The Eisenhower Doctrine
The first example of U.S-Soviet cooperation that led to a thaw in relations in the Cold War was the Suez Canal crisis. The Crisis occurred on October 29th of 1956, during the same time as the Hungarian protests, when a coalition of French, British, and Israeli soldiers invaded Egypt. Within a week the Coalition was able to drive Egypt out of the canal and institute an Israeli occupation of the Sinai, driving Egypt into Africa. Such moves were heavily protested by the Arab states with Egypt under President Gamel Nassar preparing for total war. Further escalation was fortunately prevented thanks to the timely intervention of both President Eisenhower and Secretary General Khruschev. While Britain and France had expected the United States to be occupied with Hungary, Khruschev's quick and liberal response with Central Europe would allow both the Soviet Union and the United States to place their full attention in the Middle East, seeing a rare form of American-Soviet cooperation in the United Nations Security Council where UN ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. and Soviet Ambassador Arkady Sobolev cooperating to pass multiple measures to condemn the invasion and call for a cease fire. The main reason for such large American support for Egypt was due to Eisenhower and Secretary of State Dulles to side with the Arab states in an attempt to form a working defense against the Soviet Union and ensure stability that would see Arab oil ship back to the United States and support a growing American economy. U.S-Soviet efforts were successful and on November 6th British Prime Minister Anthony Eden called for an armistice on November 6th, the advance of the Coalition stopping the next day. With heavy international pressure, Coalition troops would withdraw by the beginning of 1957 and the Suez Canal would come under complete Egyptian control.
UNSC meeting in regards to the Suez Crisis.
The effects of the Suez crisis had many lasting effects on both sides. For the Americans it was a win-lose situation. Eisenhower's actions could in a sense be considered a foreign policy success in that it strengthened Arab-American relations with many Arabs looking upon Eisenhower fondly for "rising against Zionist aggression" during the crisis. Eisenhower would score a major triumph in the Cold War next year with the United States formally joining the Baghdad Pact, a regional alliance consisting of the United States, United Kingdom, Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, and later joined by Jordan in 1959 and Lebanon in 1964, against potential advancements of the Soviet Union. Within future decades the Baghdad Pact would come to form the bulk of American allies in the Middle East, supplying America with cheap oil and strong allies to stem back the spread of Communism in Central Asia. The United States would suffer at the same time however as its relations with both Egypt and Israel would deteriorate in the following years, Israel seeing the United States as lying to them for support and Nasser choosing to go for a more independent path at the same time of strengthening U.S relations with Tehran and Baghdad. The "Special Relationship" between the United States and Britain would come under blows for America's involvement in a conflict which was seen as the end of the British Empire, and while relations would improve in the 60's the two would enter into heavy friction over decolonization in Africa. Most damaging was the relations between Washington and Paris as France in the coming years would be increasingly anti-NATO and vow to take a more independent path that would preserve French hegemony in its sphere of influence. Out of all the participating parties, the Soviet Union undoubtedly came out with no losses as Soviet ties to the Arab world were strengthened and Egypt would slide into becoming a more Soviet ally.
Inaugural meeting of the Baghdad Pact in 1957
In domestic politics the handling of the Suez Canal crisis would have ramifications for years to come as Eisenhower's siding with Egypt lead to a vast majority of American Jews voting Democratic in future elections, John F. Kennedy winning the Jewish vote in a landslide in the 1960 election against Nixon. In turn Arab-Americans and American Muslims would begin to vote Republican with a majority of Muslim politicians in the modern United States running with the GOP. In the 1960 election Nixon and Kennedy would come to debate extensively on the Middle East over which path to take. Nixon supported Arab Nationalism and a stable working relationship between the United States and the great powers of the region such as Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Turkey, and Iran, providing a buffer against the Soviet Union in Central Asia. Kennedy wanted the opposite with the formation of a strong special relationship with Israel and a heavy defense against Arab aggression. Such debates would be the formation of the modern foreign policies of the two parties towards the Middle East today.
Eisenhower's praise for the Soviet Union in the 1956 protests along with close cooperation in the Suez Crisis, started to form a rift within the Eisenhower Administration. Eisenhower's calls for detente were met with staunch criticism within both the State Department and the Republican Party, the former being led by Secretary of State John Foster Dulles who is credited with founding the "Domino Effect" theory. In Eisenhower's first term the President took the tone of a defender of the free world against Communism, the U.S forming a heavily passive aggressive foreign policy with the CIA taking heavy action in the 1954 coups of Iran and Guatemala. Dulles, who was hospitalized during the Suez Crisis, found himself increasingly alone in a more pro-Detente administration, Vice President Nixon leading the charge against Dulles' continued advance of the Domino Effect. Frustrated with the President's seemingly Pro-Soviet attitude, Dulles would resign in March of 1957, saying that he was "no longer welcome" at the White House. After Dulles' resignation, Eisenhower chose to nominate UN ambassador Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. as his replacement. With Lodge came a new change in attitude of the Eisenhower administration towards the Cold War. This showed in Eisenhower's State of the Union Address in 1957 which called for the formation of what would later be credited as the Eisenhower doctrine. Said doctrine detailed that the United States must pursue continued detente with the Soviet Union and peacefully compete in all fields from economics, diplomacy, athletics, and the space race in order to steer the world away from World War III. At the same time Eisenhower stated that the United States must remain vigilant and provide extensive aid to its allies in Europe and the third world so that no cracks would appear upon which the Soviets would take advantage of and lead to further conflict. The endgoal of Eisenhower's plan was in many ways similar to Khrushchev's new direction for the Cold War, let peace reign so that in the end the United States' superior culture and economics would be able to overcome Communism and convert the Soviet Union to becoming a democratic and capitalist society.
Secretary of State Henry Cabot Lodge Jr. Lodge would come to play a crucial part in early Cold War foreign policy with his position as Secretary of State in the Eisenhower and Nixon administrations.
Continuing upon the goals of the new Eisenhower Doctrine, President Eisenhower with consultation from Vice President Nixon and Secretary Lodge decided to push for a new step in detente in order to both reward the Soviets for their support of reform in Hungary and lead the world further away from nuclear hellfire, a ban on nuclear testing. Such action ironically had been called for before in the United States by Eisenhower's election opponent, Democratic Governor Adlai Stevenson. Stevenson was one of a growing number of people in America who pushed for a complete ban on nuclear testing due to the worries of how it pushed towards an extended nuclear arms race, along with fears of the radiation fallout from such open testing. The worst such case which brought public attention to the issue was the Castle Bravo test in 1954 during Eisenhower's first term which saw the devastation of the Bikini Atoll and a forced relocation of its residents, tens of thousands of whom suffered from radiation sickness. During both elections Eisenhower was a staunch proponent of nuclear testing, viewing it as a necessary evil to combat the Communist menace. However now with the Soviet Union showing honest signs of peaceful reform and U.S-Soviet cooperation strong during the Suez Crisis, Eisenhower viewed the test usage of such testing as no longer necessary.
On May 3rd 1957, Eisenhower gave a presidential address calling for a shift in his administration towards support of the nuclear test ban, calling for support from Khrushchev in order to come together and form a bilateral agreement. Eisenhower stressed the need to continue on the path towards peace and detente saying,
"In the past decade our world has gone to the blink of oblivion all for the sake of ideology. Before we travel to other worlds it is best that we leave behind not a world of death, but a thriving and beautiful garden." Such calls were welcomed within Moscow as Khrushchev had two years before called for the very same action to be taken, many members of the Politburo sighed in relief that millions of rubles would no longer be wasted on needless tests and that the threat of nuclear war with America would be decreased. After months of negotiations in the United Nations, the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (PNTB) was signed on September 5th in Geneva, being ratified by both the United States Senate and Soviet Politburo within the following month. The treaty called for a complete ban on surface-level testing, though allowed for the testing of nuclear weapons in underground facilities. Support was overwhelming in both of the Superpowers, though certain war hawks on both the Republicans and Democrats decried the treaty as "Cowering before the Red Menace". Most worrying was that while a majority of nations would sign the paper within the next year, two great powers would refrain from even touching it; France and China. France chose not to participate in defiance to U.S foreign policy in the aftermath of the Suez Crisis, the failure of the event caused a tense break in Franco-American relations, something that was encouraged further by recently instated French President Charles De Gaulle who sought to make French an independent third superpower. China would also refuse to sign the treaty due to Chinese General Secretary Mao Zedong viewed the treaty as a sign of weakness that would harm China in its pursuit of nuclear weapons. Mao also saw the PNTB as an act of subservience to Khruschev and Moscow, starting off the long series of events that would see the Sino-Soviet split and Mao's China becoming a pariah state in the world.
Eisenhower greets Khrushchev in Washington upon his arrival in 1958. The Secretary General made an historic visit to the United States after an invitation by Eisenhower in order to congratulate him upon Khrushchev's reforming the Warsaw Pact and the signing of the PTNB. The two men would use the trip to discuss a variety of topics including detente, China, Vietnam, trade, and the Space Race.
Lastly in regards to the Cold War came the ongoing situation in Vietnam. In 1954 the country had been divided along the 17th parallel with Northern Vietnam emerging as a Communist state while Southern Vietnam sided with the United States. The situation soon became muddy as while the United States was vocal in defending South Vietnamese sovereignty against the North, both the CIA and State department were unable to understand the intricate politics of the region and failed to form a strong plan to counter Ho Chi Minh's growing rise in popularity among the Vietnamese. What made the situation even worse was South Vietnamese Prime Minister Ngo Diem whose actions ostracized the Buddhist and peasant class with his biased support of Catholics and landowners in Southern Vietnam. In the later 1950's a guerrilla movement began to grow in Southern Vietnam called the National Liberation Front or Viet Cong, the Viet Cong was an organization that sought to end the Diem regime and reunify Vietnam under Hanoi. U.S support arrived in the form of millions of dollars of weapons and equipment sales along with Eisenhower sending Army advisors that would train and equip the South Vietnamese military. By 1960 there were over 3,000 of these advisers in Vietnam, with a few hundred participating in authorized "combat advisory missions" that would see them deployed into combat with their South Vietnamese counterparts. Privately Eisenhower was wary of the situation in Indochina, admitting to Nixon in a private conversation that Vietnam was "low-tier" in U.S interests and that in the worst case scenario they could allow a Northern victory. Such a dedication would be tested in the early years of the Nixon administration following North Vietnam in 1959 announcing their support for the Viet Cong.
ARVN combat troops engage in battle with the Viet Cong
A/N: Hey everyone, Tal Shiar gave me permission to write this special update showing how foreign affairs changed thanks to Hungary and the Space Race. By the way as a sidenote, there are two important developments that occur here that I didn't write, the 1958 Lebanon Crisis and the July 14th Iraqi Revolution no longer existing. Basically the Lebanon Crisis was caused by Muslim backlash due to the President siding with the West after the Suez crisis. Here, Lebanese President Camille Chamoun breaks off relations with Britain and France, but keeps them with the U.S. Since the U.S is regarded so highly here, things are temporarily calmed down since American influence is not perceived as Western influence. Without Lebanon the Iraqi plotters do not have an opportunity. Since 1956, the CIA is sent into the Middle East to secure the region for the U.S, and CIA agents find out about the potential coup in Iraq, informing the King and having the plotters executed. While domestic trouble still brews for Iraq and Lebanon, both are now on the side of the U.S and Iraq and Jordan maintain the Arab Federation. I'll fully show this and ongoing developments in the Middle East in a near future update that shows the shift in policy thanks to the Baghdad Pact and both Israel and Egypt shifting their foreign policies.