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General Andrew J. Goodpaster

Speech at the American Hellenic Institute's Commemoration of the 55^th Anniversary of the Truman Doctrine of Aid to Greece

Capital Hilton Hotel
March 12, 2002
12:30-2:30 p.m.

Well, it's great to be with you on the date that is indeed memorable. It was 55 years ago today that President Truman enunciated the doctrine that bears his name. The doctrine that constituted, as it was carried out, a true turning point in history. It's especially I think significant as we recall those times and those activities in the light of the events of last September 11 that were recognized just yesterday at the end of the six month, after that assault was made on America and on the international order, if I may say so, that we have come to appreciate and benefit from.

It was an assault on the lives and the livelihood of our people and on peace and freedom as the governing principles on which our own country should operate on and on which the international order should be formed.

I'm going to look back to that time 55 years ago. I happen to remember it well if that tells you something about the calendar. It was February 1947 when this was triggered. There had been a terrible winter throughout Western Europe. The countries were still in ruins from the ravages of World War II. The economies had been shattered and were unable to attain the momentum that would be needed to set them on a path to prosperity. They could not recover. They could not care for their citizens. It was a time of desperate need, pain and suffering all under the shadow of the threat of subjugation by foreign hostile military forces.

There was in fact deep concern that civil society as we knew it would go under. That the whole way of life that had been attained prior to World War II was hanging in the balance and was in jeopardy. There was a concern that a downward spiral was underway, endangering the whole fabric of Western democratic civilization that had been developed in the millennia since the flowering of Greece. So these were overwhelming.

Britain itself was exhausted from the war and the British gave notice to us, the Americans, that it was no longer able to provide the support needed for Greece and Turkey against Soviet Union pressures and demands. They wanted to seize and gain control of the Dardanelles. They wanted to obtain a naval base in Greece and in Crete that would give them control of the Eastern Mediterranean. The situation was a true crisis, centering on those two countries.

To comprehend the depth and the scope of the crisis in Greece, it's necessary I think to look back to World War II and specifically to the heroic role that Greece had played in that war and to the fearful toll that its valiant stand and defiance of Hitler had taken. The story is familiar, but it bears repetition. It must not be forgotten.

When the Italians attacked in October of 1940, they were fought to the standstill by Greek forces and indeed thrown back into Albania. Hitler then in April of 1941 launched a massive attack. Twenty first-line divisions were committed. They were able to overrun Greece and seize Crete against stiff and sustained resistance.

But this campaign delayed Hitler's attack on Russia, a delay that very well may have tipped the scale against German victory in Russia. That delay was everything. The Germans then occupied Greece throughout the war, but the resistance continued. And Greek shipping in particular, participated through the war supporting the Allied effort but at a heavy cost.

The trauma did not end with the war. It continued during the aftermath. The economies, including the economy of Greece, were severely damaged. The Greek merchant fleet, its world commerce, had been greatly reduced. A foreign-supported insurgency existed in Greece, carried out from Albania, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria -- and this was ongoing.

And this was the setting for the British withdrawal and for the decision of President Truman.

Truman was a strong believer in collective action. It had been vital to winning the war against the Nazi Power. His views were strongly reinforced and made effective in the action by General George Marshall in the last months of the war. After my return from the reception I had had from the Germans in Italy, I served under General Marshall as a strategic planner and it was in that capacity that I learned from my immediate superior, the army planner under General Marshall, that the British had declared their inability to continue to provide the absolutely essential support that was required in order to hold back the Soviet danger.

Truman was decisive. He immediately laid down the direction that our policy would follow and that our programs would be designed to support. He said, "It must be the foreign policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed authorities or by outside pressure." In those few words, the United States embarked on something that was new in times of peace.

He called on the Congress for funds to provide aid and support. I recall we had to generate some information for Undersecretary of State Dean Acheson to go up and testify before a Republican-controlled Senate Committee, Senator Vandenburg being the crucial influence at that moment. Vandenburg said, "We have the succession of requests. President Truman has set up the requests for $300 million (which in those days was a large amount). Are we going to have this aggression continue, or can't we have something consolidated and integrated?" Then Secretary Acheson said, "We've been talking about that, and thinking about it, and we're going to start it." And Vandenburg in effect said, "Well, get on with it." And he came back and met with General Marshall, who was then Secretary Marshall.

And it was Marshall's decision to start intensive studies as to just what actions would need to be taken. There was a familiar quotation by my boss, from General Marshall, who had said: "You have made a good study of the problem, this is a good analysis. Now what can we do?" And that's what we turned to at that time.

The Congress had called on the Executive Branch for this consolidated, forward-looking plan. And the Executive Branch had put in train a number of efforts, and those led up to the Marshall Plan that was presented by Secretary Marshall on June 5^th at Harvard in 1947.

It was directed as he described it "against privation and hunger and human misery." It was focused on Western Europe because you had something there to build upon. Some of us, myself included, had wanted to extend it more widely. But then Marshall's decision was that that would be too diffuse and it would involve such a variety of needs that it would be impossible to focus it, to pull it together as that needed to be done.

So, the genius of the Marshall plan was that he called on the nations of Europe to come together and themselves prepare and present a consolidated report and proposal. Meanwhile, from February on and as the Marshall Plan unfolded, the program for Greece and Turkey was launched and went forward. In Greece, General Van Fleet led an effort to provide training, equipment, advice, and a coherent and cohesive plan of action against the attacking threats and forces.

In 1949, NATO had been formed in response to the continuing threat and danger from the Soviet Union. In Mid-1950, after the Communist attack from North Korea against South Korea, which we at the time thought had been instigated and represented a commitment by the Soviet Union, the nations of Europe decided to move from, as some said, the Treaty as a scrap of paper to a force in deed, in place in Western Europe.

They invited General Eisenhower to assume the command. I had the privilege of serving as a staff officer with him during that time. I recall the statement that he made, with some variation, but essentially he said that these many nations, working together, can accomplish a result which if they acted separately would be beyond the reach of any or of all. And that's where we had some work to do -- in Central Europe, in Northern Europe and in the Mediterranean. And early in 1952, Greece and Turkey, which had not been original members of NATO, joined at the Lisbon Conference. After that time on, the commitment of NATO was to provide security throughout the Mediterranean area.

A lot of hard work went ahead, a lot of concessions, a lot of close agreements that had to be reached in order to form a common purpose, to carry out a common purpose. But the response was deep seated, strong and highly successful. At the end of about mid-1952, at the time General Eisenhower left NATO to engage we will say in other pursuits, he made his first annual report of south Europe to the military committee of NATO and he spoke at that time of an expanding spiral of strength and confidence. And from that moment on, we knew we were on a rising trajectory there in Europe.

It was a historic achievement -- the rebuilding and recovery of Europe, generated by the countries and the people themselves with the United States participating, with the United States providing often a crucial margin of support to enable that process. A collective force in being had been created, bringing about stable security in its most basic sense -- the safety of the people of our countries. It was well underway.

Looking back for just a moment, Truman's decisive action was critical. There was no equivocation on his part, and we owe a great deal to this man who had taken the reins of government after the death of Franklin Roosevelt. We owe a great deal to George Marshall, declared by Churchill to be the organizer of victory, or the architect of victory to World War II.

But he didn't stop there. He initiated the Marshall Plan, again described by Churchill as the most unsordid act in history. It was a turning point. It was a crucial decision and a crucial action on the part of the United States. An act of fundamental policy had been taken. The United States would undergird the security and the freedom of friends and allies.

We think of this -- I may just add a word -- today, after the tragedy of September 11. The assault, not only on the physical infrastructure of New York and of Washington, but on the way of life that characterizes the United States. It's an assault that our president, again acting decisively, has moved us to respond effectively.

But we have not yet begun to understand the depth of meaning of that assault. Some say we have moved into an age of disorder, from the complacent, as it now appears, the complacent days of the post-Cold War day. Some say that it's an age of turmoil that we have moved in to. We are challenged to protect the fabric for which our countries -- the United States, its allies, Greece in particular on this special day. How do we protect the fabric of stable security on which the well-being of our people so much depends? We don't have all the answers. As World War II showed, we have the human resources to meet the challenges of that dimension. I recall President Eisenhower talked about his time in North Africa, before the tide really turned in World War II, as it was turning, and the problems were difficult and often contentious. And the work was hard. And his answer was, "If the problems were easy, they wouldn't send such good people to deal with them."

I say this about the events of September 11. It is a deep challenge, but we've got good people to deal with it.

Before I close, I'd like to hold up this book and tout it. For those of you who have not read The Truman Doctrine of Aid to Greece: A Fifty Year Retrospective, it came out just five years ago edited by none other than Gene Rossides with an introduction by Professor Caraley of Columbia -- a school which Gene has been associated with in the past.

It has been a pleasure to meet with you today to recall what was well-done in the past and to look ahead at the challenges that still lie in front of us. Thank you much for your attention.

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