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The Role of the Atomic Weapon in the Foreign Policy of the United States during the Korean War
Štěpánková, Jitka ; Bečka, Jan (advisor) ; Calda, Miloš (referee)
Atomic bomb has had a profound impact on the international relations after the end of the Second World War. It became not only an effective military weapon, but as the American statesmen hoped, it could also served as an instrument of foreign policy and become a political and diplomatic asset. The United States wanted to use the atomic weapon to obtain concessions from the USSR and in general, to deter the enemy. This thesis analyzes the role of the atomic bomb in the first "hot" conflict of the Cold War - the Korean War. The atomic bomb, according to American military planners, should have played a crucial role in the US military plans, but in a limited war, which the Korean conflict turned out to be, their concepts proved to be inapplicable and as a result, the nuclear weapon was not used in combat operations. The atomic bomb was thus used in the Korean War not as a military weapon, but as a political instrument. President Eisenhower and his Secretary of State John F. Dulles, for example, believed that the nuclear threats which they had addressed to their communist adversaries, led to the armistice in Korea 1953. By analyzing the steps made by the American politicians as well as the theoretical studies focusing on the nuclear weapons as a deterrent in foreign policy, however, it can be argued that the...
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