Walter Lippmann in the Washington Post

Your unpublished thesis, submitted for a degree at Williams College and administered by the Williams College Libraries, will be made available for research use. You may, through this form. provide instructions regarding copyright, access, dissemination and reproduction of your thesis. Thefaculty advisor to the student writing the thesis wishes to claim joint authorship in this work. In each section, please check the ONE statement that reflects your wishes. I. PUBLICATIONAND QUOTATION: LITERARYPROPERTY RIGHTS A student author automatically owns the copyright to hisher work, whether or not a copyright symbol and date are placed on the piece. The duration of U.S. copyright on a manuscript--and Williams theses are considered manuscripts--is the life of the author plus 70 years. -I/we do not choose to retain literary property rights to the thesis, and I wish to assign them immediately to Williams College. Selecting thi\ option rv~lla\\ign copjright to the College. 7 hr\ In no way precludes a student author li-orii later publishing h~riher.uorh: the student uould, houcver, need to contact thr Archi\e$ for a perntiss~onform The ArchiLes ~ouldbe free in thih case to also grant permjnsiori to another reszarcher to publish mall sectlons from the theus Rarely would there be any reason for the L%rch~ve,to grant perntiss~onto another party to publi\h the thelir iir it, ent~rely:if such a situatio~~aro\e, the hrch~vec'rtould be in toucl~xith the author to lel them know that such a requeu had been made. I/wewish to retain literary property rights to the thesis for a period of three years, at which time the literary property rights shall be assigned to Williams College. Selecting this option gibe\ the author a few >ears to make exclurixe use of the thesis in up-coming projects: articles. later research. etc. -4we wish to retain literary property rights to the thesis for a period of 50 years, or until my death, whichever is the later, at which time the literary property rights shall be assigned to Williams College. Selecting this option allows the author great flexibility in extencling or shortening the time of his/her autom;itic copyrigit period. Sorne students are interested in using their thesis in graduate school work. 111 this case, it would niake sense for them to enter a number such as '10 years' in the blank, and line out the words 'or until my death, whichever is the later.' In any event, it is easier for the Archives to administer copyright on a manuscript if the period ends with the individcral's death--our staff won't have to search for estate executors in this case--but this is entirely up to each student. 11. ACCESS The Williams College Libraries are investigating the posting of theses online, as well as their retention in hardcopy. &illiams College is granted permission to maintain and provide access to my thesis in hardcopy-. and via-the web both on and off campus. Selecting this option allows researchers around the world to access the digital version of your work. Empires and Communism: The Creation of an American Public Discourse on Decolonization in the Late 1!940s by Ananda Venkata Burra Professor Karen Merrill, Advisor A thesis submitted in partial hlfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Bachelor of Arts with Nighest Honors in History WILLIAMS COLLEGE Williamstown, Massachusetts April 16'~~2007 Table of Contents Introduction 1 Chapter 1: Ambiguities and Contradictions 23 Chapter 2: Crises and ConJidence 45 Chapter 3: America and the 'Brown, Black and Yellow People of the World' 79 Epilogue: Cold Warriors and the Third World 105 Appendices 11 1 Bibliography 113 Acknowledgements Writing this thesis has meant going down a long road, and I would not have been able to complete it without the help of so many people. Most of all, I want to thank Professor Karen Merrill for being the greatest thesis advisor anyone could ever hope for. She stood by my side and supported me hom the first moment I walked into her office looking for a thesis topic, to the day I handed it in. I would also like to thank Professor Chris Waters whose confidence in me and constant presence were extremely important for me to complete this thesis. His instruction in the History Honors Seminar was invaluable. In that regard I want to thank Professor Cheryl Hicks and all the students in the History honors program for their suggestions and criticisms throughout this experience. I would especially like to thank my fellow thesis students for providing a community without which writing this thesis would have been very difficult. That goes especially for Daniel J. Aiello '07 and the long days we spent on campus working on our respective theses. I dedicate this thesis to my parents, Neera and Sundar Burra, who believed, sacrificed, and were there for me throughout my time at Williams. I can never repay the gift they gave me in letting me come to Williams. I also dedicate this thesis to my brother, Arudra Venkata Burra, who was there for me when I most needed him. I would like to thank Professor James McAllister and the Stanley Kaplan Program in American Foreign Policy for the grant that allowed me to work on this thesis over the summer of 2006. Introduction atthe height of the Second World War in November 1943, Franklin Delano Roosevelt met Winston Churchill in Cairo. The subject of discussion was French Indo- China and the status of other colonial territories after the war. FDR reportedly chided Churchill, the man who had stated that he had "not become the King's First Minister in order to preside over the liquidation of the British Empire," that he (Churchill) hacl "400 years of acquisitive instinct" in his blood and thus could not understand why any :nation "might not want to acquire land if they [could] get it."' Roosevelt saw a "new period" of world history unfolding at the end of the Second World War; one that would see the end of colonial empire; that would give birth to a world of independent nation states; most importantly, a period of time when the United States would side with decolonization movements like those in India to bring about this changc2 Nothing demonstrated America's anti-colonial credentials as much as FDR's insistence on including a clause against territorial aggrandizement in the Atlantic Charter he signed with Winston ' Churchill quote from Robert Blake and William Roger Louis, Churchill (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993), 464. FDR quotes from "'Adjusting to a New Period in World History': Franklin Roosevelt and Eilropeari Colonialism," by Paul Orders in David Ryan and Victor Pungong, eds., The United States and Decolonization: Power and Freedom (New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000), 63. Orders's chapter does a very good job of tracing FDR's motivations in framing his colonial policy. Michael Hunt also does a good job of detailing FDR's aversion to colonialism and support for decolonization. Michael H. Hunt, Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987), 146, 52, 62. Churchill in the months leading up to America's entry into the Second World War. Before 1945, America was one of the most vocal critics of colonial empires. Nominally a decolonized country itself, the United States was, by and large, outside the scramble for colonies that took place throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth cent~ries.~ Between 1945 and 1990, the centuries-old system of European colonial empires came to an end and a vast majority of the world's population became free of foreign d~mimation.~In the same period, the world was involved in the great ideological battle of the clentury: the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. America becarne the guarantor of European security and the bulwark against comm~nism.~If the pre-PMI world had been one of power blocs and spheres of influence during which much of the world lay outside America's sphere of influence, America was the predominant power in the Western Hemisphere after 1950, and had a level of influence in worlcl affairs unlike any it had ever experienced before. In the transition fiom World War Two to the Cold War, roughly between 1945 and 1950, the decolonizing world emerged on the American radar and, as the Cold War got underway, America's relationship to this 3 The followiiig books lay out some of the background for America's relationship with colonialism pre- WWII. E. Berkeley Tompkins, Anti-Imperialism in the United States: The Great Debate, 1890-1920 (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1970). Hunt, Ideology and U.S. Foreign Policy, Chapters 2, 3 and 4. Cabrie:l Kolko, The Roots of American Foreign Policy (Boston: Beacon Press, 1969). Walter LaFeber, The American Age: United States Foreign Policy at Home and Abroad since 1750, 1 st ed. (New York: Morton, 1989). The history of decolonization has been written dozens of times, from Anthony Pagden's historical survey Peopltzs and Empir-es, to Boyce's more thorough and scholarly Decolonisation and the British Empire, 1775-,1997. David George Boyce, Decolonisation and the British Empire, 1775-1997 (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1999), Anthony Pagden, Peoples and Empires: A Short History ofEtrropean Migration, Exploration, and Conquest, fiom Greece to the Present (New York: Modem Library, 2001). The kiterature on America's emergence as a 'Great Power,' and then as a 'Super Power' is vast. Walter LaFeber's history of the Cold War is a good place to start. Walteii LaFeber, America, Rzissia, and the Cold War, 1945-2000,9th ed.

Load more