The United States has looked inward throughout most of its history,
preferring to avoid "foreign entanglements," as George Washington
famously advised. After World War II, however, Americans became more
inclined to break with the past and take a prominent place on the
world stage. Much has been written about the influential figures who
stood at the center of this transformation, but remarkably little
attention has been paid to Arthur H. Vandenberg (1884–1951), who
played a crucial role in moving the nation from its isolationist past
to an internationalist future. Vandenberg served as a U.S. senator
from Michigan from 1928 to 1951 and was known in his early career for
his fervent anti-interventionism. After 1945, he became heavily
involved in the establishment of the United Nations and was a key
player in the development of NATO. As chairman of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee during 1947 and 1948, Vandenberg helped rally
support for President Truman's foreign policy—including the Marshall
Plan—and his leadership contributed to a short-lived era of
congressional bipartisanship regarding international relations. In The
Conversion of Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg, Lawrence S. Kaplan offers
the first critical biography of the distinguished statesman. He
demonstrates how Vandenberg's story provides a window on the political
and cultural changes taking place in America as the country assumed a
radically different role in the world, and makes a seminal
contribution to the history of U.S. foreign policy during the initial
years of the Cold War.
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From Isolation to International Engagement
Produktdetaljer
ISBN
9780813160610
Publisert
2015
Utgiver
University Press of Kentucky
Språk
Product language
Engelsk
Format
Product format
Digital bok
Forfatter