of the systems of government in Greece and Turkey. Who were we trying to free at that fateful moment? Whose freedom are we trying to preserve? As the Congress authorized President Truman to allocated $400 million to help the countries of Greece and Turkey, the media gave Truman an overwhelming support that plays up the menace of communism and the need to really contain this type of government and prevent it from spread its territorial coverage. The argument of George F. Kennan, that “the Soviet Union might regard military aid to a nation on its border as provocative”23 was not really taken seriously by the Truman administration. As the media at that time usually get their stories from government agencies and is reluctant to lose their source of information, most media companies took on the stand of the dominant party24. It must always be noted that the media readily accepted the Truman Doctrine at that time and the media made it possible to rally support from the people on the change of international policies. The constant drumming of the media on the probabilities of a Third World War just a few years after World War I and World War II is enough to send people cowering and thinking “let Truman get the bad guys before they get us!” Technically, the Truman Doctrine rallied the support of the Americans by creating a crisis scenario. Although the facts may be hypothetical, the presentation of the facts in the Truman Doctrine would create a sense of fear that could be used as justification of making offensive moves. According to Coates, “from the moral point of view, the idea of an anticipatory war of self-defense is fraught with danger and the possibilities of abuse are obvious”25. You cannot fight a hypothetical war with arsenals that are real and destructive. You cannot really be sure if your hypothesis will indeed come to life and would warrant the necessary response. You have a theory, and unless it is proven to be true and have become tangible, it will only constitute as a simply theory and a figment of the imagination. According to Coates, preventing a war and the consequences of war would require the imminent danger of having a war. A preventive war should be distinguished from a preemptive war. When you say preventive war, there is really no clear and present danger involved, only a theory that something is about to happen due to some supervening events. For instance, the growing power of a certain state could be view as a threat in preventive war even in the absence of a clear indication that such State has the intent to subjugate other States26. The idea really is to prevent certain events to take place by suppressing the probable cause. Based on the theory of just war, the United States does not have any probable cause to cause an offensive attack in the absence of a clear showing that the Soviet Union has the intent to subjugate Greece and Turkey and divest its people of their freedom. Note that even President Truman himself could show that the Soviet Union has all the intention of advancing into the Greek territory. The mere fact that there was an ongoing civil war in Greek territories does not amount to an international threat that must be quelled in order not to reach to such scale and it will threaten the whole world. According to Offner in his Encyclopedia of US Foreign Relations, the Truman Doctrine grossly exaggerated the Soviet behavior versus Greece and Turkey that it had created an “ideological straightjacket for American foreign policy heightened East-West bloc tension and signaled a turn away from diplomacy to resolve disputes with the Russians.”27. If you take a critical look into the scenario that was created by the Truman Doctrine in 1946, you can see that the Truman Doctrine actually establish the Soviet Union as the enemy of mankind. It presented a one-sided picture of war and the just causes of waging a war to prevent possible events that could lead to world destruction. Truman had theory and he wanted pursue that theory of subjugation even without any clear evidence that it would eventually take place. It is like having a local wound on your arm, which is painful but non-fatal, but since you believe that it could cause damage to your entire body, you cut you arm even though you are not really sure if it will indeed cause harm to your entire system. You really are not sure but still go on anyway because you want to do away with a probable discomfort. The absence of a clear showing that the Soviet Union had the intent to subjugate the countries of Greece and Turkey removes the acts President Truman from the ambit of just wars. Therefore, the declaration the Truman Doctrine in 1946 is but a clear exaggerated response to an imaginary threat. This exaggerated response to imaginary threat sends many young Americans to their death during the ensuing war in between North Korea and South Korea in 1950. When President Truman was told that the North Korea, which is a communist country, had invaded South Korea, he send 10,000 troops to help fight the war. This time it is a war against the communist ideology. The Truman Doctrine was also the culprit that sent hundreds of young Americans to Vietnam in 1965 to quell the spread of communism. This move is based on the Truman Doctrine that invokes the right to “containment”. Until now, many American still cannot see the meaning of all the lives lost fighting a war that was not really theirs. Why did they have to send 525,000 troops to Vietnam to be slaughtered mercilessly? Does the end justify the means? When the Soviet Union finally disbanded in 1991, some thought that the Truman Doctrine would no longer be invoked, as the specter of communism, which first prompted the declaration of the Truman Doctrine, is already a thing of the past. However, the recent gulf war and the more recent Iraq war clearly made us see that the Truman Doctrine is still very much alive. Although the two wars were not fought over the idea of “containment” it serve a similar purpose of policing the world. Somehow, the Truman Doctrine has evolved into a policy where the United States is justified into intervening in world affairs on the grounds that it is protecting the very essence of democracy. The Truman Doctrine of our time is no longer about containment but more on the United States serving as a watchdog of international affairs. c. Conclusion In the end, the Truman Doctrine is really about the efforts of President Truman to gain support from the people about his desire to keep the United States at the top of the powerful nations of the world. The Truman Doctrine sowed fear in the hearts and minds of the people. It effectively identified the Soviet Union as the enemy of freedom, something that must be subdued in order not to inflict damage on free nations. According to the just war theory, the United States started the Cold War through the Truman Doctrine. However, as the years went by, the Truman Doctrine has taken a life and a mind of its own. From the idea of “containment”, it had become a policy for the United States government to intervene in the conflict of nations. It is now serving as a “police” that protects the rights of the weaker States from aggressions. To some extent, the evolution of the Truman Doctrine is welcome, however, there are still many sectors that believe that the Truman Doctrine is arbitrary response mechanism that is prone to make exaggerated responses to imaginary threats to liberty. We must always bear in mind that “decisions relating to war are not made in a moral vacuum”28. There are many factors that influence decision makers on when and when not to go to war in certain situations. It is not justifiable to wage a preventive war based on mere theories and probabilities. References: 1. Aronson, James. The Press and the Cold War. Boston: Beacon P, 1970. 2. Coates, A.J. The Ethics of War. Manchester: Manchester UP, 1997. 3. Encyclopedia Britannica http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9001375/Markos-Vafiades last accessed October 10, 2006 4. Ferrel, Robert. Harry S.Truman, A Life. London: University of Missouri Press, 1994. pp. 246- 268, 353-357. 5. Frazier, R (1991) Anglo-American Relations with Greece 6. Liebovich, Louis. The Press and the Origins of the Cold War, 1944-1947. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1988. 7. Murphy, Gretchen (2005). Hemispheric Imaginings: The Monroe Doctrine and Narratives of U.S. Empire. Duke University Press) 8. Offner, Arnold A. “Truman Doctrine.” Encyclopedia of US Foreign Relations. Ed. Bruce W. Jentleson and Thomas G. Paterson. Oxford: Oxford UP. 4 (1997): 215-18. 9. Parenti, Michael. Inventing Reality. New York: St. Martin’s P, 1986. 10. Perse, Elizabeth M. Media Effects and Society. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., 2001. 11. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dardanelles last accesed October 10, 2006 12. Spalding, E. (2006). The first Cold Warrior: Harry Truman, Containment and the Remaking of Liberal Internationalism 13. Truman Doctrine.” The Avalon Project. 15 Jan. 2000. 19 Nov. 2001. http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/trudoc.htm last accessed October 10, 2006 14. Truman, Harry. S (1947) Special Message to the Congress on Greece and Turkey: March 12, 1947 http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/dl/free/0072849037/35266/3_2.html last accessed october 10, 2006 15. Wolff Bill (2001) Rhetoric of War online available at http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~wolff/courses/rhe309s02/sample_2.rtf last accessed October 10, 2006 Read More