Clark M. Clifford

Clark M. Clifford played a vital role in the formulation and implementation of U.S. foreign policy during the Cold War while serving as an adviser to Presidents Harry S. Truman, John F. Kennedy, and Lyndon B. Johnson. In 1946 Truman asked Clifford to prepare a secret report outlining relations between the United States and the Soviet Union. In the following viewpoint, excerpted from that report, Clifford—having consulted the secretary of state, the attorney general, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff—claims that Soviet threats and aggression argue against appeasement of the Soviet Union. Clifford argues that the United States should deter further Soviet aggression by increasing U.S. military strength—including atomic and biological weapons—and providing economic support to...