Council on Foreign Relations Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! === Cold War era, 1945 to 1979 === [[File:David Rockefeller - NARA - 195929 (cropped).jpg|thumb|[[David Rockefeller]] (1915β2017) joined the Council in 1941 and was appointed as a director in 1949.]] A critical study found that of 502 government officials surveyed from 1945 to 1972, more than half were members of the Council.<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|48}} During the [[Eisenhower administration]] 40% of the top U.S. foreign policy officials were CFR members (Eisenhower himself had been a council member); under [[Truman Administration|Truman]], 42% of the top posts were filled by council members. During the [[Kennedy administration]], this number rose to 51%, and peaked at 57% under the [[Lyndon B. Johnson Administration|Johnson administration]].<ref name=Shoup/>{{rp|62β64}} In an anonymous piece called "The Sources of Soviet Conduct" that appeared in ''Foreign Affairs'' in 1947, CFR study group member [[George F. Kennan|George Kennan]] coined the term "[[containment]]". The essay would prove to be highly influential in US foreign policy for seven upcoming presidential administrations. Forty years later, Kennan explained that he had never suspected the Russians of any desire to launch an attack on America; he thought that it was obvious enough and he did not need to explain it in his essay. [[William Bundy]] credited CFR's study groups with helping to lay the framework of thinking that led to the [[Marshall Plan]] and [[NATO]]. Due to new interest in the group, membership grew towards 1,000.<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|35β39}} [[File:Harold Pratt House 004.JPG|thumb|CFR Headquarters, located in the former [[Harold Pratt House]] in [[New York City]]]] [[Dwight D. Eisenhower]] chaired a CFR study group while he served as President of [[Columbia University]]. One member later said, "whatever General Eisenhower knows about economics, he has learned at the study group meetings."<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|35β44}} The CFR study group devised an expanded study group called "Americans for Eisenhower" to increase his chances for the presidency. Eisenhower would later draw many Cabinet members from CFR ranks and become a CFR member himself. His primary CFR appointment was Secretary of State [[John Foster Dulles]]. Dulles gave a public address at the [[Harold Pratt House]] in New York City in which he announced a new direction for Eisenhower's foreign policy: "There is no local defense which alone will contain the mighty land power of the communist world. Local defenses must be reinforced by the further deterrent of massive retaliatory power." After this speech, the council convened a session on "Nuclear Weapons and Foreign Policy" and chose [[Henry Kissinger]] to head it. Kissinger spent the following academic year working on the project at Council headquarters. The book of the same name that he published from his research in 1957 gave him national recognition, topping the national bestseller lists.<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|39β41}} CFR played an important role in the creation of the [[European Coal and Steel Community]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Ciappi |first=Enrico |date=2023 |title=A Reappraisal of the Origins of European Integration: From Wartime Planning to the Schuman Plan |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/00220094231200453 |journal=Journal of Contemporary History |volume=58 |issue=4 |pages=676β696 |language=en |doi=10.1177/00220094231200453 |s2cid=262030757 |issn=0022-0094}}</ref> CFR promoted a blueprint of the ECSC and helped [[Jean Monnet]] promote the ESCS.<ref name=":0" /> On November 24, 1953, a study group heard a report from political scientist William Henderson regarding the ongoing conflict between [[France]] and Vietnamese Communist leader [[Ho Chi Minh]]'s [[Viet Minh]] forces, a struggle that would later become known as the [[First Indochina War]]. Henderson argued that Ho's cause was primarily [[nationalism|nationalist]] in nature and that Marxism had "little to do with the current revolution." Further, the report said, the United States could work with Ho to guide his movement away from Communism. State Department officials, however, expressed skepticism about direct American intervention in Vietnam and the idea was tabled. Over the next twenty years, the United States would find itself allied with anti-Communist [[South Vietnam]] and against Ho and his supporters in the [[Vietnam War]].<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|40, 49β67}} The Council served as a "breeding ground" for important American policies such as [[mutual deterrence]], [[arms control]], and [[nuclear non-proliferation]].<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|40β42}} In 1962 the group began a program of bringing select Air Force officers to the Harold Pratt House to study alongside its scholars. The Army, Navy and Marine Corps requested they start similar programs for their own officers.<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|46}} A four-year-long study of [[ChinaβUnited States relations|relations between America and China]] was conducted by the Council between 1964 and 1968. One study published in 1966 concluded that American citizens were more open to talks with China than their elected leaders. Henry Kissinger had continued to publish in ''Foreign Affairs'' and was appointed by President [[Richard Nixon]] to serve as [[National Security Advisor (United States)|National Security Adviser]] in 1969. In 1971, he embarked on a secret trip to Beijing to broach talks with Chinese leaders. Nixon went to China in 1972, and diplomatic relations were completely normalized by [[Jimmy Carter|President Carter]]'s Secretary of State, another Council member, [[Cyrus Vance]].<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|42β44}} The Vietnam War created a rift within the organization. When [[Hamilton Fish Armstrong]] announced in 1970 that he would be leaving the helm of ''Foreign Affairs'' after 45 years, new chairman [[David Rockefeller]] approached a family friend, [[William Bundy]], to take over the position. Anti-war advocates within the Council rose in protest against this appointment, claiming that Bundy's hawkish record in the State and Defense Departments and the CIA precluded him from taking over an independent journal. Some considered Bundy a [[war criminal]] for his prior actions.<ref name=Grose/>{{rp|50β51}} In November 1979, while chairman of CFR, David Rockefeller became embroiled in an international incident when he and Henry Kissinger, along with [[John J. McCloy]] and Rockefeller aides, persuaded President Jimmy Carter through the State Department to admit the Shah of Iran, [[Mohammad Reza Pahlavi]], into the US for hospital treatment for [[lymphoma]]. This action directly precipitated what is known as the [[Iran hostage crisis]] and placed Rockefeller under intense media scrutiny (particularly from ''[[The New York Times]]'') for the first time in his public life.<ref>[[Murray Rothbard|Rothbard, Murray]], [http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch27.html Why the War? The Kuwait Connection] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160205132652/http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/ir/Ch27.html |date=February 5, 2016 }} (May 1991)</ref><ref>Scrutiny by NYT over the Shah of Iran β David Rockefeller, ''Memoirs'' (pp. 356β75)</ref> In his book, ''[[White House Diary]]'', Carter wrote of the affair, "April 9 [1979] David Rockefeller came in, apparently to induce me to let the shah come to the United States. Rockefeller, Kissinger, and [[Zbigniew Brzezinski|Brzezinski]] seem to be adopting this as a joint project".<ref>{{cite book|last=Carter|first=Jimmy|title=White House Diary|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IDKNVdWVMlEC|year=2010|publisher=Farrar, Straus and Giroux|isbn=978-1-4299-9065-3|page=[https://books.google.com/books?id=IDKNVdWVMlEC&pg=PA312 312]}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page