Overview

NSC 68 and the Political Economy of the Early Cold War re-examines the origins and implementation of NSC 68, the massive rearmament program that the United States embarked upon beginning in the summer of 1950. Curt Cardwell reinterprets the origins of NSC 68 to demonstrate that the aim of the program was less about containing communism than ensuring the survival of the nascent postwar global economy, upon which rested postwar US prosperity. The book challenges most studies on NSC 68 as a document of geostrategy and argues instead that it is more correctly understood as a document rooted in concerns for the US domestic political economy.

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9781107480957

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Reviews

'Curt Cardwell has offered us an economic analysis of one of the more important documents in modern US history, NSC 68, which is sure to change our understanding of the imperatives that drove American leaders in the early Cold War years, especially the 'dollar gap' and the need to stimulate spending. It will provide an invaluable source for a revisionist/materialist interpretation of the Cold War.' Robert Buzzanco, author of Masters of War and Vietnam and the Transformation of American Life 'Curt Cardwell demonstrates that political economy is not a lost art. In this meticulously researched and comprehensive account of the place of NSC 68 in the early Cold War, Cardwell lays out the economic imperatives facing the Truman administration and the role rearmament played in postwar recovery. The book is a persuasively argued revision of the standard story told with verve and energy.' Marilyn B. Young, New York University 'Curt Cardwell has written an important, perceptive, and analytically powerful book that adds a new dimension to existing understanding of the transformation of the United States after World War II into a national security state. His impressive research substantiates a provocative main thesis that US leaders prosecuted the Cold War more to preserve a liberal economic world order than to contain the Soviet Union. Cardwell exposes the previously overlooked centrality of the dollar gap as a motivating factor guiding postwar US policy, providing an important corrective, especially to existing accounts that exaggerate the success of the Marshall Plan.' James I. Matray, California State University, Chico 'Today's overwhelming US military budget had its roots in 1949-50, whereas the famous (if long-secret) NSC 68 strategy paper of 1950 shaped American plans to the end of the Cold War - and after. Curt Caldwell has written the definitive study of these crucial pivots in American history by giving this book two special qualities: a mastery of the records revealing what triggered these US policies, and a beautifully done dissection of the all-important economic causes that shaped - and misshaped - this historic turn and, consequently, the more than 60 years that have followed.' Walter LaFeber, Cornell University, and author of America, Russia, and the Cold War, 1945-2006 and The American Age: U.S. Foreign Relations at Home and Abroad Since 1750 'Curt Cardwell has written an interesting and provocative take on the origins of NSC 68, the defining ideological blueprint for the US approach to the Cold War, drafted and implemented in 1950.' Bryan Mabee, International Affairs

'Curt Cardwell has offered us an economic analysis of one of the more important documents in modern US history, NSC 68, which is sure to change our understanding of the imperatives that drove American leaders in the early Cold War years, especially the 'dollar gap' and the need to stimulate spending. It will provide an invaluable source for a revisionist/materialist interpretation of the Cold War.' Robert Buzzanco, author of Masters of War and Vietnam and the Transformation of American Life 'Curt Cardwell demonstrates that political economy is not a lost art. In this meticulously researched and comprehensive account of the place of NSC 68 in the early Cold War, Cardwell lays out the economic imperatives facing the Truman administration and the role rearmament played in postwar recovery. The book is a persuasively argued revision of the standard story told with verve and energy.' Marilyn B. Young, New York University 'Curt Cardwell has written an important, perceptive, and analytically powerful book that adds a new dimension to existing understanding of the transformation of the United States after World War II into a national security state. His impressive research substantiates a provocative main thesis that US leaders prosecuted the Cold War more to preserve a liberal economic world order than to contain the Soviet Union. Cardwell exposes the previously overlooked centrality of the dollar gap as a motivating factor guiding postwar US policy, providing an important corrective, especially to existing accounts that exaggerate the success of the Marshall Plan.' James I. Matray, California State University, Chico 'Today's overwhelming US military budget had its roots in 1949-50, whereas the famous (if long-secret) NSC 68 strategy paper of 1950 shaped American plans to the end of the Cold War - and after. Curt Caldwell has written the definitive study of these crucial pivots in American history by giving this book two special qualities: a mastery of the records revealing what triggered these US policies, and a beautifully done dissection of the all-important economic causes that shaped - and misshaped - this historic turn and, consequently, the more than 60 years that have followed.' Walter LaFeber, Cornell University, and author of America, Russia, and the Cold War, 1945-2006 and The American Age: U.S. Foreign Relations at Home and Abroad Since 1750 'Curt Cardwell has written an interesting and provocative take on the origins of NSC 68, the defining ideological blueprint for the US approach to the Cold War, drafted and implemented in 1950.' Bryan Mabee, International Affairs Curt Cardwell has offered us an economic analysis of one of the more important documents in modern U.S. history, NSC 68, which is sure to change our understanding of the imperatives that drove American leaders in the early Cold War years, especially the `dollar gap' and the need to stimulate spending. It will provide an invaluable source for a revisionist/materialist interpretation of the Cold War. - Robert Buzzanco, author of Masters of War and Vietnam and the Transformation of American Life Curt Cardwell demonstrates that political economy is not a lost art. In this meticulously researched and comprehensive account of the place of NSC 68 in the early Cold War, Cardwell lays out the economic imperatives facing the Truman administration and the role rearmament played in postwar recovery. The book is a persuasively argued revision of the standard story told with verve and energy. - Marilyn B. Young, Professor, Department of History, New York University Curt Cardwell has written an important, perceptive, and analytically powerful book that adds a new dimension to existing understanding of the transformation of the United States after World War II into a national security state. His impressive research substantiates a provocative main thesis that U.S. leaders prosecuted the Cold War more to preserve a liberal economic world order than to contain the Soviet Union. Cardwell exposes the previously overlooked centrality of the dollar gap as a motivating factor guiding postwar U.S. policy, providing an important corrective, especially to existing accounts that exaggerate the success of the Marshall Plan. - James I. Matray, California State University, Chico Today's overwhelming U.S. military budget had its roots in 1949-1950, whereas the famous (if long-secret) NSC 68 strategy paper of 1950 shaped American plans to the end of the Cold War - and after. Curt Cardwell has written the definitive study of these crucial pivots in American history by giving this book two special qualities: a mastery of the records revealing what triggered these U.S. policies, and a beautifully done dissection of the all-important economic causes that shaped - and misshaped - this historic turn and, consequently, the more than 60 years that have followed. - Walter LaFeber, Cornell University, author of America, Russia, and the Cold War, 1945-2006, and The American Age: U.S. Foreign Relations at Home and Abroad since 1750 Cardwell's book argues that NSC 68 grew out of US concerns not with a growing Soviet menace but with the prospect that Western Europe would face a serious payments deficit with the dollar area when the Marshall Plan ended in 1952. -John L. Harper, Survival

Author Information

Curt Cardwell is an Assistant Professor of US Foreign Relations history at Drake University. He received a Ph.D. in History at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey, in 2006, and was recipient of the Harry S. Truman Library Dissertation Year Grant in 2003.

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