American Foreign Policy: Reflections, Recollections and Recriminations
| DOI | 10.1177/002070205501000406 |
| Date | 01 December 1955 |
| Published date | 01 December 1955 |
| Subject Matter | Review Article |
REVIEW
ARTICLE
American
Foreign
Policy:
Reflections,
Recollections
and
Recriminations*
URING
the
past
decade
the
State
Department has
received
far
more
brickbats
than
bouquets
for
its
handling
of
American
foreign
policy.
What with
the
China
Lobby
and
the
Formosa
fans
accusing
it
of
having
"lost"
China,
the
Mc-
Carthyites
pointing
with
horror
to
its
alleged
infiltration
by
Communists,
and
the
progressives
complaining
that
it
has
coddled
the
Ruhr
industrial
barons in
West
Germany,
the
Zai-
batsu
in
Japan
and
the
tribal
chieftains
in
the
Middle
East,
it
is
little
wonder
that
the
word
"diplomat"
acquired
in
the
Fifties
as
dubious
a connotation in
American
society
as
"banker"
did
in
the
Thirties.
As
civil
servants,
members
of
the
State
Depart-
ment
could
not
reply
to
their
critics.
But
once
they
left
the
service, as
a
good
many have
done,
they
were
free
to
defend
by
voice
and
pen
their
ideas
and to
describe
the
limits
which
the
framework
of
international
politics
has
placed
upon
the
operation
of
American
foreign
policy.
No
less
than
four
former
members
of
the
Policy
Planning
Staff of
the
State Department
have
done
just
that
during the past year.
To
this
reviewer,
their
observa-
tions
are
more
impressive
than
the
charges
levelled
by
the
"revi-
sionists,"
to
use
the
description
chosen
by
one
of
them,
and
the
complaints
aired
by disappointed
generals.
When
to
these
volumes
are
added
the
memoirs
of
a former
chairman
of
the
Senate Committee
on
Foreign
Relations,
the
impressions
gleaned
on
the
world
tour
of
the
Democratic
candidate
for
the
presidency
in
1952,
the
admonitions
of
the
chairman
of
a
presidential
com-
mission
on
foreign
economic
policy,
the
verdicts
of two
civilians
who
held
administrative
posts
in
occupied
Japan,
the
reactions
of
a
foreign
journalist
to
the
contemporary
American
scene,
the
comments
of
a
symposium
on
"America
and a
New
Asia"
and
the
dissections
by
"revisionists"
of
Roosevelt's
policies
it
can
be
readily
appreciated
that
the
student
of
American
diplomacy
is
in
no
danger
of
running
short
of
reading
material.
Let
us
note
first
the
advice
the
planners
have
to
offer.
Their
senior
is
Mr.
George
Kennan
with
twenty-seven
years
in
the
State
Department,
from
which
he
retired
in
1953.
Realities
of
*The
books
reviewed
in
this
article
are
listed
on
p.
287.
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