George Kennan and the Dilemmas of ‘Containment’
Peter Parides
HIS 632
SPRING 1992
1
Preface
The chasm between the meaning of language and its interpretation can often be great. The case
of George Frost Kennan and the “containment” doctrine is one instance in which this statement
is shown to be true. In the pages that follow, I will attempt to prove that what Kennan put forth
as his theory of “containment” was startlingly different than what the key players in the
administration of Harry S. Truman believed Kennan meant to tell them.
To understand why this was so requires vastly more than an exercise in language theory. I
have therefore devoted the first half of this essay to a description of the events that transpired
from Josef Stalin’s decision to lead the Soviet Union on an independent foreign policy in the
early spring of 1945 to the Iranian crisis of March 1946. Only by describing these events in a
chronological fashion can one understand why they occurred as they did. Such is definitely the
case with the timing of the reading by Under Secretary of State Dean Acheson of Kennan’s
“Long Telegram” from Moscow on March 6, 1946. For on that Wednesday morning, Acheson
received a telegram from the American consul in Tabriz, Iran, informing the State Department
of heavy Soviet troop movements in the northern Iranian section of Azerbaijan and of the
activities of a communist-led separatist movement in that same area.
Acheson was astonished. The activities of the Soviets seemed to follow the exact letter of the
“Long Telegram,” which Acheson had in his hand as the telegram from the American consulate
in Iran came to be placed on his desk. Acheson quickly came to the belief that Kennan, among
all those who had opinions on Soviet behavior, possessed the right one.
This belief had great importance. Just a few days prior, Acheson read another report
concerning a theory on Soviet behavior, the Bohlen-Robinson report, written by diplomat
Charles Bohlen and Columbia University professor Geroid Robinson. This report argued that
since American power was so vastly superior to that of the Soviet Union, the United States need
not fear the spread of Soviet aggression for some years to come. Because the United States had
this breathing spell, they argued, there was no need to worry frantically about having to
2
develop a comprehensive policy to deter any immediate Soviet aggression, because there was
no chance of such aggression occurring.
The division chiefs in the State Department took the Bohlen-Robinson report seriously,
circulating it amongst themselves for days. But just a few days after Acheson read the report, he
discounted it; for he received, on March 6, word of the Soviet troop movements in Iran. In
just a few days, Kennan, with the drafting of the “Long Telegram,” became the leading Soviet
expert in the American government.
Kennan’s fame was due to a mixture of timeliness and perception. The “Long Telegram”
had great impact largely because of the day on which Acheson read it and what he perceived it
to mean. It was this mix of timeliness and perception that allowed Kennan to gain the status
from which he could write the famous “X” article, which fully laid out his conception of
“containment.” From the day this report appeared in the July 1947 issue of Foreign Affairs to the
present era, the United States government has based its entire national security policy on what
the Truman administration falsely believed was Kennan’s idea of “containment.”
What Kennan’s true conception of “containment” was is the focus of the latter half of this
essay. By analyzing his many writings from 1946-1951, I will attempt to prove that he
consistently argued, from the outset, for a discriminatingly applied, diplomatic “containment”
of the Soviet Union. That is to say, Kennan’s later criticisms of “containment,” which mainly
concerned its dependence on the military aspects of
developed in
his
later years,
as
American
power,
were not
Barton Gellman, for one, suggests in Contending With
Kennan: Toward a Philosophy of American Power.
Gellman’s book was by no measure the first, or last, study of Kennan and “containment”
undertaken in recent times. The thirtieth anniversary of the appearance of the “X” article
marked the reemergence of this endeavor. In July 1977, Foreign Affairs published an article by
historian John Lewis Gaddis entitled “Containment: A Reassessment.” Gaddis argued that the
controversy concerning what Kennan meant by “containment” resulted from his failure to
adequately explain what he meant by “counter-force.” Gaddis implied that Kennan did in fact
3
mean “counter-force” to be the application of military power because in his lecture of January 7,
1947 at the Council on Foreign Relations, he used the term “counterpressure” when describing
what methods could be used to deter Soviet expansionism.1
Gaddis’ article provoked historian Eduard Mark to write an article entitled “The Question of
Containment: A Reply to John Lewis Gaddis,” which appeared in the January 1978 issue of
Foreign Affairs. Mark likewise disputed the argument, chiefly offered by Kennan himself, that
the diplomat proposed a policy of diplomatic, not military, “containment.” In making his case,
Mark offered the argument that Kennan agreed with the Clifford-Elsey report of September
1946, a position paper drafted by Clark Clifford and George Elsey, junior aides to Truman,
which argued that the United States should adopt a belligerent attitude toward the Soviet
Union.2
Gaddis and Mark were not the only academics to argue that Kennan did indeed offer
“containment” as a military doctrine. In 1984, Gellman echoed Gaddis’ argument concerning
Kennan’s use, on numerous occasions, of the term “counterpressure.”3
The most recent attempt to answer the question of what type of policy Kennan argued for
came from historian Walter Hixson, whose 1989 book, George F. Kennan: Cold War Iconoclast,
argued that Kennan favored a military policy to deter Soviet aggression. Like Mark before him,
Hixson argued that Kennan responded favorably to the Clifford-Elsey report. 4 Overall, Hixson
used Kennan’s language to argue that the former diplomat favored a military “containment” of
the Soviet Union in much the same way as the above-mentioned academics.5
Hixson was not the first such academic to conduct a textual analysis of Kennan’s writings.
Mark, in his article of January 1978, attempted to use Kennan's language to assert that the
1
John Lewis Gaddis, “Containment: A Reassessment,” Foreign Affairs (July 1977): 877.
Eduard Mark, “The Question of Containment: A Reply to John Lewis Gaddis,” Foreign
Affairs (January 1978): 433.
3 Barton Gellman, Contending With Kennan: Toward a Philosophy of American Power (New
York: Praeger, 1984), 132-3.
4 Walter L. Hixson, George F. Kennan: Cold War Iconoclast (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1989), 33-4.
5 Ibid, 35.
2
4
diplomat never intended “containment” to be the benign diplomatic doctrine for which he now
claims to have argued. In support of this claim, Mark asserted that in the draft of the CliffordElsey report which Clifford sent to Kennan in
mid-September 1946, Kennan suggested that
Clifford make a significant revision. Alongside the call for American mass development of
atomic and biological weaponry, Kennan suggested that a sentence or two be added stating that
the United States should declare that it was “important that this country be prepared to use
them if need be, for the mere fact of such preparedness may prove to be the only deterrent to
Russian aggressive actions and in this sense the only sure guarantee of peace.”6 Mark, in
making such an argument, implied that looking at such an isolated and vague phrase alone
could lead one to firmly determine that Kennan, in 1946, meant “containment” to be a military
doctrine.
Mark was not the only academic to attempt to attribute to Kennan certain intentions based
on a single word or phrase. Gellman, for instance, focused on Kennan’s use of the words
“pressure” and “force.” Gellman, in Contending With Kennan, correctly concluded that merely by
looking at how Kennan used such terms in single speeches, his actual beliefs concerning
“containment” cannot be determined. Gaddis echoed this line of thought in his decade-old
study The Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security
Policy.
Gellman and Gaddis correctly assessed the problems concerning this method of language
interpretation. It is, as they wrote, impossible to determine what Kennan originally intended
the “containment” doctrine to be by merely glancing at a token speech given by Kennan on
any one day. To determine what Kennan really meant, one must analyze Kennan’s speeches
and telegrams to the varied audiences to which he lectured over the years 1946-1951 in concert
6
George F. Kennan, “Letter by George F. Kennan to Clark M. Clifford,” 16 September
1946, Box 63, George M. Elsey Papers, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence,
Missouri; in Eduard Mark, “The Question of Containment: A Reply to John Lewis
Gaddis,” Foreign Affairs (January 1978): 433.
5
with his psychological profile and general attitudes toward the making and conduct of
American foreign policy. It is to this task that I devoted my energies.
The undertaking produced the desired results. By analyzing these writings, I revealed that
from 1946-1951 Kennan repeatedly and unswervingly argued for a fastidiously applied,
diplomatic “containment” of the Soviet Union.
Following the essay itself is a short afterword, the purpose of which is to place my argument
in proper context, to explore “the big picture,” so to speak. The argument here is that the
misreading of Kennan’s conception of “containment” by the Truman administration has far
reaching implications even today.
Finally, I refrained from making any judgements concerning the accuracy of Kennan’s
assumptions, or the assumptions of others discussed in this paper, for that sort of analysis was
not the purpose of this essay. But I do admit agreement with Kennan’s statement that, “It was
not ‘containment’ that failed; it was the intended follow-up that never occurred.”7
7 George
F. Kennan, Memoirs: 1925-1950 (New York: Pantheon Books, 1967), 365.
6
[1]
Restraining the Beast:
The Birth of ‘Containment’
By the early spring of 1945, the prospect for American-Soviet relations on the scale envisioned
by Franklin Roosevelt was but pure fantasy. The belief that global peace could be maintained by
the active cooperation of the “four policemen” — the United States, the Soviet Union, Great
Britain, and China, had dissipated due to events in Moscow.
Just weeks after the signing of the Yalta Accords, Josef Stalin decided to lead the Soviet
Union on an independent foreign policy designed to strengthen his nation’s security. The Soviet
leader came to this determination in the face of a United States government that seemed
unwilling to open a second front designed to relieve the Soviet Union during the early months
of the Russo-German war, an American political leadership that stopped supply shipments to
the Soviets in what seemed to be an attempt to exact its diplomatic demands, and an American
nation that willfully kept information concerning the development of atomic weapons from its
Soviet ally. Stalin’s foreign policy initiative, in its initial form, involved the creation of a ring of
satellite states in the areas bordering on the Soviet Union. By the early spring of 1945, such a
ring of buffer states was already in place in eastern Europe. To many in the United States
government,
the motivation for this policy was
a
mystery,
mainly
because
these
individuals
were unaware that the Soviet Union knew of the atomic bomb before the August
1945 attack on Hiroshima.1
This ignorance of Stalin’s motives did not deter certain State Department personnel from
offering recommendations on how the United States should behave towards this new
expansionist power, which was, with each passing day, coming to be viewed as a dangerous
1
See Peter Parides, “Policies of Ignorance: A Reinterpretation of Soviet-American
Relations From 1917 to 1947” (Undergraduate Honors Thesis, University at Stony
Brook, 1991), 43-77.
7
adversary. The first of these policy recommendations, offered by the Chief of the Division of
Southern European Affairs, Cloyce K. Huston, came on October 24, 1945.
Huston’s report was quite bold. He first stated that because prewar eastern Europe harbored
such a vast amount of anti-Soviet sentiment, which happened to be fueled by “American. . .
interests,” the Soviet Union, with its creation of satellite states in the area, was merely
attempting “to ensure that the wall shutting Russia off from the rest of Europe [was] never
rebuilt.” 2 In order to persuade the Soviet Union to lift its hold on eastern Europe, argued
Huston, the United States should adopt “a fresh statement of American policy” aimed at
publicly committing itself to the “active support” of the Soviet goal of ensuring its national
security. In so doing, the American government, argued Huston, should declare its
opposition to any “grouping aimed against the Soviet Union.”3 Such a policy, claimed Huston,
should facilitate the restoration of democratic government to the nations of eastern Europe.
Within just two days, Huston’s superiors discounted the possibility that his
recommendations might actually be adopted as official United States policy. The Huston
report was not rejected, it was merely set aside by John Hickerson, the assistant Chief of the
Division of European Affairs, who remarked that the report contained “good material” that
“should be very carefully considered. . .in light of the survey. . .of the Under Secretary.”4
The Under Secretary being spoken of was Dean Acheson. A one-time clerk for Supreme
Court justice Louis Brandeis, Acheson, because of his assistance to Roosevelt’s 1932 campaign,
2
Cloyce K. Huston to [H. Freeman] Matthews and [John] Hickerson, Memorandum on
Suggested Extension of American Policy in Eastern Europe, 24 October 1945,
Department of State File 711.61/10-2445 CF/V (SF), Record Group 59, National
Archives, Washington D.C.; in Robert L. Messer, “Paths Not Taken: The United States
Department of State and Alternatives to Containment, 1945-1946,” Diplomatic History 1
(Fall 1977): 302.
3 Ibid, 302.
4 John Hickerson, “Letter of John Hickerson to [H. Freeman] Matthews,” 26 October
1945, Department of State File 711.61/10-2445 CS/V (SF), Record Group 59, National
Archives, Washington D.C.; in Robert L.
Messer, “Paths Not Taken: The United States Department of State and Alternatives to
Containment, 1945-1946,” Diplomatic History 1 (Fall 1977): 303.
8
became the Department’s second highest ranking official. In 1945, Acheson controlled the policy
analysis duties of the Department because Jimmy Byrnes, the Secretary of State, was often
overseas attending postwar conferences. In this capacity, Acheson, in late October 1945,
assigned Charles Bohlen, a career diplomat who served in the Moscow embassy during the war,
and Geroid Robinson, a Columbia University professor of political science serving temporarily
as the Chief of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Division, to head a project for the
determination of “The Capabilities and Intentions of the Soviet Union as Affected by American
Policy.” Acheson, in effect, charged Bohlen and Robinson with the responsibility of
recommending to him a policy toward the the Soviet Union that could be used to advise Harry
Truman.
Bohlen and Robinson offered just such a recommendation on December 10. Because the
United States enjoyed what they termed a “decisive military superiority” over the Soviet Union,
“the United States need not be acutely concerned about the immediate current intentions of the
Soviet Union” for at least “a few years.” During this span of time, which Bohlen and Robinson
referred to as “Period I,” the United States should enjoy “considerable latitude” in constructing
its policy toward the Soviet Union. In short, they argued that the United States had a generous
amount of time in which to decide between a “moderate and deliberately reassuring policy” or
a hard-line policy of “developing a maximum alignment of power against the Soviet Union.”5
The Bohlen-Robinson report made a significant impact on the division chiefs who served
directly beneath Acheson. Classified “Top Secret,” the report circulated among these senior
analysts for nearly seven weeks before making its way to Acheson’s desk during the final week
of February 1946.
5
Charles E. Bohlen and Geroid T. Robinson, “The Capabilities and Intentions of the
Soviet Union as Affected by American Policy,” 10 December 1945, Department of State
File FW 711.61/12-1045 (SF), National Archives, Washington D.C.; in Robert L. Messer,
“Paths Not Taken: The United States Department of State and Alternatives to
Containment, 1945-1946,” Diplomatic History 1 (Fall 1977): 306.
9
Acheson responded favorably to the Bohlen-Robisnon report. But just as he began to
prepare a briefing concerning the proposal for Truman, Acheson suddenly lost faith in the
recommendation offered to him by Bohlen and Robinson. This loss of faith had to do with the
receipt by Acheson of yet another situation analysis sent directly from Moscow. The author of
this eight thousand word essay, which came to be known as the “Long Telegram,” was the
chargé d’affairs of the American embassy in Moscow, George Frost Kennan.
Like Bohlen, Kennan was a career diplomat. In fact, Kennan and Bohlen entered the Foreign
Service in the same year, 1926, just twenty-four months after the Service’s creation. Four years
after entering the diplomatic corps, Kennan and Bohlen entered the Soviet Specialists Training
Program, a group created by the Chief of the Eastern European Division, Robert Kelley, for the
purpose of training diplomats for future service in the Soviet Union.
Kennan received his training in Russian at the Oriental Seminary of the University of Berlin.
When he first reached the German capital, Kennan harbored no preconceived distaste for
communism. In fact, at his first sight of a communist demonstration, he was “suddenly moved
to tears by the realization of [the] great earnestness” shown by the “ranks of shabby people with
tense, troubled faces.”6
Kennan’s sympathy for those who espoused communism did not last long. Soon after
beginning his studies, Kennan found himself subjected to a harshly anti-communist
environment. Nearly all his instructors were Russian emigrés of the Tsarist period who
repeatedly declared the Bolshevik government to be a “pariah regime.” Kelley, often
characterized as “unremitting” in his “hostility toward the USSR,” did much to advance
Kennan’s growing resentment toward the Bolshevik government, which Kennan believed held
responsibility for denying him the opportunity to experience the grandeur of Tsarist Russia.7
6
Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, The Wise Men: Six Friends and the World They Made
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1986), 147.
7 Walter L. Hixson, George F. Kennan: Cold War Iconoclast (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1989), 6- 7.
10
This environment became all the more harshly anti-Soviet upon his graduation from the
program in 1931. Because formal diplomatic ties did not yet exist between the United States and
the Soviet Union, the State Department sent Kennan and his colleagues to the recently
independent Baltic republics. Kennan’s specific area of operation was Riga, the capital of Latvia.
While in Riga, Kennan found himself further exposed to segments of the Tsarist aristocracy
displaced by the Bolsheviks’ coming to power. The attitudes of the former Tsarist upper class
had a profound impact on Kennan’s attitude toward communist Russia. Speaking of Riga’s
transformation during the transition from Tsarist Russia to communist Russia, Kennan, in his
memoirs wrote that “. . .the proud title of ‘Paris of the Baltics’ gave way all at once to the gray,
dead shabbiness of isolation behind the impenetrable walls of Stalin’s Russia. . .” 8 Kennan
certainly harbored feelings of resentment toward the Soviets.
This attitude dominated Kennan’s thinking for many years to come. In fact, it played a
critical role in the way Kennan viewed Soviet behavior as Stalin began to embark on
his independent foreign policy in the early spring of 1945. During that period, Kennan
disregarded the belief that the American government could reconcile its differences with the
Soviet Union so that the wartime agreements made at Yalta and at prior conferences might be
adhered to. “I continued,” Kennan wrote, “throughout the immediate post-hostilities period, to
be an advocate — the only such advocate. . .of a prompt and clear recognition of the division of
Europe into spheres of influence.” He further recalled that, “I felt that we were only deceiving
ourselves. . .by clinging to the hope that what the foreseeable future held in store for [eastern
Europe] could be anything less than complete Communist domination. . .on the Soviet
pattern.” 9 On another occasion, Kennan wrote that “[we] should entertain no false illusion or
hopes about the possibilities of tripartite control [in Germany]. . .We are basically in
competition with the Russians [in Germany].”10
8
George F. Kennan, Memoirs, 1925-1950 (New York: Pantheon Books, 1967), 29.
Ibid, 253.
10 Ibid, 258.
9
11
It is not surprising, then, that Kennan, a Soviet expert possessing such firm beliefs as to what
the future course of American-Soviet relations should be, enthusiastically responded to the State
Department’s request for an analysis of Soviet behavior from its Moscow embassy. As Kennan
himself wrote,
For eighteen long months I had done little else but pluck people’s sleeves, trying to make them
understand the nature of the phenomenon with which we in the Moscow embassy were daily confronted
and which our government and people had to learn to understand if they were to have any chance of
coping successfully with the problems of the postwar world. . . .They had asked for it. Now, by God,
they would have it.11
What Kennan gave to the State Department was nothing short of a bold, comprehensive
analysis of Russia’s traditional outlook on world affairs. Kennan stated that, “At bottom of
Kremlin’s neurotic view of world affairs is [a] traditional and instinctive Russian sense of
insecurity. . .” Because of
this deep paranoia,
Kennan
wrote, Russia’s
leadership
historically sought “security only in patient but deadly struggle for total destruction of rival
power, never in compacts and compromises with it. . .”12 It was from these beliefs that
Kennan came to the conclusion that the United States could not reconcile its differences with the
Soviet Union.
More than just giving his analysis of Soviet behavior, Kennan, in the “Long Telegram,”
wrote of the manner in which the American government should approach what he believed to
be a new era of restraining Soviet aggression. Because he believed that “Soviet power. . .does
not take unnecessary risks. . .” due to its being “highly sensitive to the logic of force. . .,”
Kennan believed that the Soviets would “withdraw. . .when strong resistance is encountered at
any point.” From these assumptions, Kennan believed that the United States government could
“approach calmly. . .[the] problem of how to deal with Russia.”13
11
Ibid, 293.
George F. Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” 22 February 1946, Box 23, Folder 47,
George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University,
Princeton, New Jersey.
13 Ibid.
12
12
Although Kennan’s was just one of a myriad of policy recommendations being offered, the
American government was quick to adopt it as the official United States policy toward the
Soviet Union. This process of adoption had to with the day on which Acheson read the “Long
Telegram” — Wednesday, March 6, 1946.
On that day, Kennan’s perceptions seemed to be undeniably proven by fact. With the
Bohlen-Robinson report, which minimized the threat of imminent Soviet aggression, on
Acheson’s desk for a week, the Under Secretary received, that morning, a telegram from Iran.
Sent by the American consul in Tabriz, the telegram notified the State Department of the
existence of heavy Soviet troop movements in Iran. The note further warned of the activities
of a communist-led separatist movement under the direction of the Tudeh Party in the northern
Iranian section of Azerbaijan. At the very moment that this telegram came to be placed on his
desk, Acheson had in his hand the “Long Telegram.” In a matter of minutes, Acheson
disregarded the assumptions of the Bohlen-Robinson report
and accepted those of the
“Long Telegram.” Acheson made these decisions because the Soviet Union’s behavior in
Iran seemed to warrant them. Of Kennan, whose analysis seemed to predict Soviet behavior
as it occurred, Acheson said, “his predictions and warnings could not have been better.”14
Having come to the conclusion that Kennan’s analysis was wholly correct, Acheson
recommended to Truman that the United States follow Kennan’s advice in handling the crisis in
Iran. Within a few days, Iran and the United States brought the issue before the United
Nation’s Security Council, asking that body to accept jurisdiction over the matter. When the
Security Council accepted jurisdiction, the Soviet ambassador to the United Nations, Andrei
Gromyko, stormed out of the meeting, declaring that his nation did not intend to participate
any longer in the newly-created world organization.
The United States then decided to take up the matter directly with the Soviets, boldly
asserting its new but yet unsolidified policy of restraining the Soviet Union. While bilateral
14
Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (New York: W.
W. Norton & Co., 1969), 151.
13
negotiations went on, the date for the Soviet withdrawal of troops from Iran, agreed upon by
Roosevelt and Stalin at the 1942 Teheran conference, elapsed. The American government, upon
the conclusion of this day, came to the belief that a show of force might be necessary.
The United States therefore sent the battleship Missouri to the eastern Mediteranean in the third
week of March.
This display of force produced the desired result. On March 24, the Soviet Union and Iran
reached an agreement whereby the Soviets agreed to remove their troops in return for oil
concessions. Suspicious of the Soviet Union’s sincerity, the United States demanded that the
issue be kept on the Security Council docket until the full withdrawal of the Red Army from
Iranian soil. The Soviets deeply resented this demand, but nevertheless soon withdrew their
troops in strict accordance with the agreement made with the Iranian government.
The Iranian crisis seemed to be a test in which Kennan’s analysis was proven correct. The
United States met Soviet aggression with strong resistance and found that the Soviet Union
was not willing to engage in a clash of force. The Truman administration believed that it had
found the proper policy to adopt toward the Soviet Union. As Acheson stated, “The year 1946
was for the most part a year of learning that minds in the Kremlin worked very much as George
F. Kennan had predicted they would.” 15
15
Ibid, 196.
14
[2]
Of Language and Meaning:
What Kennan Really Meant
The Iranian crisis certainly was a test in which Kennan’s analysis proved to be correct. But the
controversy remains concerning what type of policy Kennan argued for based on this analysis.
In attempting to answer this question, many academics have focused on the language Kennan
used in his writings. The arguments put forth by these scholars are well thought out and
compelling.
But they are unsound. Each of these academics failed to consider the entire realm of
Kennan’s public and private utterances in conjunction with his personal background and views
on the making and conduct of American foreign policy. Such an undertaking clearly indicates
that from Kennan’s first brief intimation concerning “containment,” the “Long Telegram,” to his
final, comprehensive enunciation of it in “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy,”
Kennan experienced no change in thought concerning the “containment” doctrine.
A careful and comprehensive study of Kennan’s writings from 1946-1951 clearly show that
he repeatedly and unswervingly favored a discriminatingly applied, diplomatic “containment”
of the Soviet Union. The necessary starting point for this textual analysis is the “Long
Telegram” of February 22, 1946, in which Kennan first discussed his theory of how the
American government could best deter Soviet aggression. The diplomat primarily stated
that because Soviet leaders tended to act cautiously when faced with the threat of force, the
United States should resist prospective Soviet aggression with such a threat of force.
This statement was a bold one. It seems, as many argued, that Kennan here meant to
propose that that the United States should deter Soviet aggression through the use of military
power. But the last two sentences of this paragraph indicate that Kennan, when
he
wrote
of the necessity to have “sufficient force” and of the necessity to make clear to the Soviets the
United States’ “readiness to use it,” merely advocated that the American government maintain
15
a large military force, the mere existence of which should serve to deter Soviet aggression. “. . .if
adversary has sufficient force and makes clear his readiness to use it, he rarely has to do so. If
situations are properly handled there need be no prestige-engaging showdowns,”wrote
Kennan.1 This analysis proved to be correct during the Iranian crisis.
Dean Acheson agreed. By the end of this event, the Under Secretary of State believed that
Kennan could not have been more correct in the assessments made in the “Long Telegram.” He
was not the only one who felt this way, for there was an even higher ranking official in the
administration of Harry S. Truman who believed Kennan was right — the Secretary of the
Navy, James Forrestal.
Forrestal was a shrewd man. Keenly aware of the limits of his intellect, Forrestal often
searched far and wide for the person who could best give him a solution for whatever problem
plagued him. After reading the “Long Telegram” and viewing the Iranian crisis first hand,
Forrestal believed that Kennan could most adequately answer the problem of of how the United
States should treat the Soviet Union. “[I]t was exactly the kind of job for which Forrestal had
looked vainly elsewhere in the government. . .,” wrote Walter Millis, the chief compiler of
Forrestal’s diaries, about the “Long Telegram.”2
Having come to this conclusion, Forrestal desired to have Kennan within his inner circle.
Using his influence, Forrestal had the diplomat transferred from Moscow to Washington,
where he secured for him the position of Deputy Commandant for Foreign Affairs at the
National War College, scheduled to open its doors in September 1946. In just two months,
Kennan went from being an ignored analyst in Moscow to being in the center of great attention
in Washington, all because of the “Long Telegram” and the policy which it espoused, a
discrminatingly applied, diplomatic “containment” of the Soviet Union.
1 George
F. Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” 22 February 1946, Box 23, Folder 47, George
F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton,
New Jersey.
2 Walter Millis with E.B. Duffield, eds., The Forrestal Diaries (New York: The Viking
Press, 1951), 136.
16
This policy endured yet another major test one month before Kennan assumed his new
duties at the National War College. On August 7, the Soviets sent to the United States a copy of
a note from the Kremlin to the Turkish government informing the Turks of the demand that a
joint Russo-Turkish defense system be created for the purpose of regulating the Turkish Straits,
which were fully within the national boundaries of Turkey.
The Truman administration quickly concluded that it could not allow for such an event to
come to pass. During the week of August 15, the American government sent to the Kremlin a
telegram declaring Turkish sovereignty over the Straits to be in the national interest of the
United States. To show the Soviets just how serious it was, the Truman administration
dispatched a naval force of moderate size led by the newly commissioned supercarrier Franklin
D. Roosevelt to join the battleship Missouri, which was already patrolling the eastern
Mediterranean. Understanding the boldness of these acts, the American Army Chief of
Staff, General Dwight Eisenhower, believed that the presence of such a large American naval
force could lead to an American-Soviet war. 3
Military hostilities never came close to occurring. A few weeks after the United States
response to the Soviet action, the Kremlin withdrew totally its demand for joint RussoTurkish control of the Straits. As with the March Iranian crisis, the Turkish crisis seemed to
prove to the entire Truman administration, above all to Acheson and Forrestal, that the policy
espoused by Kennan in the “Long Telegram” was the perfect policy with which to deter Soviet
aggression.
In Kennan’s view, the United States, in both the Iranian and Turkish crises, followed this
policy to the letter. The Truman administration, in both cases, met Soviet aggression with firm
diplomacy and a display of force it did not mean to use. In both cases, the Soviets relented, as
Kennan predicted in the “Long Telegram.” Kennan believed that all in the Truman
3
Dean Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (New York:
W.W. Norton & Co., 1969), 195-6.
17
administration understood exactly that firm diplomacy and a mere show of force was all that
needed to be exercised to deter Soviet aggression.
To Kennan’s dismay, not everyone in the Truman administration grasped this important
point. Clark Clifford and George Elsey were two aides who failed to comprehend the
distinction between a mere show of force and its actual use. For a proposed speech to be used to
explain the administration’s hard line toward the Soviets, Truman, in the late summer of 1946,
charged Clifford and Elsey, junior aides in the Navy Department, to draft an analysis of
American-Soviet relations which could be used to justify the administration’s foreign policy.
Clifford and Elsey completed their report, entitled “American Relations with the Soviet Union:
A Report to the President by the Special Counsel to the President,” on September 24, 1946.
The Clifford-Elsey report departed significantly from the policy for which Kennan argued in
the “Long Telegram.” Although the report was, on the surface, basically a synthesis of Kennan’s
writings, Clifford and Elsey differed with Kennan concerning the role of force in the deterrence
of Soviet aggression. “. . .the United States,” claimed the two naval aides, “. . .must assume that
the U.S.S.R. may at any time embark on a course of expansion effected by open warfare.”4
Given this fact and given that the Soviet Union was “vulnerable to atomic weapons” and
“biological warfare,” Clifford and Elsey argued that the United States “must be prepared to
wage atomic and biological warfare.”5 Considering that the Clifford-Elsey report so
fundamentally departed from Kennan’s theory concerning the deterrence of Soviet aggression,
it should be expected that Kennan actively criticized it.
Just the opposite occurred, on the surface at least. On September 15, nearly a week and a
half before Clifford presented the final draft of his report to Truman, he delivered a draft copy
4 Clark
Clifford and George Elsey, “American Relations with the Soviet Union: A
Report to the President by the Special Counsel to the President,” 24 September 1946; in
Clark Clifford with Richard Holbrooke, Counsel to the President: A Memoir (New York:
Random House, 1991), 125.
5 Clark Clifford and George Elsey, “American Relations with the Soviet Union: A
Report to the President by the Special Counsel to the President,” 24 September 1946; in
Thomas H. Etzold and John Lewis Gaddis, Containment: Documents on American Policy
and Strategy, 1945-1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978), 66.
18
to Kennan for critical analysis. Writing back to Clifford on the same day, Kennan said of the
draft, “I think the general tone is excellent. . .and I have no fault to find with it.”6 Such an
appraisal hardly seemed critical.
The truth of the matter is that Kennan did criticize the Clifford-Elsey report, but in his own
manner. Kennan did not directly confront Clifford or Elsey because it was not in the nature of
the shy, reserved man to engage in such conduct. In fact,
the only instance
when
Kennan directly confronted anyone appears in the record of his service in Washington with
Charles Bohlen. After a serious argument concerning the feasibility of Franklin Roosevelt’s
vision of a postwar American-Soviet alliance, Kennan came to tears when Bohlen, in a rush
of emotion, declared their twenty-year old friendship over. Though he quickly amended the
situation, Kennan never again engaged anyone in such heated debate. Nor did he criticize the
professional work of others.
Kennan’s criticism of the Clifford-Elsey report was of a subtle type. Instead of directly
speaking of the report itself, Kennan took to lecturing in an effort to explain just what he meant
in the “Long Telegram.”
Kennan wasted no time in taking up the task of clarifying his view concerning what
“containment” should be. On September 16, just one day after first reading the draft copy of the
Clifford-Elsey report, Kennan delivered to an audience at the National War College a lecture
concerning the methods for settling an international dispute short of war, which he entitled
“Measures Short of War.” Kennan began the lecture by stating that, “. . .in light of the recent
events and the experience of diplomacy since the termination of hostilities. . .the most important
subject for study. . .is a very, very careful appraisal and study of the means short of war which
this country has at its disposal for meeting the problems which it faces today.” He summed
6 Clark
Clifford with Richard Holbrooke, Counsel to the President: A Memoir (New York:
Random House, 1991), 125.
19
up this opening statement by declaring that “to meet. . .problems in a peaceful way depends on
the weapons with which we are equipped.”
7
Kennan then described at length the diplomatic weapons that he described to be the
“measures short of war.” “The main thing I want you to note about these traditional lists of
“measures short of war,” Kennan declared, “is that these lists were drawn up with the idea of
the adjudication or the adjustment of disputes and are not primarily for the idea of the exercise
of pressure on other states.”8 The appearance of such statements just one day after he read the
draft copy of the Clifford-Elsey report indicates that Kennan disagreed with Clifford and
Elsey’s recommendation that the United States “be prepared to wage atomic and biological
warfare.”9
Furthermore, Kennan, for the first time, used the term “counterpressure,” defining it
specifically as the leveling of economic sanctions against the Soviet satellite states of eastern
Europe. That Kennan spoke of “counterpressure” as the leveling of economic sanctions
clearly discredits the arguments made by John Lewis Gaddis and Barton Gellman that Kennan
spoke of “counterpressure”as the use of offensive military force. Kennan concluded his lengthy
lecture by declaring that “these measures short of war will be all the ones we will ever
have to use to secure the prosperous and safe future of the people of our country;” in other
words, to successfully deter Soviet expansionism.10
7 George
F. Kennan, “National War College Lecture: ‘Measures Short of War,’” 16
September 1946, Box 16, Folder 12, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd
Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
8 Ibid.
9 Clark Clifford and George Elsey, “American Relations with the Soviet Union: A
Report to the President by the Special Counsel to the President,” 24 September 1946; in
Thomas H. Etzold and John Lewis Gaddis, Containment: Documents on American Policy
and Strategy, 1945-1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978), 66.
10 George F. Kennan, “National War College Lecture: ‘Measures Short of War,’” 16
September 1946, Box 16, Folder 12, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd
Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
11 Ibid.
20
In explaining his proposal for the diplomatic “containment” of Soviet aggression, Kennan
proposed that the United States government ought to pursue a “cultivation of solidarity
with other like minded nations on every given issue of our foreign policy.” 11 This statement
clearly resembled the argument Kennan made in the “Long Telegram” when he wrote that,
“We must formulate a much more positive and constructive picture of sort of world we would
like to
see. . .”12
That Kennan reiterated his belief that the use of military force was unnecessary to deter
Soviet aggression, and that, moreover, the American government should cultivate “solidarity
with other like minded nations” seven months after he first stated them in the “Long Telegram”
indicates that from his first intimations concerning the deterrence of Soviet aggression, Kennan
advocated a diplomatic policy of “containment.” More specifically, these statements suggest
that Kennan disagreed with the Clifford-Elsey report.
Kennan offered further criticism of this report the next day in a lecture given by him and
fellow diplomat Llewellyn Thompson to a group of junior officers in the Department of State.
When asked if he thought it likely that the Soviets might use military force against Turkey in the
future, Kennan responded by saying, “It has been said that ‘all war was a cash settlement’. . .I
don’t think the Russians would accept a cash settlement, or a showdown, as we would call it, as
long as they were confronted with a superior force. . .I
believe that is the reason they
withdrew on the uraniun (sic) [Iranian] issue as they did.” 13 Here again, Kennan clearly
emphasized that he believed the use of force unnecessary to the successful control of Soviet
aggression.
12
George F. Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” 22 February 1946, Box 23, Folder 47,
George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University,
Princeton, New Jersey.
13 E. Koontz, “Lecture by Mr. George Kennan and Mr. Llewellyn Thompson,” 17
September 1946, Box 16, Folder 13, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd
Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
21
Once again, Kennan harkened back to the phrase “use of force.” From the moment he wrote
the “Long Telegram,” which claimed that the Soviets would likely refrain from committing acts
of aggression if met with the mere display of force, the diplomat believed that there was a clear
difference between the display of force and its actual use. Kennan believed his thesis to
have been proven correct during the Iranian crisis. Because he believed that the prospect of
Soviet aggression seemed unlikely so long as the United States maintained a large tactical
military force, Kennan felt, contrary to Clifford and Elsey, that there was no need to “be
prepared to wage atomic and biological warfare.”14
Kennan echoed this belief again, on January 7, 1947, at a discussion meeting of the Council
on Foreign Relations in New York City. As Edwin C. Hoyt Jr., the recorder of the speech given
by Kennan, wrote, “. . .of the Soviet way of thought, Mr. Kennan found no cause for despair. He
thought . . .it perfectly possible for the U.S. . .to contain Russian power, if it were done
courteously and in a non-provocative way. . .Mr. Kennan thought that no ‘get-tough’ policy was
called for. . .” Of the necessity to prepare for atomic war, called for in the Clifford-Elsey
report, Kennan stated that “[the Russians] know. . .that no one wins an atomic war. They are
wiser than we are in that sense.”15
Beginning on the day after Kennan read the draft copy of the Clifford-Elsey report, Kennan
embarked on a lecturing tour lasting nearly four months designed indirectly to criticize the
report by reiterating the policy for which he argued in the “Long Telegram,” the deterrence
Soviet
of
aggression through firm diplomacy and strong displays of force. 16 It is readily
14
Clark Clifford and George Elsey, “American Relations with the Soviet Union: A
Report to the President by the Special Counsel to the President,” 24 September 1946; in
Thomas H. Etzold and John Lewis Gaddis, Containment: Documents on American Policy
and Strategy, 1945-1950 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978), 66.
15 Edwin C. Hoyt, Jr., “Council on Foreign Relations Discussion Meeting Report, Soviet
Foreign Policy: ‘The Soviet Way of Thought and Its Effect on Soviet Foreign Policy,’” 7
January 1947, Box 16, Folder 20, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton
University, Princeton, New Jersey.
16
On March 14, 1992, the author sent the first half of this essay to Kennan, currently a
professor emeritus at the School of Historical Studies at The Institute For Advanced
Study at Princeton University. The author asked Kennan to comment on the accuracy of
the argument that Kennan did indeed disagree with the Clifford-Elsey report. While
22
apparent in these lectures that Kennan believed his theory on the role of force to be a main
component in the successful application of “containment.”
Before long, Kennan came to realize that the other main component of his theory, the
recognition of the distinction between communist aggression and Soviet aggression, had also
been ignored. The point Kennan wanted understood concerning this distinction was a subtle,
yet important point. The primary national interest of Stalin’s foreign policy was, according to
Kennan, the solidification of the territorial integrity of the Soviet state, not the vigilant and
haphazard pursuance of world communist revolution.
This conclusion was an informal one which Kennan came to only after long and careful
thought. From viewing Stalin at a close distance in his two years in Moscow, Kennan concluded
that the Soviet leader’s “fundamental motive was the protection of his own personal position. . .
this was the key to his diplomacy.”17 Kennan came to this conclusion shortly after Stalin
assumed the bulk of power in the mid to late 1920s. One of Stalin’s first diplomatic actions was
the enunciation of a policy entitled “Socialism in One Country.” This policy, in essence,
detached the Soviet Union from the communist goal of world revolution. Stalin argued that
the Soviet government should instead devote its energy to securing the future existence of the
Soviet state.
The implementation of this policy actually began in the weeks following the Bolshevik
victory in the Russian Civil War of 1918-1922, while Vladimir Lenin held the seat of power.
During this period, the new Soviet leadership entered into treaties with Latvia, Lithuania,
Estonia, Finland, and Poland in which the Soviet government fully acknowledged the
independence of these former holdings of the Russian empire. Lenin defined the purpose of
refusing to comment on such a far-gone event, Kennan did specifically comment on
various portions of the essay which he believed needed adjustment. That he
commented specifically on portions of the essay which he did not like but refused to
comment on the argument concerning his response to the Clifford-Elsey report could
indicate that he tacitly agrees with this section of the author’s argument.
17 George F. Kennan, Russia and the West under Lenin and Stalin (Boston: Little, Brown,
and Company, 1960), 252.
23
this foreign policy, known as “peaceful coexistence,” on November 23, 1920, seven months after
the Soviet treaty with Latvia and two weeks before the Soviet treaty with Finland, the fourth of
the five compacts. “Our task,” declared Lenin, “is to maintain the existence of our isolated
republic. . .which is so much weaker than the capitalist enemies who surround it; to remove the
opportunity for the enemies to create an alliance among themselves for a struggle against us.”18
This goal was, of course, not the only objective of “peaceful coexistence.” After the
consolidation of the Soviet state began to progress, Soviet leaders intended once again to pursue
communist world revolution. But even at the pinnacle of this drive, this activity was never
carried out with much vigor. In the entire period from the creation of the Communist
International, the Soviet apparatus charged with directing foreign communist activity, to its
dissolution by Stalin in 1943, the International failed to direct foreign communist parties in the
way the Soviet government initially intended.
The actions of the German and French communist parties immediately following the signing
of the Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact of August 1939 indicates the truth of this claim.
Following the signing of this treaty by the Soviet government with communism’s archenemy, fascism, the French and German communist parties balked at the compact. On the day
following the treaty’s completion, August 25, 1939, the Central Committee of the German
Communist Party called on German workers to “intensify the struggle against the Nazi
dictatorship,” which had just become allied with the Soviet Union, the German Communist
Party’s supposed patron. The French Communist Party, for its part, declared, a few days later,
that, “If Hitler really dares to take the decisive step he is planning, French Communists. . .
will lie in the front ranks of the defenders. . .of the French Republic.”19 Such statements indicate
the lack of control that the International exerted over foreign communist parties.
18
Xenia Joukoff Eudin, Harold H. Fisher, with Rosemary Brown Jones, Soviet Russia and
the West, 1920-1927: A Documentary Survey (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1957),
6.
19 Julius Braunthal, History of the International, vol.2, 1914-1943. Translated by John Clark
(New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1967), 496-7.
24
In the only major civil war engaged in by a communist group, the Chinese Civil War, Stalin
throughout the 1920s and 1930s, supported Chiang Kai-shek’s Koumintang Party, which fought
against Mao Tse-tung’s communist armies. Stalin supported Chiang because, unlike Mao, it was
he who desired to cease hostilities, even if it meant sharing power.
Stalin, like Chiang, wanted to see an end to the Chinese Civil War.20 Stalin desired that the
Chinese Civil War be stopped because he understood that the Soviet Union could not actively
aid the Chinese communists. Aiding Chiang, according to Stalin, might allow for the
communists to share power in China. Even though Stalin did want to see the Chinese
communists gain power, he never intended to risk the security of the Soviet state, for the
consolidation of the sovereignty of the Soviet Union was the primary national interest of the
Soviet leadership.
Stalin, argued Kennan, should therefore not be expected to engage the United States in
direct military confrontation. Considering the weaknesses of the Soviet state, argued Kennan,
such a clash of force should surely threaten the basic interest behind Soviet foreign policy.
Because the United States faced a Soviet leader, Stalin, who was a cautious pragmatist, not a
fanatical ideologue,
it
should
easily be possible to deter Soviet aggression through
diplomatic, rather than military, means. Kennan believed this important point had been
made clear with his stating that “. . .Marxist dogma. . .became a perfect vehicle for sense of
insecurity with which Bolsheviks. . .were afflicted.”21
Forrestal, for one, did not grasp the vague distinction between communist and Soviet
aggression contained in the “Long Telegram.” It is unfortunate that he did not grasp this point,
for Forrestal had, for quite some time, ruminated over the question of what type of entity was
20
Isaac Deutscher, The Prophet Unarmed: Trotsky, 1921-1929 (New Yorek: Oxford
University Press, 1959), 316-39.
21 George F. Kennan, “The Long Telegram,” 22 February 1946, Box 23, Folder 47,
George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton Unversity,
Princeton, New Jersey.
25
the Soviet Union. “I expressed it as my view that it would not be difficult to work with Russia
provided we were dealing with her only as a national identity. . .the real problem was
whether or not Russian policy called for a continuation of the Third International’s objectives,
namely, world revolution,” wrote Forrestal in his diary after a conversation that took place at a
June 30, 1945 dinner at the British embassy in Washington.22 Forrestal echoed these remarks on
January 7, 1946. In a letter to columnist Walter Lippmann on that day, the naval secretary told
the journalist that “the fundamental question in respect to our relations with Russia is whether
we are dealing with a nation or a religion — religion being merely the practical extension of
philosophy.”23
Not having grasped Kennan’s answer to this question, Forrestal, in the fall of 1946,
instructed Edward F. Willett, a Smith College professor of political science, to draft a paper
answering for him this perplexing question. On January 14, 1947, Willett presented to Forrestal
a paper entitled “Dialectical Materialism and Russian Objectives.” Stating that the principles of
Marxism-Leninism dominated the actions of the Soviet state, Willett wrote that, “Capitalist
Democracies can expect no mercy if Communist philosophy prevails. . .
24
Upon reading
Willett’s paper, with which he agreed, the naval secretary came to conclude that war with the
Soviet Union was inevitable.25
Kennan vehemently disagreed with this conclusion. But instead of criticizing Willett’s
paper, which was not in his nature to do, he asked Forrestal if he might write for him his own
view on the subject of American-Soviet relations. With Forrestal’s approval, Kennan, on January
31, 1947, submitted to the Secretary a paper entitled “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet
Foreign Policy.”
22
Walter Millis with E.B. Duffield, eds., The Forrestal Diaries (New York: The Viking
Press, 1951), 72.
23 Ibid, 128.
24 Edward F. Willet, “Dialectical Materialism and Russian Objectives,” 14 January 1947,
Box 16, Folder 21, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library,
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
25 Arnold A. Rogow. James Forrestal: A Study of Personality, Politics, and Policy (New
York: The Macmillan Company, 1963), 154.
26
Kennan, in this analysis, immediately took issue with Willett’s assertion that MarxistLeninist dogma dominated Soviet action in the international sphere. Upon explaining, in the
first few paragraphs of his paper, the process which the first class of Bolshevik leaders took to
affect the consolidation of Soviet power, Kennan claimed that the “extraordinary circumstance
concerning the Soviet régime is that down to the present day this process of political
consolidation has never been completed and the men in the Kremlin have continued to be
predominantly absorbed with the struggle to secure and make absolute the power which they
seized in November 1917.” 26 Kennan clearly stated here his belief that the primary national
interest of the Soviet Union was the consolidation of the Soviet state. But, it could be argued,
the United States still needed a military policy of deterrence to halt even aggression undertaken
in the name of consolidating Soviet power.
Kennan next took up this argument by claiming that the Soviet Union was too economically
weak to sustain war with the United States. After listing the economic weakness of the Soviet
Union, which he believed could not “be corrected at an early date by a tired and dispirited
population,” Kennan concluded that “Russia will remain economically a vulnerable, and in a
certain sense an impotent nation.” Given this fact and given that Stalin was a pragmatic leader,
the Soviet Union should be expected to refrain from putting itself in a position where
war with the United States could arise. The United States, Kennan ultimately surmised, could
therefore enter “with reasonable confidence upon a policy of firm containment, designed to
confront the Russians with unalterable counter-force at every point where they show signs of
encroaching upon the interests of a peaceful and stable world.” The “containment” of the Soviet
Union on this pattern, and not an offensive military attack on the Soviet Union, was all that
needed to be employed because, Kennan argued, “Soviet power. . . bears within it the seeds of
its own decay. . .the sprouting of these seeds is well advanced.27
26
George F. Kennan, “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy,” 31 January
1947, Box 1, Folder 8, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library,
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
27 Ibid.
27
This paper had an immediate, forceful impact. Upon reading it on February 17, Forrestal
wrote Kennan to tell him that the paper was “extremely well done.” 28 Forrestal believed that
Kennan’s analysis was so superb that he made it required reading for all members of his staff.
He even distributed copies of the paper on Capitol Hill.
Evidence of the extreme impact that “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy”
had on Forrestal appears in the remarks he made in the days immediately following his reading
of it. On February 19, at a meeting attended by representatives of the State, Navy, and
War Departments, Forrestal argued that “the United States has a continuing need to apply force
at a distance” and that “changed conditions” should, according to him, “be taken into account
by measures such as the redesign of submarines and the redesign of ships to permit the
carrying of guided missiles.”29
The naval secretary clearly misunderstood what Kennan meant by “unalterable counterforce.” When Kennan declared, in “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy,” that
Soviet aggression should be met with “unalterable counter-force,” Kennan, as he had done for
the previous eighteen months, argued that prospective expansion on the part of the Soviet
Union could, and should, be deterred by diplomatic measures such as the use of
“counterpressure,” which he, in September 1946, declared to be the implementation of
economic sanctions. Coupled with the enforcement of diplomatic pressure, Kennan believed the
United States should prevent Soviet aggression by threatening the Soviets with the use of
tactical force. In early 1947, the United States military considered guided naval missiles of
the type which Forrestal spoke to be strategic weapons. Forrestal’s statement of February 19
suggests that Kennan’s passage concerning the “containment” of the Soviet Union through the
28
James V. Forrestal, “Letter to George F. Kennan,” 17 February 1947, Box 1, Folder 8,
George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University,
Princeton, New Jersey.
29 Walter Millis with E.B. Duffield, eds., The Forrestal Diaries (New York: The Viking
Press, 1951), 244.
[24]
28
application of “unalterable counter-force” made an impact on the naval secretary, who came to
conclude that Kennan’s proposal should be adopted as official United States policy.
Forrestal was not the only official who held this opinion. There were many administration
officials, who in conjunction with Forrestal and a group of congressmen, urged Kennan to
publish his paper. After much reservation, Kennan submitted the paper to the journal Foreign
Affairs, which published it in July 1947, in unaltered form under the byline of “X” as an article
entitled “The Sources of Soviet Conduct.” Kennan, because he was, at the time, the Director of
the Policy Planning Staff of the Department of State, did not want his authorship of the article to
be publicly known. Hamilton Fish, the editor of Foreign Affairs, agreed, therefore, to publish the
article under the “X” pseudonym.
That Forrestal believed Kennan’s proposal should be adopted as official United States
foreign policy is not the only point brought to light by his remarks of February 19, 1947. The
naval secretary’s belief that naval vessels ought to be redesigned to permit their carrying guided
missiles suggests that Forrestal believed Kennan proposed a policy based on the use of military
force when he wrote that the United States could enter “with reasonable confidence upon a
policy of firm
containment, designed to confront the Russians with unalterable counter-
force at every point where they show signs of encroaching upon the interests of a peaceful and
stable world.”30
Even before Forrestal made his statement of February 19, Kennan again took to lecturing in
an effort to explain publicly why he believed that diplomatic measures alone could prevent
Soviet expansion. In a paragraph of
handwritten notes Kennan ostensibly wrote for
himself before speaking at the mid-winter meeting of the Inland Press Association on February
10, 1947, there appeared the following passage, in the following format:
30
George F. Kennan, “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy,” 31 January
1947, Box 1, Folder 8, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library,
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
[25]
29
Flexibility of Russian Policy.
Nature of Russian system is such that
Sov. negotiators are mainly concerned
to find out how far they can go.
Then they want to run back home. [apparent omission] 31
Kennan, at a lecture at the University of Virginia on February 20, came to the conclusion that
dominated his thought since the drafting of the Clifford-Elsey report and “Dialectical
Materialism and Russian Objectives. “. . .what we need today,” declared Kennan, “is a much
more specific and careful examination of the elements of such a policy of firm containment,
designed to bring out just what is going to mean for us on the practical level.”32 To Kennan’s
great dismay, he soon discovered exactly how the Truman administration wanted
“containment” to be translated on the practical level.
31
George F. Kennan, “Notes from a talk given at the mid-winter meeting of the Inland
Press Association,” 10 February 1947, Box 16, Folder 24, George F. Kennan Papers,
Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
32 George F. Kennan, “Lecture given at the University of Virginia: ‘Russian-American
relations,’” 20 February 1947, Box 16, Folder 25, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G.
Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
30
[3]
A New World Order
The year 1946 presented to the United States government two crises which caused the Truman
administration to conclude that Franklin Roosevelt’s vision of a new world order based on
global collectivism could not be achieved. Instead, the United States seemed to be entering into
quite a different new world order in which it needed to adopt quite a different foreign policy,
one designed to halt the aggressive designs of America’s rival expansionist superpower, the
Soviet Union.
George F. Kennan’s theory of “containment” was one policy option available to the Truman
administration. It was ultimately the one favored by the President and his chief advisers.
In 1946, though, it was still unclear whether the Truman administration desired to implement
the policy for which Kennan argued from the moment he first espoused it on February 22, 1946,
or whether Truman had his own conception of how “containment” should be applied on the
practical level.
To Kennan, the answer to this question came in March 1947, just weeks after the completion
of “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy.” In the late morning of Friday,
February 21, the State Department received from the British ambassador to the United
States, Lord Inverchapel, a note informing the American government that the British, due to
austerity, could no longer supply financial aid to Greece or Turkey, nations that depended upon
such aid for their national survival. Because General George Marshall, who replaced Jimmy
Byrnes as Secretary of State in late January 1947, was on his way to Princeton University to
speak at its bicentennial, the note came to be placed on the desk of Under Secretary of State
Dean Acheson.
Acheson felt astounded by what he read. He immediately concluded that the United States
should replace Britain as financial patron to Greece and Turkey, for he believed that if the
American government did not take such action, they might fall under the “iron curtain.” To
31
journalist Louis Fisher, Acheson said, “The British are pulling out everywhere and if we don’t
go in the Russians will.”1
Truman agreed. “Greece and Turkey,” he felt, “were. . .free countries being challenged by
Communist threats both from within and without. These free peoples were now engaged in a
valiant struggle to preserve their liberties and their independence.” 2 Speaking specifically of
Greece, which was then being torn by civil war, Truman said, “Greece needed aid, and needed
it quickly and in substantial amounts. The alternative was the loss of Greece and the
extension of the iron curtain across the eastern Mediterranean. If Greece was lost, Turkey would
become an untenable outpost in a sea of Communism. Similarly, if Turkey yielded to Soviet
demands, the position of Greece would be extremely endangered.”3 Truman therefore came to
believe that the American government ought to offer immediate financial support to Greece
and Turkey.
It was to this purpose alone that Truman desired to obligate the American government.
While it is true that the policy which resulted from this episode, the Truman Doctrine, seemed
to be a commitment by the Truman administration to combat
Soviet
expansionism
wherever and whenever it appeared, its language was merely a device of political expediency.
The record of the formation of the Truman Doctrine reveals the truth of this claim. A few
days after the receipt of Lord Inverchapel’s note, Truman held a meeting of his cabinet at which
he informed his advisers of the decision to request from Congress $250 million in aid for Greece
and $150 million in aid for Turkey. Truman knew that the prospect for receiving such an aid
package was slim. The American Congress, dominated by the right wing of the Republican
party, favored cuts in foreign aid and defense spending coupled with the slashing of taxes.
1
Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas, The Wise Men Six Friends and the World They Made
(New York: Simon and Schuster, 1986), 393.
2 Harry S. Truman, Memoirs, vol. 2, Years of Trial and Hope (Garden City: Doubleday &
Company, Inc., 1956), 101.
3 Ibid, 100.
32
Appearing before Congress at this time with a request for $350 million in aid for two small
nations half a world away did not seem to be a glorious exercise.
Truman, believing that the United States needed desperately to aid Greece and Turkey,
nevertheless proceeded with his plan. On February 27, Truman invited a number of
congressional leaders to the White House to discuss the matter. The most important
congressman in attendance was Arthur Vandenberg, the highly influential chairman of the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The task of convincing these congressmen, thirteen in all, that the United States should
extend aid to Greece and Turkey fell to Marshall. Acheson, present at the meeting, reflected
the awesome task faced by the Administration when he said, “I knew we were met at
Armageddon.” 4
The meeting did not start off well. Marshall, following Truman’s order, articulated the
Administration’s request in terms of providing specific aid to Greece and Turkey alone. As
Joseph Jones, a junior State Department staffer in attendance, said, “[Marshall] conveyed the
overall impression that aid should be extended to Greece on the grounds of loyalty and
humanitarianism.”5
This tactic worked not well at all. Within minutes, the congressmen began to drill Marshall
with questions. “What are we getting in for?,” asked one. “How much is this going to amount
to?,” asked another. And yet a third congressman asked, “Does this mean pulling the British
chestnuts out of the fire?”6
Acheson decided to take over. Upon receiving whispered permission from Marshall to
speak, the Under Secretary proceeded to gain the support of the disgruntled congressmen.
Acheson, in a firm and eloquent voice, said to the congressmen,
4 Dean
Acheson, Present at the Creation: My Years in the State Department (New York: W.
W. Norton & Co., 1969), 219.
5 Issacson and Thomas, 394.
6 Ibid, 394.
33
In the past eighteen months. . .Soviet pressure on the Straits, on Iran, and on northern Greece had brought
the Balkans to the point where a highly possible Soviet breakthrough might open these continents to
Soviet penetration. Like apples in a barrel infected by one rotten one, the corruption of Greece would
infect Iran and all to east. It would also carry infection to Africa through Asia Minor and Egypt, and to
Europe through Italy and France. . .These were the stakes that British withdrawal from the eastern
Mediterranean offered to an eager and ruthless opponent.7
This short oration caused a remarkable change in thought among the congressmen. After a
moment of silence, Vandenberg looked to Truman and said, “Mr. President, if you will say
that to the Congress and the country, I will support you and I believe that most of its members
will do the same.”8
Truman took Vandenberg’s advice. He and his staff immediately began to draft a speech
requesting from Congress the aid bill sought by the Administration. Given before a joint session
of Congress on March 12, 1947, Truman used the same sort of language used by Acheson in
the meeting with the several leaders of Congress two weeks prior. “. . .totalitarian regimes
imposed on free peoples,” declared Truman, “. . .undermine the foundations of international
peace and hence the security of the United States. . .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.”9
Truman’s language produced the desired result. As Vandenberg predicted, Congress
reacted to Truman’s linkage of specific aid to Greece and Turkey with the declaration to assist
any and all groups in the struggle to resist Soviet aggression by overwhelmingly approving his
request for an aid package for Greece and Turkey.
In the spring of 1947, Truman did not intend to commit the United States government to
what became known as the Truman Doctrine, an indiscriminate policy of resisting Soviet
7 Acheson,
219. Acheson’s characterization of rotten apples in a barrel led to the
cocnceptualization of the “domino theory.”
8 Ibid, 219.
9 Harry S. Truman, “Address of the President of the United States on the Matter of Aid
to Greece and Turkey,” 12 March 1947, House Document 171, Congressional Record, vol.
93, (Washington, 1947), 1980.
34
aggression. Truman’s language was merely a device of political expediency. After witnessing
the February 27 meeting, Truman concluded that an aid bill for Greece and Turkey, the fate of
which many Americans did not see affecting the national security of the American nation,
could only be passed by the isolationist wing of the Republican party if he linked it to a broad
American foreign policy of preventing Soviet aggression.
Two points lend credibility to this argument. First, Truman, in his March 12 address was
extremely specific in describing how his administration intended to spend the aid within
Greece. Furthermore, Truman made no mention of any desire to commit to Greece American
military personnel for the purpose of resisting Soviet aggression or to take part in the Greek
Civil War. Secondly, Acheson, arguably Truman’s closest adviser, rejected a proposal by Army
Chief of Staff General Dwight Eisenhower that the speech should include a request for aid to
other countries.10 The Administration intended only to provide limited aid to Greece and
Turkey.
Kennan did not assess the situation in that manner. The diplomat, recently appointed
director of the State Department Policy Planning Staff, took immediate issue with Truman’s
address. Kennan sincerely believed that Truman indeed desired to commit the United States
government to the “support [of] free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed
minorities or by outside pressures.”11 Kennan recalled, “I took exception to [the Truman
Doctrine] because of the sweeping nature of the commitments which it implied.”12 In other
words, the Truman Doctrine violated Kennan’s conception of a discriminatingly applied,
diplomatic policy of “containment.”
As in the weeks following the Clifford-Elsey report, which Kennan believed violated his
conception of “containment,” the diplomat, in the weeks following Truman’s address, once
10
Achseon, 219.
Harry S. Truman, “Address of the President of the United States on the Matter of Aid
to Greece and Turkey,” 12 March 1947, House Document 171, Congressional Record, vol.
93, (Washington, 1947), 1980.
12 George F. Kennan, Memoirs: 1925-1950 (New York: Pantheon Books, 1967), 319-20.
11
35
again took to lecturing in an effort to educate the American nation concerning his proposal for a
fastidiously applied, diplomatic “containment” of
the Soviet Union. On March 28, 1947,
Kennan, in a lecture at the National War College entitled, “Comments on the National Security
Problem,” spoke specifically of possible Soviet aggression against Turkey. “The Russians,”
he said, “are not yet in a position to undertake any direct aggression against Turkey or any
country. . .On the other hand, they badly want control of Turkish political life. . .the most
favored means for accomplishing such ends is political penetration. . .If therefore, the Turks. . .
keep their internal political life relatively clean. . .they will probably enjoy. . .immunity to
Russian pressure. . .” Towards this end, Kennan said, “. . .it is important that everything be
done to support Turkish self-confidence and will to resist. 13 Kennan believed that since the
Soviet threat was a solely political and diplomatic threat, it need only be met with the
diplomatic “measures short of war” designed to foster between the United States and other
nations a “cultivation of solidarity” aimed at instilling in these nations “the will to resist.”
Kennan offered this argument again, just two weeks later. In a lecture given at the Air War
College on April 10, Kennan said, “. . .here. . .you are dealing with a bunch of people who are
very elastic, very sensitive to the realities of power. . .they are confined to the use of ideological
weapons. . .I think they are very reluctant to go to war” because “military strength is
tremendously important to them merely as a criterion of how great are risks they can afford to
take in political ventures.”14 Here, Kennan reiterated his belief that the Soviet Union was solely
a political threat. Furthermore, he once again stressed that military power need only be used as
a deterrent. The arguments made by Kennan in the March 28 and April 10 speeches were
13
George F. Kennan, “National War College Lecture: ‘Comments on the National
Security Problem,’” 28 March 1947, Box 16, Folder 28, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley
G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
14 George F. Kennan, “Airl War College Lecture: ‘Russia’s National Objectives,’” 10
April 1947, Box 16, Folder 29, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript
Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
36
absolutely consistent with his prior arguments for a fastidiously applied, diplomatic
“containment” of Soviet aggression. Kennan offered these arguments because of what he
believed to be the formation of a policy of sweeping commitment on the part of the Truman
administration to resist Soviet aggression, by any means, wherever and whenever it appeared.
Upon the conclusion of the events that brought forth the Truman doctrine, the Truman
administration concluded that a serious, comprehensive policy needed to be formulated to
secure western Europe from possible political penetration by the Soviets. This policy,
ultimately named the Marshall Plan, committed the United States to
investing
nearly $30 billion in the economic reconstruction of that war-torn region. To Kennan, who
played a critical role in the formulation of the Marshall Plan, the Truman administration, in the
summer of 1947, seemed to be taking a giant step in implementing his diplomatic conception of
“containment.”
Kennan, it will be remembered, most comprehensively explained this conception of
“containment” in “Psychological Backgrounds of Soviet Foreign Policy,” which was later
published as the famous “X” article. It can therefore be surmised that Kennan viewed the
Marshall Plan as the implementation of the policy espoused in the “X” article, which attracted a
grand attack from columnist Walter Lippmann. With the Marshall Plan in progress, Kennan,
while undergoing treatment for ulcers on April 6, 1948, wrote from his hospital bed at Bethesda
Naval hospital a lengthy letter to Lippmann explaining the inequities in the journalist’s assault,
expressed in twelve columns Lippmann wrote during the summer of 1947. “The Russian
threat,” wrote Kennan, “has not been basically a military threat. . .Theirs is first and foremost a
political attack.”15
The timing of this statement was remarkable. Just six weeks prior, on February 25, the
Soviets,
using
a large
military force,
brutally repressed a rebellious movement
15
George F. Kennan, “Letter to Walter Lippmann,” 6 April 1948, Box 17, Folder 7,
George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University,
Princeton, New Jersey.
37
in
Czechoslovakia. Kennan fully understood that the Soviets used military force to destroy the
rebellion in Czechoslovakia. Even though Kennan had recently witnessed the use of
military force by the Soviet Union, the diplomat, in his letter to Lippmann, still maintained his
belief that the Soviet Union was a political, not military, threat.
This sequence of events clearly discredits one of the central arguments that attempted to
account for Kennan’s late criticisms of the “containment” doctrine, C. Ben Wright’s theory that
Kennan “remained in basic agreement with United States foreign policy until 1949.”16 Wright,
in his 1976 article “Mr. X and Containment,” further claimed that after first advocating a
military “containment” of the Soviet Union, Kennan altered his thought, after viewing the
then present world situation, in favor of a diplomatic “containment” of Soviet aggression.
Kennan, according to Wright, first argued for a “hard” military policy, then decided upon a
“soft” diplomatic policy, after viewing the state of the world. Wright ultimately argued that this
change occurred as the Truman administration began to implement “containment.”
Just the opposite should have happened. After witnessing the Iranian and Turkish crises, in
which the United States, in its first implementation of “containment,” ultimately deterred Soviet
aggression only through the dispatch of naval force, Kennan could easily have been expected,
after arguing for a “soft” policy, to have changed his mind in favor of a “hard” policy.
This change in thought did not occur. Nearly two weeks after the Turkish crisis, Kennan
reiterated, in “Measures Short of War,” his belief that the United States should adopt a
diplomatic policy of “containment” for the deterrence of future Soviet aggression. Being that
this change, “soft” to “hard,” did not occur, the argument that Kennan, in the face of the
realities of the Iranian and Turkish crises, altered his thought from first advocating a “hard”
policy to ultimately advocating a “soft” policy becomes not very credible.
Kennan’s actions in February 1948 further disputes Wright’s argument. In view of the Soviet
military crackdown on Czechoslovakia, it should be expected that Kennan did alter his thought
16
C. Ben Wright, “Mr. X and Containment,” Slavic Review (March 1976): 25.
38
concerning “containment,” but from the support for a diplomatic doctrine to a favoring of
a military policy. No such change occurred, in either direction. Kennan maintained throughout
the events of 1946-1948 that a diplomatic “containment” was all that needed to be implemented
for the successful resistance of Soviet aggression.
Kennan, to the end of his diplomatic career in Washington in 1951, never wavered from this
belief. The diplomat, from 1948-1951, consistently argued for a discriminatingly applied,
diplomatic “containment” of the Soviet Union, even in the face of further instances of Soviet
aggression. The next such instance came on June 26, 1948, when the Soviets dismantled all
transportation and communication links between the West and West Berlin. Universally viewed
as blatant aggression on the part of the Soviet Union, the West, led by the United States,
defeated the Soviet Union’s attempt to blockade West Berlin by airlifting supplies to the city. It
could be expected that this event altered Kennan’s thought concerning “containment.”
It did not. In a National War College lecture entitled “Comments on the General Trend of
U.S. Foreign Policy,” which he gave on August 20, 1948, Kennan said that the United States
should decide which areas of the world it considered to be “vital to our security.” These areas,
according to Kennan, were the Atlantic Community, which included Germany; the nations of
the Mediterranean and the Middle East; and Japan and the Philippines.
It was these areas,
and these alone, said Kennan, where “containment”should be applied.17 Such statements are
absolutely consistent with Kennan’s prior arguments concerning a fastidiously applied policy of
“containment.”
Soviet aggression struck again just five months later. On January 21, 1949, the communist
forces of Mao Tse-tung defeated the forces of Chiang Kai-shek to gain power in China. The
Truman administration, Kennan included, believed that the Soviet Union was responsible for
Mao’s victory. Even with this belief in mind, Kennan experienced no change in thought
concerning “containment.” In notes which he wrote for himself for a seminar at Princeton
17
George F. Kennan, “Draft Paper: ‘Comments on the General Trend of U.S. Foreign
Policy,” 20 August 1948, Box 23, Folder 54, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd
Manuscript Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
39
University just twenty-four hours after Mao’s victory, Kennan wrote the following in his
notebook,
2. Not military threat.
4. Policy therefore:
a. To attempt to reduce vulnerability of
restoring vigor and self-confidence to west.18
western society by
These arguments, which Kennan reiterated on February 21, 1950 in a Reader’s Digest
article entitled “Is War With Russia Inevitable” and again on May 5 and May 27, 1950 in
addresses before the Milwaukee Foreign Policy Association and the Russian Institute Student
Group at Columbia University, respectively, were absolutely analagous to what he had stated
from his first intimation concerning “containment” — the “Long Telegram” of February 1946.
Still, the most shocking instance of Soviet aggression was yet to come. Shortly before 10
pm on Saturday, June 24, 1950, North Korea invaded South Korea. Terror immediately ran
through the hearts of those in the Truman administration. The North Korean invasion, these
men believed, was the first stage in a Soviet attack on western Europe and the United States.
While this belief shortly revealed itself untrue, all in the Truman administration believed
that the North Korean invasion, which they felt to have been orchestrated by the Soviets,
signaled a drastic shift in the foreign policy of the Soviet Union.
All except Kennan, that is. On January 27, 1951, in an address before the National
Committee for Roosevelt Day, the diplomat boldly said, “I am challenging our right. . .to call
[the North Korean invasion] a manifestation of some ‘new aggressiveness’ on the part of the
Soviet Union.” 19
18
Goerge F. Kennan, “Notes for Seminar at Princeton University,” 23-26 January 1949,
Box 17, Folder 20, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library,
Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
40
Throughout four distinct instances of Soviet aggression from 1948-1950, Kennan
experienced no change in thought concerning “containment.” That he did not alter his line of
thought in the manner in which could most easily be expected, from the advocation of a
diplomatic policy to the support of a military policy, unquestionably discredits Wright’s
argument that after 1949 Kennan changed his initial support for a military policy to the
advocation of a diplomatic doctrine. Kennan, from his first brief intimation concerning
“containment,” the “Long Telegram,” to the conclusion of his diplomatic career in Washington
in 1951, repeatedly and unswervingly favored a discriminatingly applied, diplomatic
“containment” of the Soviet Union.
19
George F. Kennan, “Address before the National Committee for Roosevelt Day,” 27
January 1951, Box
2, Folder 7, George F. Kennan Papers, Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript
Library, Princeton University, Princeton, New Jersey.
41
Afterword
G eorge Frost Kennan first proposed his policy of “containment” in the late winter of 1946, a
time when the United States government held responsibility for guiding the American nation
into a new world order. As important as it was then to comprehend accurately what Kennan
meant by “containment,” so too is it important that the United States government today fully
and accurately comprehend the policy Kennan first espoused in the “Long Telegram.”
Just as Harry Truman was, in 1946, responsible for guiding the American nation into a new
world order, so too is George Bush now responsible for leading the United States into a new
international order. On February 18, 1992, the Bush administration took a major step in this
effort. On that day, the Department of Defense presented to Bush a draft copy of
a
document entitled “Defense Planning Guidance.” The Pentagon drafted this document as part
of its routine reevaluation of America’s strategic role in the global community, a task
undertaken by the Pentagon once every two years.
This latest reevaluation had special significance. It was the first such undertaking since the
end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union in the fall of 1991. Because of these
events, the Defense Department held responsibility for proposing to Bush what America’s
strategic role in the future new world order should be.
The proposal, part of which appeared in the Sunday, March 8, 1992 edition of The New York
Times, was striking. The Department of Defense, which did not intend for the document to be
released to the press, proposed that the United States should seek to maintain its role as the sole
world superpower. The American government, the document further proposed, should
“persuade” all regional powers that they need not seek superpower status because the United
States has as its intention the accommodation of goals sought by these powers.1
The most significant aspect of the proposal was its section concerning the role of American
military power under this strategy. In essence, the document proposed that the United States
1
Andrew M. Rosenthal, The New York Times, 8 March 1992, 1.
42
should consider offensive military force to be a primary option in maintaining its role as the
sole world superpower.2 Absent from this document was any discussion of enforcing this goal
through diplomatic measures. This absence indicates that even today it is not widely
understood what Kennan meant by a discriminatingly applied, diplomatic strategy of
“containment.”
The experience of the Gulf War was also a likely reason for this omission. The United States,
from August 1991 to January 1992, attempted to drive Iraqi forces from Kuwait through the
leveling of economic sanctions on Baghdad. As it became apparent that this tactic alone could
not quickly complete this goal, the United States, at the forefront of an international coalition,
used military might to expel Iraq from Kuwait.
The experience of the Gulf War is not a fair example by which to judge the effectiveness of
what Kennan termed the “measures short of war.” When Kennan spoke of “containing”
Soviet aggression through diplomatic means, he had in mind a Soviet Union led by a cautious
pragmatist, Josef Stalin, pursuing a flexible foreign policy.
The Iraq of August 1991 did not fit these characteristics. Iraq was, and still is, led by a ruler,
Saddam Hussein, who is far from being a cautious pragmatist who is able to assess individual
situations with realistic eyes. Neither was the Iraq of August 1991 a nation in pursuit of a
flexible foreign policy. These characteristics, coupled with the size of the Iraqi military at the
time, is what made the application of offensive military power necessary to expel Iraq from
Kuwait.
Kennan’s conception of a “containment” policy implemented through diplomatic means can
successfully be applied in today’s world. To be sure, there are nations with the military and
economic capability to pursue the status of world superpower. But none of these nations could
be likened to Iraq, which is not led by a cautious pragmatist pursuing a flexible foreign policy. It
can easily be assumed that the United States can, through diplomatic means alone, restrain
these nations from pursuing the status of world superpower. It can also be assumed that such a
2 Ibid,
1.
43
policy could easily keep Iraq, and nations like her, from achieving a position in which war
against them might be necessary.
That “Defense Planning Guidance” made no mention of such proposals indicates that it is
still not widely understood what Kennan actually meant when he put forth his policy of
“containment.” It is therefore necessary and worthwhile to now, more than ever, conduct a
study which revealed that Kennan, from 1946 to 1951, repeatedly and unswervingly argued for
a discriminatingly applied, diplomatic “containment” of the Soviet Union.
44
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