Throughout much of World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union were reluctant allies. Germany posed a significant threat to both countries and necessity dictated that they cooperate militarily. Germany had launched an invasion into the Soviet Union in 1941 that led to the Soviet Union begging the western Allies to attack the German army on its western front. The U.S. and Britain lacked resources and were unwilling to launch a costly attack on the Germans. Instead, the Allies engaged the Germans on other fronts, allowing the Soviets to regain lost territory and push the Nazis back (Hanhimäki & Westad, 2002, p. 25). The U.S. and the Soviet Union had vastly differing political beliefs and their relationship was strained until it finally …show more content…
Iran was rich in oil and was an important ally for both of the great powers. The Soviets stationed troops in Iran during the war to secure the Middle East and prevent German attacks. At the Tehran Conference in 1943, all of the major Allies agreed to remove troops from Iran (Hanhimäki & Westad, 2003, p. 30). However, the Soviets still had troops stationed there in 1946, a full year after the war. Stalin went so far as to use his military to support and aid a rebellion in Iran in 1946. Truman was furious about Stalin's betrayal again. Americans grew more distrustful of the Soviets and began to worry that the Soviet Union intended to spread communism to the Middle East. Because of this, Churchill delivered a powerful and controversial speech in Missouri in March 1946 where he criticized Stalin and the Soviet Union as opportunistic and dangerous to western nations, and coined the phrase “the Iron Curtain” in reference to the vast divide between the Soviets and the West in Europe. Many U.S. leaders desired cooperation with the Soviet Union, and they were upset by Churchill's remarks. A majority of Americans feared the expansion of the Soviet Union, and Churchill's comments increased the seriousness of the Soviet threat in many American …show more content…
in Hanhimäki & Westad, 2003, p. 106). He detailed the threat of communism, and Congress quickly agreed to allocate the requested $400 million to prevent the fall of Greece and Turkey to the communists (Keylor, 2011, p. 263). Truman also stated, “it must be the policy of the United States to support free people who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures” (qtd. in Keylor, 2011, p. 263). The Truman Doctrine effectively reoriented U.S. foreign policy, away from its usual stance of withdrawal from regional conflicts not directly involving the United States, to one of possible intervention in far away conflicts. The Truman Doctrine became the official policy of the United States, and it had far-reaching repercussions. It drove the wedge between the U.S. and the Soviet Union much deeper, thus polarizing the world. Other nations and regions essentially had to choose between supporting the United States or the Soviet Union. The Truman Administration made further attempts to contain the Soviet threat with the Marshall Plan. Much of Western Europe was economically crippled by WWII and showed little hope of recovery. The widespread poverty, soaring unemployment, and limited potential
Even though the United States and Russia (Soviet Union) were friendly during World War II, they started having disagreements after World War II ended. First, the Soviet Union thought the United States entered World War II too late. Also, the Soviet Union started to enlarge their territory into Eastern Europe after World War II, which made the United States a little afraid because they thought the Soviet Union was trying to control the world. The Soviet Union set up communist governments in Poland, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria. As a result, the United States started to build more weapons.
During World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union created an alliance to prevent Nazi Germany from spreading their fascist and radical ideals, but after the war, it quickly became apparent that both countries had intentions to exploit their previously stable relationship. Shortly after World War II, the Soviet Union made it their primary goal to expand their communist policies across Europe (and eventually the world). Their communist policies heavily contradicted the reason why the United States joined World War II, contrasted American ideals, and placed American democracy in jeopardy. Although relations seemed healthy shortly after the war, the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union dwindled to war due to the United States’
The Truman Doctrine affected the Cold War by stopping Communists from destroying Europe any further. History.state.gov states, “President Harry S. Truman established that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces.” In his speech, he asked Congress to give support to the Greek government and go against the Communists. If the U.S. government failed to help the Greek government, the Communists would continue to damage Europe. The Truman Doctrine affected the Cold War, and another policy that affected the Cold
Truman gave his iconic Truman Doctrine speech in front of a joint session of congress. This speech outlined the broad strokes of the Truman Doctrine as well as marked the declaration of the Cold War as well as sets the direction of American foreign policy for the next 40 years. Truman used this speech which was broadcast on the radio across the country as a form of going public to help his doctrine pass through congress. The Truman Doctrine finically aided Greece and Turkey in their ongoing war against communism as well as established Truman’s containment policy towards communism. A year later in 1948 when Truman planned to spread a program much like the Truman Doctrine across Europe in the form of the European Recovery Program. Truman knew that due to his high unfavorable rates he would need to use bargaining this time instead of going public to enact his plan. The Marshall plan is born with Truman recruits popular Secretary of State General George C. Marshall to be the face of the plan in order to garner support. While Marshall was the face of the plan Truman worked diligently behind the scenes to garner support for the plan from republicans. The Marshall Plan ultimately passed and in the end sent 13 million dollars in relief funds to Europe to aid in rebuilding from World War II in addition to holding at bay the treat of communism spreading. Truman became a shining example of how going public and bargaining both of there place in the
The Truman Doctrine was a policy first set forth by United States President Harry S. Truman in 1947. The immediate objective of the policy was to send U.S. aid to anti-Communist forces in Greece and Turkey, but it was later expanded to justify support for any nation that the United States government believed was threatened by Communism during the Cold War period. The containment policy had been quite successful in the initial stages. Politically, the Truman Doctrine was to provide funding, weapons and supplies to governments who were fighting against the communist threat. It successfully helped Greece and Turkey in resisting a communist takeover.
In the Second World War USA and its western allies like Britain, France and so forth needed the help of Soviet Union to combat Nazi Germany. “Indeed, the western democracies could not have defeated Germany except the unlimited support of those Soviet troops which in 1945 occupied all areas in dispute.”(Graebner, 1976) However, after the war, the Soviet-American unity collapsed following the Yalta Conference of February 1945, largely over the issue of Poland. As a result, USSR established what Churchill termed as ‘iron curtain’ from Stettin to Trieste.
However, keeping Germany weak included the implementation of communism, which the U.S. strongly opposed. The U.S. used the policy of containment to directly prevent the spread of communism. Their first step into trying to contain communism was the Truman Doctrine, in which Harry Truman incorporated the desire for containment, which vowed to support nations fighting communism. Truman and Congress had pledged $400 million to fight communist revolutionaries in Greece and Turkey. If Greece were to fall under the control of communist rebels communism might also spread throughout the Middle East (Truman, 1947). Truman also convinced the Western European powers to join NATO so that they could mutually defend themselves against the threat of a Soviet
The foreign policy of the United States during the Cold War fully supported the growth of democratic nations. The USSR, however, wanted countries to become communist like them. These opposing views led to tension between the two nations. As a result, in 1947, President Truman issued the Truman Doctrine which stated that the United States would supply aid to any country as long as they pledged to be democratic. The Marshall plan was enacted in 1948 and it was similar to the Truman Doctrine except it provided financial aid to these countries. In the late 1940s and early 1950s, the United States used its foreign policy to help countries resist communist influence.
Since WWII was needed to take the U.S. out of the Great Depression, the danger of the country returning to that state after the war finished was imminent. One event that exemplified this insecurity was the Strike Wave of 1946, which Truman solved by basically making it consequential by law to go on strike. However, economic problems were still occurring overseas in Europe. In order to assist them, Truman provided “Europe with badly needed economic recovery aid (the Marshall Plan)” (Hastedt). The Marshall Plan was an action that the U.S. took in an attempt to aid Europe’s economy, by paying $13 billion. This seemingly was also made in an effort to reduce the power of the Soviet Union, and allow Europe’s powers to compete, sequentially reducing the risk of an authoritarian influence. There was also Truman’s Fair Deal, which generally dealt with America’s domestic problems, but because of that also addressed its economic difficulties. Since it primarily aimed to make everything fair in domestic life, as the name suggested, the economy improved as a result. Overall, Truman’s economic policy revolved around keeping the economy at a manageable level, rather than having it crash similar to the Great Depression, and have to bring it back up.
As stated before the Truman Doctrine was a pivotal point in United States foreign policy. Such a policy has its advantages and disadvantages. The major advantage of that time was that the United States stepped in and help an economically strapped Europe and not let them fall under the domination of a single, hostile state. With Britain withdrawing aid to Greece and Turkey if the United States did not implement the Truman Doctrine, Stalin could have easily became a communist influence on those countries. Another advantage of the Truman Doctrine was that is transform America from being isolationist. Getting involved in the affairs of other countries to contain communism had a major
The Truman Doctrine was the impetus for the change in United States foreign policy, from isolationist to internationalists; thus we were drawn into two wars of containment and into world affairs. The Truman Doctrine led to a major change in U.S. foreign policy from its inception - aid to Turkey and Greece - to its indirect influence in Korea and Vietnam. The aftermath of World War II inspired the U.S.
Within theories and finding, The Truman Doctrine was established and on March 12th, 1947. Truman speech pledged “American support for free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures” (Simkin, n.d.) Congress also agreed to give economic aid to the military to help fight Greece against communism as he felt that the political stability was threatened. With Greece in trouble Truman as concerned the other countries would fall into Communism and was known as the ‘domino theory’. If it was not for Truman then Greece and Turkey could no longer afford to fight the rebels. “Truman said that the Cold War was a choice between freedom and oppression; Therefore, Americans would have to abandon their decisions not to get involved in European affairs; America was OBLIGED to get involved” (Clare, n.d.). The Truman Doctrine was an American challenge not only to Soviet ambitions but also through a policy of containment.
The U.S and the Soviet Union had mistrusted each other from the beginning, which started the Cold War. when the U.S was attacked on December 1941, The Soviet Union had made an alliance with them along with Britain, which soon followed with the U.S supplying their allies with military supplies. During their alliance against the fascist powers, Stalin was suspicious which made “The Soviets believed that the Western Allies had
The original main idea of the Truman doctrine and the policy of containment were to support Turkey and Greece – who were on the verge of being subjugated to the Soviet Union and communism. They needed the assistance of an outside power to help them fight off this threat . The main point to understand this is that it set the precedent that the USA would help any country that was under threat from the Soviet Union in any way, including a communist government trying to take power.
The brewing business is extremely competitive. As lager has advanced into fully grown category, the industry has encountered an escalation in mergers and acquisitions, product differentiation and global strategy. Overall 650 beers compete across the nations in this category, the top 10 defraying over $22M annually (Taylor 2004). The market is dominated by the giant 10 brands that form up 77% of the market. The top 20 occupy 87% which leaves Tiger and its 0.1% SOV to battle against the remaining 620 premium beers for 13% of the market. Included in this last 13% are power house global brands like Heineken Export, Corona, Stella Artois and Becks (Taylor 2004).