George F. Kennan and the Making of American Foreign Policy, 1947-1950

by Wilson D. Miscamble, C.S.C.

Overview

When George C. Marshall became Secretary of State in January of 1947, he faced not only a staggering array of serious foreign policy questions but also a State Department rendered ineffective by neglect, maladministration, and low morale. Soon after his arrival Marshall asked George F. Kennan to head a new component in the department's structure--the Policy Planning Staff. Here Wilson Miscamble scrutinizes Kennan's subsequent influence over foreign policymaking during the crucial years from 1947 to 1950.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691227993
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	04/13/2021
Series:	Princeton Studies in International History and Politics , #43
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	444
File size:	15 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Wilson D. Miscamble, C.S.C., is Director of Graduate Studies and Associate Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations
Preface
Acknowledgments
Abbreviations Used in Text and Notes
Ch. 1	Director of the Policy Planning Staff	3
Ch. 2	Launching the Marshall Plan	43
Ch. 3	Meditertanean Crises: Greece, Italy, and Palestine	75
Ch. 4	The North Atlantic Treaty	113
Ch. 5	The Division of Germany	141
Ch. 6	Titoism, Eastern Europe, and Political Warfare	178
Ch. 7	The Limits of America's China Policy	212
Ch. 8	Japan and Southeast Asia	247
Ch. 9	The Hydrogen Bomb and the Soviet Threat	281
Ch. 10	Korean Dilemmas and Beyond	314
Conclusion: America's Global Planner?	346
Appendix A: Policy Planning Staff Papers, 1947-1949	359

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"This book is the most insightful treatment of George Kennan that has yet been published and the best work I know on the making of U.S. foreign policy during this period. The work is an astonishing scholarly accomplishment. Miscamble offers fresh interpretations and a new sense of the context in which policy was made and of the complex influences on the policymakers."—Richard H. Ullman, Princeton University

Ullman

This book is the most insightful treatment of George Kennan that has yet been published and the best work I know on the making of U.S. foreign policy during this period. The work is an astonishing scholarly accomplishment. Miscamble offers fresh interpretations and a new sense of the context in which policy was made and of the complex influences on the policymakers.
— Richard H. Ullman, Princeton University

Editorial Reviews

Finalist for the 1993 Hoover Presidential Library Association Book Award

"A good analytical examination of American foreign policy as seen through the lens of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff. . . . As such it embraces much more than the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The author insists that there was no grand design to American policy in these years, but one is impressed by the pervasive and lucid intellect of Ambassador Kennan."—-William G. Hyland, Foreign Affairs

From the Publisher

A good analytical examination of American foreign policy as seen through the lens of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff. . . . As such it embraces much more than the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The author insists that there was no grand design to American policy in these years, but one is impressed by the pervasive and lucid intellect of Ambassador Kennan.

Foreign Affairs - William G. Hyland

A good analytical examination of American foreign policy as seen through the lens of the State Department's Policy Planning Staff. . . . As such it embraces much more than the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. The author insists that there was no grand design to American policy in these years, but one is impressed by the pervasive and lucid intellect of Ambassador Kennan.
— William G. Hyland

Foreign Affairs