The Success of the Truman Foreign Policy
On May 1947, President Harry S. Truman addressed to the Congress, “I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.
I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.” That was the so-called Truman Doctrine, which was the guideline for the U.S. foreign policy during the post war years when the European nations were devastated economically and politically in the aftermath of the Second World War. The destiny of these nations fell into the hands of the two major powers, USSR and the United States. The U.S. has historically pursued a isolationist policy, but found such isolationist policy would only render the Europe to the totalitarian rule of the Communist USSR. If they do not act, the Iron Curtain, within which the Soviet Union controles everything, would soon envelope the whole Europe . The United States would then loose allies of freedom, and partners of markets and trade. Truman and his administration sensed the urgency, felt Stalin’s motives of aggressively expanding under nationalist policies and ideology. As a result, Truman and his advisors developed postwar foreign policies, based on The Truman Doctrine. The Marshall plan and other containment strategies were implemented. The U.S. successfully stopped the expansion of the Soviet Union, sustained the U.S. national interests, secured their dominance in Europe and maintained a superpower position in the world since