The Long Telegram of February 22, 1946, by the deputy to the United States Ambassador in the Soviet Union George Kennan, was a conceptual turning point in the history of the Cold War.
Written by a professional diplomat, it wielded a direct influence on the shaping of U.S. policy towards the Soviet Union. The Long Telegram served as a long-lasting intellectual foundation of U.S. policy towards the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War.
A conceptual tour de force, Kennan’s Long Telegram was aimed at clarifying the objectives of the Soviet Union. It did so by combining historical analysis with an assessment of probable future actions. To understand the essence of Soviet foreign policy, Kennan argued, one had to delve deeply into Russian history. In addition, one had to comprehend the role played by Marxist ideology in the shaping of Soviet foreign policy. A combination of traditional Russian policy and Communist beliefs had shaped a worldview that rendered it most difficult to effect a long-lasting reconciliation between the United States and the Soviet Union. Driven by fear and ambition, and by a neurotic perception of reality and Communist ideology, the Soviet Union would attempt to expand politically and territorially whenever and wherever possible.
Although Kennan considered the Soviet Union an irreconcilable adversary, he was careful enough to distinguish its potential challenge from that of Nazi Germany. The Soviet Union was less schematic and more amenable to counterforce and deterrence than Nazi Germany. Indeed, even though Kennan thought that the Soviet Union was “impervious to logic of reason,” it was still “highly sensitive to logic of force.” Therefore, it would back down “when strong resistance is encountered at any point.”
Thus, Kennan argued that a totalitarian state can be perceived as a threat without being compared to Nazi Germany. In Kennan’s Long Telegram, there was as much alarm as nuance, as much caution as reason. The Soviet Union could be deterred, and war could be averted.
Kennan advanced a solid analytical tool to understand Soviet policy and an intellectual base upon which to shape future U.S. policy.
The Long Telegram was followed a year later (1947) by an article of his in the prestigious publication Foreign Affairs, under the pseudonym “X,” titled “The Sources of Soviet Conduct.” In it, Kennan coined the term “Containment” for the policy that, in his view, had to be adopted by the United States towards the Soviet Union. The aim of the United States, Kennan wrote, should be to pursue “a policy of firm containment designed to confront the Russians with unalterable counterforce at every point where they show signs of encroaching upon the interests of a peaceful and stable world.” The term “Containment” would later be applied to the policy pursued by the Administration of President Harry Truman following World War II, and in general by the United States towards the Soviet Union throughout the Cold War.
The article in Foreign Affairs had a broader readership than the Long Telegram, as it reached an audience beyond the confines of the State Department and the White House. However, it must be stressed: The Foreign Affairs article was based entirely on the Long Telegram. It was the latter that made its mark among those shaping foreign policy in Washington, D.C. Indeed, those who knew Kennan realized that the author of the Foreign Affairs article, “X,” was none other than George Kennan.
For our purposes, it would be logical to include the Foreign Affairs article under the headline of the Long Telegram, as the former was merely an elaboration of the latter.
There are examples in modern history of diplomats writing a credo on the challenges facing their country, which elicited considerable attention at home. For instance: the so-called “Mein Kampf Telegram” of April 26, 1933, in which the British Ambassador to Germany Sir Horace Rumbold cautioned that the Nazi Party intended to implement what they said; or the dispatch by Britain’s outgoing Ambassador in France, Sir Nicholas Henderson, of March 31, 1979, which explained how British foreign policy had contributed to Britain’s economic decline just as the latter had undermined Britain’s diplomacy.
However important these diplomatic dispatches were, and notwithstanding the significant echo they produced in government and beyond, their long-term impact on policymaking was considerably less pronounced than Kennan’s Long Telegram. Neither the “Mein Kampf Telegram” nor Henderson’s writing on Britain’s decline became the intellectual basis of a foreign policy.
Indeed, President Truman delineated the diplomatic and military framework of a policy founded upon the conceptual analysis and practical guidelines contained in Kennan’s Long Telegram when he introduced The Truman Doctrine on March 12, 1947, in a speech he delivered to Congress. From then onwards, the United States was committed to assisting “free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.”
The Truman Doctrine, aimed at containing the Soviet Union and the expansion of Communism throughout the world, represented a clear break with past U.S. foreign policy. Contrary to the policy of isolation prevalent in peacetime until the U.S. entry into World War II, President Truman announced that thenceforward the United States would be directly involved in international affairs, lending its active support to other countries in resisting Communist aggression. Kennan had advanced the conceptual basis for the new policy articulated by President Truman, which would define U.S. foreign policy throughout the Cold War.
To be sure, Kennan himself harbored serious reservations regarding the interpretation given to his Long Telegram. He argued that he meant the Soviet Union had to be contained by political, diplomatic, economic, and propaganda rather than by military means. That’s why Kennan, who was in favor and took part in the decision-making process leading to the Marshall Plan of 1948 – designed to help Western Europe economically – was opposed to the formation in 1949 of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a politico-military alliance aimed at containing the Soviet Union. His Containment Policy, he would later contend, was not intended to have a military arm.
Even if Kennan was right and his Long Telegram was misinterpreted by U.S. policymakers, the fact remains that it brought a turning point in U.S. foreign policy. What matters in this context is not whether what was done in his name reflected what he meant, but whether it was conceptually founded on his words as they were interpreted.
In his Long Telegram, Kennan wrote that the Soviet Union was “impervious to logic of reason,” but was still “highly sensitive to logic of force.” Therefore, it would back down “when strong resistance is encountered at any point.”
To which “logic of force” did Kennan refer? What did he mean by “strong resistance”? Would it be illogical to assume that the formation of a defensive alliance, like NATO, might be a reasonable means to convey to the Soviet Union a deterrent “logic of force” and provide a potentially “strong resistance” to it?
Based on what he wrote, Kennan’s interpretation of his own writing seems less convincing than the interpretation of his contemporary and future readers.
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