What if Truman followed Marshall's advice?

Secretary of State George Marshall cautioned President Truman on being too eager to immediately recognize the State of Israel, claiming it would alienate the then extremely Pro-American Arabs (hard to believe but in 1948 the US was one of the most beloved nations in the Arab world) and that the creation of the State of Israel would cause a massive amount of violence.

He stated this on the concept:

Quote:
"If you (recognize the state of Israel) and if I were to vote in the election, I would vote against you."


What if Truman had followed his advice, been more cautious and worked to take time for a better resolution to the issue?

Would Israel have been a Soviet-Aligned state (the Soviet Union was the first nation to formally recognize Israel) and the Middle East US-Aligned?
 
interesting topic. Considering Eisenhower's failed attempt to win Arab support by coming out hard against the Anglo-French-Israeli Suez Campaign and his attempts with Nasser and the Aswan Dam, I think some of this is structural and clearly not related to U.S. policy. U.S. policy after Truman's recognition was not particularly supportive of Israel by any means until LBJ or Nixon.

As for Israel in the Warsaw Pact? Not seeing it. Israel was a socially democratic country at the outset, not a Marxist-Leninist state.
 
As for Israel in the Warsaw Pact? Not seeing it. Israel was a socially democratic country at the outset, not a Marxist-Leninist state.

... What? Israel's very early history was quite socialist, almost Marxist in both theory and application. In the early years of the state, the Labor Zionist movement led by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion dominated Israeli politics, and the economy was run on primarily socialist lines.

As well, under the early state major political parties ran their own education systems and these competed for immigrants to join them in the late 40s and early 50s. Fearing that the immigrants lacked sufficient "Zionist motivation", the government banned the existing educational bodies from teaching in the transit camps and instead tried to mandate a unitary secular socialist education. In 1953 the party-affiliated education system was scrapped. The General Zionist and Socialist Zionist education systems were united to become the secular State education system while the Mizrahi became the State Modern-Orthodox system. Agudat Israel were allowed to maintain their existing school system.
 

Typo

Banned
Wait....the Arab loved the USA in 1948? What is the reason for this?
Because back then the US was genuinely well liked for its purported anti-imperialistic stance, as well as greatly admired for its democratic institutions and respected for its power and supposedly fairness. As well as being pretty much the only major power that hadn't fucked with the middle-east yet.
 
Britain and France had screwed over the Arabs already... the US hadn't and was all for colonial liberation. Same reason Ho Chi Minh loved the US.

Because back then the US was genuinely well liked for its purported anti-imperialistic stance, as well as greatly admired for its democratic institutions and respected for its power and supposedly fairness. As well as being pretty much the only major power that hadn't fucked with the middle-east yet.

Until they realised that beating Commies and winning the next election meant more than stable government or negotiation over disputes.
 

Typo

Banned
yeah pretty much, the US then spent the cold war destroying its own standings in the region

Also the US wasn't pro-Israel until the six day war period, so the issue was hardly set in 1948.
 
... What? Israel's very early history was quite socialist, almost Marxist in both theory and application. In the early years of the state, the Labor Zionist movement led by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion dominated Israeli politics, and the economy was run on primarily socialist lines.

As well, under the early state major political parties ran their own education systems and these competed for immigrants to join them in the late 40s and early 50s. Fearing that the immigrants lacked sufficient "Zionist motivation", the government banned the existing educational bodies from teaching in the transit camps and instead tried to mandate a unitary secular socialist education. In 1953 the party-affiliated education system was scrapped. The General Zionist and Socialist Zionist education systems were united to become the secular State education system while the Mizrahi became the State Modern-Orthodox system. Agudat Israel were allowed to maintain their existing school system.


OK, none of that refutes what I said. They weren't a one-party socialist dictatorship, they were a parliamentary democracy with opposition parties. Labor may have been in power until '77, but they were still a Western European-style social democracy, not an Eastern European-style socialist dictatorship.
 
Actually Labor was often in power because it was able to forge a coalition with smaller parties and there even cases of governments of national unity where the Likud also were involved.
 
OK, none of that refutes what I said. They weren't a one-party socialist dictatorship, they were a parliamentary democracy with opposition parties. Labor may have been in power until '77, but they were still a Western European-style social democracy, not an Eastern European-style socialist dictatorship.

All of which means that they're neither naturally inclined to align with either the USA/West/NATO or USSR/East/Warsaw :rolleyes:
 
OK. I just pointed out that I didn't see them as officially aligned in the Warsaw Pact, but I could see them as not in either camp. But I think they're closer to Western Europe, especially the way they designed their government.
 
Top