Religion and American Foreign Policy, 1945-1960

William Inboden is currently the Senior Vice President of the Legatum Institute. He previously served as Senior Director for Strategic Planning on the National Security Council at the White House. He has also worked at the State Department as a member of the policy planning staff and in the Office of International Religious Freedom, and at the American Enterprise Institute as a Civitas Fellow.

• Introduction; Part I: 1. Hopes deferred: Protestants and foreign policy, 1945–1952; 2. Unity dissolved: Protestants and foreign policy, 1953–1960; Part II: 3. The 'real' Truman Doctrine: Harry Truman's theology of containment; 4. To save China: Protestant missionaries and Sino-American relations; 5. Guided by God: the unusual decision-making of Senator H. Alexander Smith; 6. Chosen by God: John Foster Dulles and America; 7. Prophet, priest, and president: Dwight D. Eisenhower and the New American Faith; Afterword.

'Inboden understands both foreign policy and religion, a rare combination. In addition, he does not condescend to evangelicals, gets John Foster Dulles right (no easy task, given the stereotypes of the dour puritan) and even gets Reinhold Niebuhr right (no easy task either, given Niebuhr's murky prose). This is an essential book for historians of recent foreign policy and students of the contemporary religious scene.' Leo Ribuffo, George Washington University