Talk:NSC 68

NEW REVISION
This page went into an overhaul in 2007 to remove poor language by Lissacha, Huskybear, and other contributors. Please access as it is the first result in a google search of NSC-68. While there was controversy previously, I believe that a reading of this article stays to the facts as any encyclopedia entry should, I would like to see the status of this article upgraded. If you disagree please discuss in this section. Previous discussion entries were dated as significant revision has occurred.

re: Korea - Use Another Quote?
I would change (add?) the quote from Robert L. Beisner, Dean Acheson: A Life in the Cold War (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), 238: "In Acheson’s view, Truman’s parsimony endangered national security, and NSC-68 aimed to recruit (or force) him to State’s strategy of building strength. Korea did that instead." which makes Korea's place in accepting NSC-68 clearer. Ronbarak (talk) 12:06, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

GA failed
I have reviewed this article according to the GA criteria and have failed this article at this time for several reasons. An infobox would be great to add plus any image if available. The main reason for failing this article is the lack of citations. There are a few footnotes, but many sections are lacking inline citations. Go through the article and make sure to add inline citations to any statements that may be questioned about their verifiability. Also, the headings should only have the first word capitalized to meet the WP:Method of Style requirements. Full dates should also be wikilinked. Consider getting a peer review to help you get some feedback on how to further improve the article. Once you have addressed these issues, please look over the rest of the criteria to see if the article is ready to be nominated again. If you disagree with this review, then you can seek an alternate opinion at Good article review. If you have any questions about this review, let me know on my talk page and I'll get back to you as soon as I can. --Nehrams2020 23:22, 24 June 2007 (UTC)

Truman Show
The article states: "Truman officially signed NSC-68 on September 30, 1950." and "Truman sent it back for further review until he finally approved it in 1951."

Was he using an Alien time machine found at Roswell or what? Hcobb (talk) 21:41, 15 November 2009 (UTC)

"Truman Library Scanned Original Document"
One of the external references is to the "Truman Library Scanned Original Document," but I went to the website and could not find it there. Could someone edit the reference to refer to the specific title on the Truman Library website, or shall we delete the reference? 125.243.118.66 (talk) 02:48, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Updated link from Truman Library to scanned PDF. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.13.60.99 (talk) 05:18, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

Sorry for not following protocol, but I am unclear how to update note 2 in summary - Better links (rather then a redirect to US State Dept History home page) are:  (showing actual declassification date and name of Henry Kissinger on document cover page and cover letter). — Preceding unsigned comment added by 50.13.60.99 (talk) 06:38, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

"unchecked bias"
The very last sentence fails any objectivity test: "The strategy outlined in NSC-68 achieved ultimate victory, according to this view, with the collapse of the Soviet power and the emergence of a "new world order" centered on American liberal-capitalist values". The external reference leads to a text on jstor which is not in the public domain. The title of the text, how "we" won the Cold War, suggests a strong bias. But more importantly, the reasons for the collapse of the Soviet Union are multiple and complex. To state that "the strategy outlined in NSC-68 achieved ultimate victory" is a gross shortcircuiting of historical causality. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Newrat (talk • contribs) 22:21, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Relation to US Foreign Policy
This paragraph is mostly conjecture and has no substantiated facts. It seems to me to need a total rewrite. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2607:F470:6:63:CD86:4B30:3D9E:B68D (talk) 04:44, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

Requested move 2 March 2018

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: moved as requested, per the discussion below. Dekimasu よ! 06:26, 9 March 2018 (UTC)

NSC-68 → NSC 68 – The document is clearly marked "NSC 68" (see bottom left): just like all the other national security council papers of the time, there was no dash. For whatever reason, people have begun adding the dash, including even the Office of the Historian. But there is no dash. Gregory Mitrovich, "Undermining the Kremlin" (2000) does not use any dashes in refering to NSC documents like NSC 68. Nitze himself [https://www.jstor.org/stable/2626672? has later coauthored writings] using "NSC 68". A book released in 1994 (presumably in close cooperation with Nitze) ("NSC-68: forging the strategy of containment") used dashes. Some editors has changed the titles of some works cited in this article to use the dash (I've found 3 instances, barely searching). The only other Wikipedia article I could find on a NSC paper from the early Cold War period is NSC 162/2. The dash is just wrong. See the original document for yourself. It even refers to itself explicitly as NSC 68, just look at the 1 June 1950 memorandum explaning that page 4 was incorrect (page 7 of the pdf). It also correctly refers to an earlier NSC paper as NSC 20/4 (page 14 of pdf, denominated page 10). Uglemat (talk) 18:39, 2 March 2018 (UTC)
 * Tend toward Support: It is difficult to identify a clear preference among authors for one style or the other. References to NSC 81 are similarly divided, while NSC 73 is usually cited without the dash. There's division even in later writings by the authors of the report. The Manual of Style doesn't provide any clear guidance here, except that it does recommend using non-breaking spaces to prevent confusing line breaks, which might be one reason authors have used the hyphen. I tend to accept the authority of the original document. 24.7.14.87 (talk) 21:50, 4 March 2018 (UTC)


 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

"Dollar gap" stuff
I've got the impression from reading Gregory Mitrovich's "Undermining the Kremlin" (2000) that the main impetus for NSC 68 was an alarming reevaluation of the strategic situation after the Soviets acquired the atomic bomb. The "historical background" section of this article is far more vague as to the motivation. I think the basic cause is that the source used is Curt Cardwell, "NSC 68 and the Political Economy of the Early Cold War" (2011) which is an advocate of the questionable idea that early US Cold War policy was really all about the "dollar gap" (Europe needs more dollars to buy American produce, hence NATO, Marshall Plan, aiding the French in Indochina, you name it. This argument has been advanced by Gabriel Kolko. For a critical review of Cardwell's book, see here). I think this general vagueness about the impetus should be removed, and the dollar gap theory might be mentioned, although it should be made clear to the viewer that it is a fringe view. Uglemat (talk) 23:23, 3 March 2018 (UTC)
 * I agree = fringe. I looked at all 6 of the scholarly reviews included in the standard guide, America: History and Life. here is a summary:


 * 1) "He is particularly harsh on Melvyn Leffler, who dismisses the dollar gap as a major consideration. Cardwell's evidence for this radical revisionist interpretation is rather sparse. It is largely based on occasional comments made by Acheson and Nitze as well as discussions in two study groups formed by the Council on Foreign Relations about the threat to the world economy posed by Western Europe's balance-of-payments deficits. The fact that there is no mention of the dollar gap in Acheson's and Nitze's memoirs, nor in NSC 68 itself, suggests that there must have been a clandestine conspiracy conducted by the memorandum's architects to conceal their true motives for launching what would later be called the "National Security State." One cannot rule out that possibility. But until more credible "smoking guns" in the paper trail are identified, the revisionist argument of this lucid book deserves the Scots verdict "not proven." Keylor in Journal of American Studies Nov2012
 * 2) "An interesting if not entirely convincing take....in the end, the narrow focus on economic issues fall short of a complete explanation of this seminal document." Journal of World History June 2013 page 491
 * 3) The Journal of contemporary history Oct 2012 p 905 says Cardwell ignores Japan, France, Italy, Germany and is focused almost entirely on Great Britain
 * 4) "The author has two converging agendas that undermine the reliability and utility of his arguments" American Historical Review October 2012 p 1254
 * 5) "This provocative yet exaggerated account.... Many scholars of the Cold War will find it difficult to accept the basic framework of this book." Journal of Cold War Studies July 2012 p 192
 * 6) Diplomatic History. Jan 2014, p221 "His treatment challenges standard works on the subject... On balance, Cardwell's argument is unconvincing."  Rjensen (talk) 00:40, 4 March 2018 (UTC)

Section "Relation to US Foreign Policy" has no citations
Is that normal? It reads like a blog entry.

2605:A601:A19C:DC00:ACB2:8646:6F20:D929 (talk) 14:08, 30 May 2019 (UTC)

Top secret
If it was top secret, how and when did we know about it? Error (talk) 16:18, 5 July 2022 (UTC)
 * It was declassified in 1975. See here. I will add it to the page. Etzedek24 (I'll talk at ya) (Check my track record) 07:43, 6 July 2022 (UTC)