1949

Truman's second term: 1949 to 1953

Democrats had grabbed both houses back from the Republicans.

Truman was now able to push through his social security and minimum wage measures.

Rent control - slum clearance, re-housing - dams and power stations.

His NHS proposal failed due to the opposition of doctors.

Federal aid to schools failed due to Roman Catholic demand for similar aid to parochial schools.

Truman's need for Southern bloc votes prevented any advance in civil rights. Blacks were knocked back from apparent advances made during wartime.

In 1949 Dean G Acheson took of SoS

J Howard McGrath became Attorney G

Oscar I Chapman became Interior

Louis A Johnson replaced Harriman at Defense

DATES?

March 8th 1949 The French install Bao Dai as puppet head of state in South Vietnam.

The French established the (south) Vietnamese National Army in July.

http://www.btinternet.com/~rod.oakland/vietnam.htm

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/VNbo.htm

Fair Deal

Truman began a “broad program of reform” from January 5th. His “Fair Deal” went further than FDR over minimum wage and social security. Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC) to prevent economic discrimination against blacks and overhaul of the farm subsidy program. Fair Deal was never enacted. Minimum wage was raised to 75 cents per hour. Social security was broadened to an extra 10m Americans, congress blocked health, education and civil rights measures. Despite Democratic victory of 1948, congress remained under control of a bi-partisan conservative coalition of northern Republicans and Southern Democrats. It was the alignment that had halted FDR in 1938.

A state Dept memo from George Kennan in 1949 stated that the third world was to be “exploited” for the reconstruction of Europe and Japan.

Four point program to provide aid to underdeveloped countries?

GI bill of rights

Employment act of 1946

PRIVATISATIONS

Truman sold 1/5 of industry govt had taken over during war.

He nationalised nothing in his "Fair Deal"

Chairman Mao’s guerrillas completed their take over of China in 1948

On 3rd of February 1949 Dean Acheson recommended that the US "cut loose" from Chiang Kai-Shek and stop a shipment of $60m in supplies, but Congress opposed and Truman approved the shipment.

In August Acheson's State Dept produced a China "White Paper". A factual rebuttal of the China lobby and Congressional support for Chiang with 645 pages blaming China's problems on Chiang - not the Communists. Mao's forces advanced across the Yangtze River by mid 49 and looked increasingly like he would soon be running China. The Republicans and Democrats squabbled over China policy.

1949 October 1st – Mao Zedong proclaims the people’s Republic of China. Anti-commie sentiment ignited in USA regarding se Asia and results in (or justifies?) White House policy goal of “containment”.

1st December Chiang Kai-Sek moves to Formosa and creates a nationalist government.

27th December Truman follows Acheson rather than Johnson and promises aid to Chiang but no military intervention.

31st December NSC 48/2 defined south east Asia as a "major" interest, but only to support allies. The US should support French colonial government against Ho Chi Minh, and also the UK in Malaysia.

Modern Military complex

See Koreatruthcommision.org/plus/board/table/thesis/upload/indictment.pdf

1950 30th January Truman – on the same day that he approved H-bomb development and ordered a re-evaluation of US policy that results in NSC-68 by April 12th - Paul Nitze replaced George Kennan in PPC.

The X-1 now the fastest plane on earth – superseded by the X1a and the USA were going for Mach 2 (21,000 mph) – Chuck Jeager/Yeager.

Harriman at peak of power

"Lovett, Marshall, Harriman and Acheson went to unhorse General Douglas MacArthur, commander of US forces in Asia. MacArthur kept Wall St intelligence agencies away from his command, and favoured real independence for the non-white nations.

"That September Robert Lovett replaced Marshall as Sec of Defence. Meanwhile, Harriman was named director of the Mutual Security Agency, making him the US chief of the Anglo-American military alliance. By now Bush & Brothers-Harriman were everything  but Commander in Chief.

"A central focus of the Harriman Security regime in Washington ('50 to '53) was the organisation of covert operations, and "psychological warfare". Harriman together with his lawyers and business partners, Dulles Brothers, wanted the government's secret services to conduct extensive propaganda campaigns and mass psychological experiments with the US, and para-military campaigns abroad. This would supposedly ensure a stable world-wide environment favourable to the Anglo-American financial and political interests."

Lovett called for MacArthur's firing on March 23rd 1951, citing MacArthur's insistence on defeating the Chinese invaders in Korea. MacArthur was fired on April 10th 1951”, “relieved of his command on April 11th 1951” but D, B, F & W, in their book, didn’t feel it necessary to explain why.

NSC 68

12th April Truman approved NSC-68. Key idea of "coercion". Must spend 20% of GNP on defence ($50bn). Expand US military forces into Europe, tighten western alliance and integrate military planning, assume indefinite period of danger from the "ruthless fanatics" spreading monolithic global communism; engage in "total diplomacy" from all agencies of government; develop public support at home for the long struggle. Conclusion: "the cold war is in fact a real war in which the survival of the free world is at stake."

20th April Truman calls for "campaign of truth to puncture the Russian "big lie". Freedom train; Voice of America and Radio free Europe; Munich transmitter Project Dumbo; Relay bases at Manila and Honolulu and Salonika and Tagier; Project Troy at MIT to develop megawatt transmitters to overcome jamming and beam radio into Russia - the "Ring Plan" is funded September 27th by Congress with $41m appropriation, then raised to $61m in 1951 to build 6 megawatt transmitter in the US. Also, budget of US International Information and Education Program (USIE) is raised to $131m by 1951.

Eisenhower, in 1950, was, made NATO supreme commander. Four US divisions were stationed in Europe as the core of the new NATO army.

National Security Council memorandum 68 (NSC-68) developed the views of Sec of State Dean Acheson, written by Paul Nitze (later to work for Reagan as arms control negotiator) called for a “roll back strategy” that would foster the seeds of destruction within the Soviet system” so we could then negotiate a settlement on our terms “with the Soviet Union (or successor state/states)”. The huge military expenditure and cutbacks necessary would also necessitate means to counter the “excess of tolerance” that allows too much domestic dissent.

In June the UN Security Council voted to resist the aggression against a member state of the UN and President Truman sent US forces to support south Koreans in its name. USSR was boycotting meetings of the council at the time. The bulk of the UN forces in Korea were US. Within a few months the allied army had crossed into the territory of the north Korean across the 38th parallel. As fighting drew near the Manchurian border, Chinese forces intervened. UN forces were thrown back and the danger of a much greater war (nuclear?) loomed. And behind China, the USSR? Further fighting but China could not overthrow South Korea against the US. Armistice was signed in July 1952.

The Disposal of Forrestal

On March 28th 1949 Forrestal was forced out of office and flown on an Air Force plane to Florida. According to John A. Keel in “Visitors From Space” Forrestal “went bananas and raced through the corridors of the Pentagon screaming, “We’re being invaded and we can’t stop them!” He was convinced that his phones were being tapped and some enormous conspiracy was under way. Soon after he was placed in a hospital he leaped out of a window to his death.” He was taken to "Hobe Sound" (Jupiter Island) where Robert Lovett and an Army psychiatrist dealt with him .

"The Secretary of Defense, James Forrestal, had become a problem to the Harriman faction . Forrestal had long been an executive at Dillon-Read on Wall Street. But in recent years he had “gone astray”. As Secretary of the Navy in 1944, Forrestal proposed the racial integration of the Navy. As defense Secretary he pressed for integration in the armed forces and this eventually became US policy."

"Forrestal opposed the…strategy of appeasement coupled with brinkmanship. He was simply opposed to communism. "He was flown back to Washington, locked in Walter Reed Army Hospital and given insulin shock treatment for alleged "mental exhaustion". He was denied visitors except his estranged wife and children (his son had been Avrill Harriman's aide in Moscow). On May 22nd, his body was found, bathrobe cord tightly round his neck, after he had plunged from the 16th Storey hospital window. Chief psychiatrist declared suicide even before an investigation had started. The army's inquest results were kept secret. Forrestal's diaries when published were 80% deleted after a year of direct government censorship and rewriting."

Now Forrestal seems to have become a victim to some sort of Orwellian revisionism. In Divine, Breen, Frederickson and Willows' book there is not a mention of him. Other accounts skate over his "unfortunate demise", his official biography notes only that he “died tragically”.

Dean Acheson became Secretary of State (1949 to 1953). He succeeded Marshall.

China Crisis

Mao’s forces in China forced nationalists out of Manchuria in late 1948, and China went Communist on 1st of October.

On 3rd of February Dean Acheson recommended that the US "cut loose" from Chiang Kai-Shek and stop a shipment of $60m in supplies, but Congress opposed and Truman approved the shipment.

In August Acheson's State Dept produced a China "White Paper". A factual rebuttal of the China lobby and Congressional support for Chiang with 645 pages blaming China's problems on Chiang - not the Communists. Mao's forces advanced across the Yangtze River by mid 49 and looked increasingly like he would soon be running China. The Republicans and Democrats squabbled over China policy.

1949 October 1st – Mao Zedong proclaims the people’s Republic of China. Anti-commie sentiment ignited in USA regarding se Asia and results in (or justifies?) White House policy goal of “containment”.

1st December Chiang Kai-Sek moves to Formosa and creates a nationalist government.

27th December Truman follows Acheson rather than Johnson and promises aid to Chiang but no military intervention.

31st December NSC 48/2 defined south east Asia as a "major" interest, but only to support allies. The US should support French colonial government against Ho Chi Minh, and also the UK in Malaysia.

Check year is 1949