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Isolationism or discerning internationalism: Robert Taft, Mike Mansfield and US Troops in Europe*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2009

Phil Williams
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Extract

The United States security guarantee to Western Europe enshrined in the North Atlantic Treaty has been not only the most important and enduring of American foreign policy commitments since the late 1940s, but also the least controversial Few critics have challenged the view that the Atlantic Alliance is vital to American security. The manner in which the commitment has been implemented, however, and in particular the extent to which it requires a substantial presence of American conventional forces in Europe has been much more controversial Indeed, the troop deployment policy of the Executive Branch has been challenged by Congress on several occasions. The first challenge came in 1951 when leading members of the Senate questioned both the legitimacy and the wisdom of President Truman's decision to send US troops to Europe. During the latter half of the 1960s and the first half of the 1970s, the issue arose once again as Senate Majority Leader Mike Mansfield articulated doubts about the need to maintain the existing troop level in Europe. From 1966 to 1970 Mansfield introduced several Sense of the Senate Resolutions advocating troop reductions; in 1971 and again in 1973 and 1974 he pressed amendments to legislation which, had they been approved, would have mandated reductions.

Type
Research Article
Information
Review of International Studies , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , January 1982 , pp. 27 - 38
Copyright
Copyright © British International Studies Association 1982

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References

1. Polsby, N., Congress and the Presidency (2nd ed) (Englewood Cliffs NJ, 1971), p. 68.Google Scholar

2. This belief is reiterated in the Memoirs of some of those involved. See, for example, Acheson, D., Present at the Creation (London, 1970), pp. 460–61Google Scholar and Kissinger, H. A., The White House Years (London, 1979), p. 939.Google Scholar During an interview with Ambassador Mansfield, in Tokyo on 10 December 1980, he confirmed to the author that, in his view, Kissinger genuinely regarded him as an isolationist.

3. An interesting biography of Taft is Patterson, J. T., Mr Republican: A Biography of Robert Taft (Boston, 1972)Google Scholar. As yet there is no formal biography of Mansfield although Charles Hood's illuminating study, China Mike Mansfield: The Making of a Congressional Authority on the Far East (PhD dissertation:Washington State University, 1980) goes a long way towards filling this gap. A compilation of Mansfield's speeches, together with a little biographical detail can be found in Baldwin, L.Hon. Politician: Mike Mansfield of Montana (Missoula, Montana, 1979).Google Scholar

4. Armstrong, J. P., ‘The Enigma of Senator Taft and American Foreign Policy’, Review of Politics, Vol. 17 (April, 1955), pp. 206–31 at p. 223.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

5. This is brought out more fully in an extremely useful paper by Dr Geoffrey Matthews, ‘Robert Taft, the Senate and American Foreign Policy, 1939–53’ presented at the British International Studies Association Conference, University of Keele, December 1979.

6. The speech can be found in United States Congress Congressional Record 82nd Congress, 1st Session, Vol. 97, pt. 1 (3 January 1951 to 21 February 1951), p. 54 ff.

7. Taft, R. A., A Foreign Policyfor Americans (New York, 1951), p. 68.Google Scholar

8. Ibid. p. 68.

9. Ibid. pp. 69–70.

10. Mansfield, M., The Foreign Policy of the United States. Speech before the Bar Association, Butte, Montana, June 1951, p. 1.Google Scholar

11. Ibid. p. 2.

12. M. Mansfield, Remarks at a symposium, University of Arkansas, La Fayetteville, Arkansas, 9 March 1968 on International Responsibilities: Reappraisal and Reapportionment, pp. 20–21.

13. Senator Mansfield emphasized the importance of principle in a personal interview with the author on 17 September 1975.

14. See in particular the response by Secretary of State Acheson to Senator Hickenlooper's question in Hearings Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Eighty First Congress, First Session, on the North Atlantic Treaty, p. 49.

15. M. Mansfield, The Next Stage in Foreign Policy. Speech on Senate Floor released 14 July 1957.

16. M. Mansfield, Address on Changing Europe and United States Policies to The Springfield Adult Education Council, Springfield, Mass. 10 October 1962, p. 4.

17. R. A. Taft, Address to the Executives Club of Chicago, 26 January 1951.

18. M. Mansfield, Changing Europe and United States Policies, op cit. p. 17.

19. This concern is fully documented in Hood, op cit.

20. R. A. Taft, Address to the Executives Club of Chicago, op cit.

21. R. A. Taft, A Foreign Policyfor Americans, op cit. p. 78.

22. Ibid. p. 79.

23. Ibid. p. 80.

24. Statement by M. Mansfield in Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Arms Control, International Law and Organisation of the Committee on Foreign Relations, United States Senate, Ninety-Third Congress. First Seminar on US Forces in Europe, p. 12.

25. Speech of M. Mansfield, Review of Foreign Policy: the United States and the Soviet Union, 24 July 1956, p. 16.

26. See Mansfield Statement released 2 January 1961.

27. The Next Stage in Foreign Policy, op cit.

28. Schlesinger, A. M. Jr, ‘The New Isolationism’, Atlantic Monthly, No. 189 (May 1952), pp. 34–8.Google Scholar

29. M. Mansfield, at the 18th Semi-Annual Meeting of the Manufacturing Chemists' Assoc, Inc. New York Hilton, 26 November 1968 on Towards a Discerning Internationalism, p. 23.