BE+-+Truman+Doctrine


 * How did America become the "world's police"?**

The idea of one nation regulating and keeping other nations in check was present even when Theodore Roosevelt was president. He followed the proverb "Speak softly, and carry a big stick".

After World War II, the Germans and English were devastated, creating a vacuum of power, and the United States was quick to fill it. The response to this new super power status was the Truman Doctrine, which dictates that if a country were to threaten another country or the freedom of their people, the United States would interpret this a threat. The United States thought that you should go to the United Nations to solve conflicts peacefully instead of using violence.

"To ensure the peaceful development of nations, free from coercion, the United States has taken a leading part in establishing the United Nations. The United Nations is designed to make possible lasting freedom and independence for all its members. We shall not realize our objectives, however, unless we are willing to help free peoples to maintain their free institutions and their national integrity against aggressive movements that seek to impose upon them totalitarian regimes. This is no more than a frank recognition that totalitarian regimes imposed upon free peoples, by direct or indirect aggression, undermine the foundations of international peace, and hence the security of the United States." - //Truman Doctrine//