FOREIGN RELATIONS, 1946, VOLUME I



Policy Planning Staff Files 49
        Memorandum Prepared in the Department of State 50

                             [Extracts]

SECRET                            [WASHINGTON,] December 1, 1945.

               FOREIGN POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES

                          FUNDAMENTALS

  President Truman has set forth the following "fundamentals" of
our foreign policy:
  1. We seek no territorial expansion or selfish advantage. We have
no plans for aggression against any other state, large or small. We
have no objective which need clash with the peaceful aims of any
other nation.
  2. We believe in the eventual return of sovereign rights and self-
government to all peoples who have been deprived of them by force.
  3. We shall approve no territorial changes in any friendly part of
the world unless they accord with the freely expressed wishes of the
people concerned.
  4. We believe that all peoples who are prepared for self-govern-
ment should be permitted to choose their own form of government by
their own freely expressed choice, without interference from any for-
eign source. That is true in Europe, in Asia, in Africa, as well as in
the Western Hemisphere.
  5. By the combined and cooperative action of our war allies, we
shall help the defeated enemy states establish peaceful democratic
governments of their own free choice. And we shall try to attain a
world in which Nazism, Fascism, and military aggression cannot
exist.
  6. We shall refuse to recognize any government imposed upon any
nation by the force of any foreign power. In some cases it may be im-
possible to prevent forceful imposition of such a government. But the
United States will not recognize any such government.
  7. We believe that all nations should have the freedom of the seas
and equal rights to the navigation of boundary rivers and waterways
and of rivers and waterways which pass through more than one
country.

49Lot 64D563, files of the Policy Planning Staff, Department of State, 1947-
1953. The source text is filed in this lot although the Policy Planning Staff
did
not come into existence until May 7, 1947.
GO This document consists of two sections. The first, pp. 1-25, treated general
aspects of United States policy, and was considered as a possible public
state-
ment. The second part, pp. 26-106, dealt with policy with respect to specific
areas
of the world. It was never intended for public use, but was entirely for
working
purposes. The document was transmitted to the State-War-Navy Coordinating
Committee for the information and comment of the War and Navy Departments
on December 17, 1945.



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