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Keywords: Berlin Blockade
(Complete Item Description)
- Abstract: Clark Clifford was special counsel to President Harry S. Truman from 1946 to 1950. In this video segment, he recounts the 1948 Berlin blockade-the first major East-West confrontation in which Western policymakers were required to grapple with choices that risked war with the Soviet Union, a power seen as capable of overrunning Western Europe. Clifford recalls assessing the risk of an unexpected escalation of tension if moves made by the West were perceived as provocations. He heralds the decision to airlift supplies to Berlin in order to fracture the Soviet blockade, although at the time, few believed the airlift could fully supply the city. In the interview Clifford conducted for War and Peace in the Nuclear Age: 'The Weapon of Choice,' he looks back at key moments of the Truman presidency. He recalls his role in drafting what became known as the Truman Doctrine, a founding speech of the "containment order" in which the administration generalized its obligations to Greece and Turkey into a commitment to resist Soviet expansionism wherever it occurred. Following his work on the Truman Doctrine, Clifford helped formulate the Marshall Plan speech, which outlined a program to aid in the rebuilding of a devastated post-war Europe. This speech was part of the United States' search for a new economic order at home and abroad. As the president's top policy adviser, Clifford was on hand for Truman's private reactions. They included shock, disappointment, and hopefulness, as well as anxiety about entering the nuclear age as hostilities with the Soviet Union were deepening and the electorate was becoming increasingly war weary.
- Subject:
Humanities, Social Sciences, Science and Technology
- Collection:
WGBH Open Vault
(Complete Item Description)
- Abstract: For nearly half a century, Paul Nitze was one of the chief architects of U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union. In 1961, President John F. Kennedy appointed Nitze assistant secretary of defense for International Security Affairs. In this video segment, Nitze describes key issues confronting the incoming Kennedy administration. This transition period focused on the goals of the country's nuclear-strategic policy; how to approach crises in every region, from the Middle East to Vietnam; and whether to unify the armed services. Included are Nitze's recommendations regarding a conventional military buildup and a 'no-cities' policy, which would target military forces instead of civilian populations. Nitze's interview conducted for War and Peace in the Nuclear Age: 'At the Brink' moves the viewer through his work with the World War II Strategic Bombing Survey, which placed him in Hiroshima and Nagasaki soon after the atomic bombs were dropped. From 1950 to 1953, Nitze served as director of the State Department's Policy Planning staff, and from 1961 to 1963 he was assistant defense secretary. As his interview reveals, Nitze held key positions during the period after World War II when the United States emerged as a superpower and Cold War strategic policies were being debated and defined. His classified 1950 report, National Security Memorandum 68, remains a seminal document: it was initially designed to persuade President Harry S. Truman that an increasingly menacing world required major increases in spending on defense and foreign military assistance. Nitze was also a major contributor to the Gaither Report, which stressed the need for a survivable nuclear deterrent by citing the vulnerability of the U.S. bomber force. Nitze opposed the doctrine of massive retaliation from the moment John Foster Dulles announced it at a dinner party in 1954. He was involved in crisis contingency planning, including the Berlin blockade and airlift in 1948, construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961, and the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. During the missile crisis, Nitze recalls, he worked out the scenarios of increasing military escalation to pressure the Soviets to withdraw the missiles. Finally, he describes his disappointment that, although Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara initially embraced his no-cities strategy, following the Cuban missile crisis McNamara entirely abandoned the notion of winnable nuclear war.
- Subject:
Arts, Humanities, Social Sciences, Science and Technology
- Collection:
WGBH Open Vault
(Complete Item Description)
- Abstract: Dean Rusk came from barefoot poverty in rural Georgia and achieved black-tie success. He was the first assistant secretary for UN Affairs, in 1949; assistant secretary of state for Far Eastern Affairs, in 1950; and the country's second-longest-serving secretary of state (1961 to 1969), after Cordell Hull. In this video segment, Rusk voices his opposition to the Strategic Defense Initiative, commonly known as 'Star Wars' and first unveiled in March 1983. In his interview conducted for War and Peace in the Nuclear Age: 'Visions of War and Peace,' Rusk reflects on a wide range of political and nuclear issues spanning more than forty years. He discusses his recognition that the first atomic bomb introduced a 'new phase of warfare'; his opinion that Soviet premier Joseph Stalin's 'adventures' spawned the Cold War and the United States' 'containment' policy; how the past three decades created a vastly different diplomatic landscape against which to conduct foreign relations; and the urgency of domestic problems that threaten national security. Although known throughout his career for his hawkish views, in 'Visions of War and Peace' Rusk turns again and again to the dominant lesson of the nuclear age: nuclear war is 'simply that war which must never be fought.'
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