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On Friday we discussed

-       the course plan and how the material in the current unit on the Cold War can be connected to it. (See note below.)

-       The Soviet response to the Truman Doctrine

-       The Marshall Plan

On Vklass I will soon post a document that summarizes some of the points I made regarding the course plan and material we’ve been working with. Please look at it and see if you have questions, comments, feedback.

I said that I would post here on the blog a summary of issues we’ve discussed about the Truman Doctrine (TD) and the Soviet response to it. I’m guessing that you already have much of this in your notes. Look at your notes and see if you want to add anything. You may well already have most all of this – just in slightly different words.

Truman Doctrine

What we call the Truman Doctrine was a speech given by U.S. President Harry Truman in 1947. The speech was meant to persuade the U.S. Congress to approve funds (money) that could be provided to Greece and Turkey to help them in civil wars being fought there. Great Britain, which had previously been providing support – including financial support – to these two countries, was completely lacking the resources to continue with this aid by 1947. And thus GB asked the U.S. to step in.

By 1947, there was there fear in GB and the United States that communist forces could gain control in Greece and possibly even in Turkey. The West had accepted that there was nothing that could be done to change the establishment of communism in the eastern European countries that the Soviet Union had liberated after WWII. But there was the hope that communism could be prevented from spreading further.

As a part of Truman’s argument for why the U.S. should get involved in Greece and Turkey, Truman first noted that there are two ways of life. You worked with these in class last Tuesday. And then Truman said, “I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way. It is necessary only to glance at a map to realize that the survival and integrity of the Greek nation are of grave importance in a much wider situation. If Greece should fall under the control of an armed minority, the effect upon its neighbor, Turkey, would be immediate and serious. Confusion and disorder might well spread throughout the entire Middle East.”

Does this summary make sense to you? Can you put it together with other issues that we’ve discussed? That is, do you see that the Truman Doctrine can be connected with any other events or ideologies that we’ve talked about?

Soviet response to the TD

The Soviets were critical to American involvement in Greece and Turkey. This is clear from the ideas presented in the response we talked about in class. I noted that there were two main arguments.

a.     The U.S. is going to continue with policies/practices such as Britain had been engaging in in Greece since 1944 and those had not resulted in stable systems. Thus, why should the Americans expect any better results.

b.     If the Americans go in with money and personnel, won’t that threaten the sovereignty of these nations? The U.S. is using talk about totalitarian regimes (governments) as an excuse to expand its authority further.

Again: does this summary make sense? And can you tie it together with other events (such as the Soviet influence in eastern Europe after WWII)?

The goal is that you can

-       understand different sources,

-       you can use them within arguments you’re trying to make (for example, pulling out specific sentences to support/explain a point you are making,

-       and can examine them.

What does it mean to examine a source? There are different things that can be part of examining or analyzing a source:

-You can check factual information and discuss it.

-You can discuss whether the arguments made make sense in connection with other events or in connection with the ideologies of the person/body behind the source

-You can discuss the motives behind the source.

                       

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Here is a timeline of some of the things we've been discussing. You should be making your own timelines.

On Tuesday we worked with elements of the Truman Doctrine. I've uploaded on Vklass a document that has the table and questions we worked with. I didn't upload the excerpt from the speech. You already have a document with parts of the speech.


We also talked about the Berlin Blockade and Airlift. Here are the short YouTube videos I showed.