Walter Lippmann and the American Century — 34 Swimming up Niagara

1. 1. George Kennan's 1946 'long telegram' argued that Soviet policy was governed by communist ideology, not security interests, making diplomatic settlement impossible.
2. 2. Lippmann criticized the Baruch Plan for atomic energy control, arguing the veto issue was overblown and the plan would harden American opinion on unrealistic ideas.
3. 3. Lippmann opposed Byrnes's Stuttgart speech promising Germans return of lost territories and a strong central government, calling it a promise only Russia could deliver.
4. 4. Lippmann saw the Henry Wallace episode as evidence of Truman administration ineptitude, with no one controlling policy.
5. 5. Lippmann advised Forrestal that Stalin's 1946 offer to cut Soviet ground forces in exchange for US atomic disarmament was a trap, as the US would lose its strongest weapon while Russia could quickly remobilize.
6. 6. Lippmann dismissed disarmament schemes as absurd, arguing the nuclear balance of terror, not international authorities, prevented war.
7. 7. Lippmann argued the Soviets were essentially defensive, not ideological fanatics, and that Western policy had given them pretexts for iron rule behind the Iron Curtain.
8. 8. Lippmann supported the Greek-Turkish aid bill but condemned the Truman Doctrine's sweeping rhetoric as an unlimited ideological crusade.
9. 9. Lippmann argued that intervention in the name of balance of power was justified, but indiscriminate support for unstable client regimes was wasteful and dangerous.
10. 10. Lippmann's column 'Cassandra Speaking' proposed a massive European aid program akin to Lend-Lease, which became the blueprint for the Marshall Plan.
11. 11. Lippmann and Kennan agreed the Soviets should be invited to participate in the Marshall Plan, but Stalin refused, seeing it as an attempt to reverse Yalta.
12. 12. Lippmann's series of columns refuting Kennan's 'X' article coined the term 'Cold War' and attacked containment as a 'strategic monstrosity' that would require endless intervention.