Strategy, Diplomacy, and the Cold War

Abstract

This chapter takes a look at U.S. war planning during the Cold War. Looking through Joint Chiefs of Staff records, the chapter shows that U.S. war planning, although crude, began in the early months of 1946. If war erupted, for whatever reasons, the war plans called for the United States to strike the Soviet Union (USSR). Expecting Soviet armies to overrun most of Europe very quickly, planners assumed that the United States would launch its attack primarily from bases in the United Kingdom and the British-controlled Cairo-Suez base in the Middle East. To protect the latter, it would be essential to slow down Soviet armies marching southward to conquer the Middle East. The United States needed the Turkish army to thwart Soviet military advances and required Turkish airfields to insure the success of the strategic offensive against targets inside the USSR.