“We Must Put on the Armor of God”: Harry Truman and the Cold War

Abstract

Harry Truman was the second Baptist—Warren G. Harding was the first—to be president of the United States. In the mid-1940s and early 1950s, America was a country of believers and churchgoers, but mainline Protestant subtleties—more than biblical sermons—resonated in the halls of the State Department as well as in higher education. Intellectuals found direct appeals to religious faith to be ignorant, coarse, and even detrimental to political progress: They criticized the president for lack of tact and sophistication, viewing the growing conflict with the Soviet Union in Manichean terms, and refusing to negotiate with the Kremlin. It is interesting to note that if we substitute Methodist for Baptist, and the war on terrorism for the cold war, we can see some parallels between the twenty-first century and Truman’s time in office. For a deeper understanding of the modern era overall and some insights into today’s connections between religion and politics in the White House, let us take another look at Harry Truman. Not only will we see the influence of faith and religion on one man’s worldview and his politics, but we will also see how faith and religion can be central to understanding the main global conflict of the twentieth century.