ons. But they refused the aid. By March 1948, Congress had appropriated the first installment. Truman signed it into law on April 3, 1948. By it completion in 1952 it would provide more than $13 billion in aid to war-ravaged Europe.This was a huge change in U.S. Foreign policy. We had gone from isolationists to internationalists. This Doctrine is indirect contrast to the Monroe Doctrine. The Monroe Doctrine served as the U.S. Foreign policy for over 150 years. It essentially stated that the U.S. would not intervene in the World's affairs as long as no one interfered with hers. With the Truman Doctrine, we completely reversed that role that had been briefly breached during the World Wars. Our new policy was one of Containment: To contain the spread of Communism to the states in which it presently inhabits.Our relationship with the U.S.S.R. after Truman's declaration was in continuing deterioration. A major threat to our relationship was the Berlin Blockade of 1948. On June 24, 1948, the Soviets enacted a total blockade on Berlin. The U.S. response was to airlift supplies into West Berlin. By its end 277,804 sorties delivered 2,325,809 tons of goods to Berlin - more than a ton a piece to every Berliner.On June 24, 1950 Truman was told that North Korea had invaded South Korea, or, in other words, Communism was spreading! The UN Security Council took a unanimous vote to declare war on North Korea. Truman quickly sent 10,000 troops from Japan to combine with the South Korean Army. Even together, they were hardly a match for the 90,000 strong North Koreans. General MacArthur was put in charge and surrendered a lot of space in order to buy time for reinforcements. Back in the U.S. the citizens were not seeing the value of killing their boys in Korea. Truman increased military spending to finance the war reinforcements. With newly received reinforcements, MacArthur changed the tune of the war. MacArthur only briefly caused a problem. Later he ...
