The Council on Foreign Relations and the Grand Area: Case Studies on the Origins of the IMF and the Vietnam War

G William Domhoff

doi:10.25148/crcp.2.1.16092111

Abstract

This article examines the role of corporate elites within the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in establishing the framework for the IMF and the rationale for the Vietnam War. Drawing on the CFR's WarPeace Study Groups, established in World War II as a conduit between corporate elites and the U.S. government, the author first analyzes the role of corporate power networks in grand area planning. He shows that such planning provided a framework for postwar foreign and economic policymaking. He then documents the relationship between corporate grand area planning and the creation of the IMF. The analysis concludes with an examination of the relationship between grand area planning and the Vietnam War.

Highlights

In this article I aim to show why and how the corporate and financial leaders in the United States took the initiative to shape the world to their economic and political liking after World War II
This article examines the role of corporate elites within the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) in establishing the framework for the IMF and the rationale for the Vietnam War
The CFR’s Economic and Financial Group had concluded in a paper of June 7, three days before the first State Department memorandum, that a "Pan-American Trade Bloc" would not work because it would be weak in needed raw materials and unable to consume the agricultural surpluses of Canada and the southern half of Latin America

Summary

INTRODUCTION

Davis was a financial adviser to the American delegation to the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, where he worked with Thomas Lamont, another Morgan partner He served briefly as an Assistant Secretary of Treasury and Undersecretary of State before turning to a banking career in New York in March 1921. It is necessary to determine whether the CFR’s access to the decision-makers on foreign policy gave it any influence, or if these officials relied upon the information and recommendations of independent experts employed by the State Department to do planning from the inside On this issue the CFR leaders could draw upon the high stature of the experts they invited to lead their discussions, several of which came from highly prestigious universities. Its function was to create and organize the policy goals of the internationalist segment of the dominant class

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE GRAND AREA STRATEGY

THE GRAND AREA AND THE ORIGINS OF THE IMF

THE GRAND AREA AND THE VIETNAM WAR

CONCLUSION

Findings

MANUSCRIPT COLLECTIONS CONSULTED