Seeing Red: U.S. Air Force Assessments of the Soviet Union, 1945-1949

Abstract

In the immediate postwar period Army Air Force A-2 cultivated a unique intelligence culture that focussed on the air-atomic threat posed by the Soviet Union and the use of the most advanced technologies to monitor countries behind the 'Iron Curtain'. Although most intelligence reports presented a detailed analysis of Russian air power capabilities, consideration was also given to an assessment of intentions. Based on a literal interpretation of Marxist texts and an unambiguous reading of Soviet expansion in Eastern Europe and the Middle East, A-2 more than any other agency was convinced of the Soviet willingness to wage war. As for a reading of capabilities, the fact that the Soviets were developing a long-range air force was in itself evidence of intentions. A-2 was, however, left out of the national security decision-making loop until after the successful test of the Soviet A-bomb, which was accurately predicted by the Air Force in the summer of 1949. Until that time most officials in the Truman administration believed in the likelihood of the slow incremental expansion of Soviet power rather than the launching of an 'atomic Pearl harbor' against the Western bloc.