"A Babe in the Woods?": Billy Graham, Anticommunism, and Vietnam"

 Hays, Daniel Alexander

(2017). Masters Theses

https://thekeep.eiu.edu/theses/2521

Abstract

This thesis focuses on famous evangelist Billy Graham's role in the Vietnam War, both as a public supporter and private advisor. It argues that, contrary to his self depiction, he was no "babe in the woods," no mere neophyte or bystander. Rather, America's most famous preacher was an active participant in promoting and even planning the war.

 Graham's evangelical theology, with his premillennialist beliefs, led to his intensely anticommunist worldview, where communism was the Antichrist. His public support buttressed the presidents prior to and during the Vietnam War and, sometimes, Graham even delved into policy recommendations for the war.

Graham's role in the Vietnam War spanned four presidencies. Beginning with Dwight D. Eisenhower, Graham encouraged the president to strongly respond to the Vietminh victory at Dien Bien Phu. After openly opposing John F. Kennedy in the election of 1 960, Graham listened to the president's views on Vietnam and publicly derided communism. Graham grew increasingly intimate with both the presidency and the Vietnam War during the administration of Lyndon B. Johnson. At the requests of Johnson and his generals, the evangelist made two trips to Vietnam, returning both times strongly in support of the war. With his close friend Richard Nixon's ascendance to the presidency, Graham advised that Vietnamization was the key to victory in his "Confidential Missionary Plan for Ending the Vietnam War." 

In addition, while he publicly gave lip service to being apolitical, Graham organized massive events that provided veiled support for Nixon and the war in Vietnam.

This thesis builds on and contributes to the work done by historians on the influence of religion in American foreign policy, notably Jonathan Herzog and Andrew Preston. In addition, it details a side of Graham that is largely absent from or glossed over by the religiously oriented biographies of the famous evangelist

The Christian Right and US Foreign Policy in the Twenty-First Century

SALLEH, MOHD,AFANDI
(2011)
Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/669/

Abstract
The thesis discusses the role of the Christian Right in the US foreign policy
decision making process. The research revealed that the Christian Right has long
been fascinated with some international issues in general and US foreign policy in
particular. The Christian Right’s interest in international issues increased
markedly during years of the George W. Bush presidency.

 It successfully widened its activities from domestic social conservative issues to foreign policy issues by participating in, articulating and lobbying for its religious version of American foreign policy. 

In assessing the role of the Christian Right in US foreign policy making, this dissertation examines three aspects of US foreign policy, namely Israel, international religious freedom and global humanitarianism. Based on these aspects, the Christian Right is seen as skilled in framing and defining issues. 

The Christian Right seems effective in selecting and prioritizing international issues
that have a reasonable chance of being selected by foreign policy decision makers,
especially in Congress. Moreover, the Christian Right has shown its maturity in
seeking engagement and cooperation with other organizations, secular and
religious, in order to advance its international goals. 

Finally, in pursuing and conveying its international agenda, the Christian Right has adopted a more moderate and less overtly religious approach. Instead of using its traditional religious rhetoric, the Christian Right has successfully projected its foreign policy preferences into the conventional realist discourse of American foreign policy that is largely based on the objective of national interest and national security.

Nevertheless, this study does not, in any way, conclude that the Christian Right
was able to influence or determine the direction of US foreign policy and its
outcomes; however, it does suggest that the Christian Right did contribute and
have an impact on the formulation of some US foreign policy. 

As such, the research contends that the role of the Christian Right is similar to other interest group lobbies and that its perceived influence on US foreign policy should 

not be exaggerated. 

Finally, the research suggests that the emergence of the Christian Right as an actor in asserting its global agenda through US foreign policy can possibly provide an example of how religious beliefs and values can become a potential source of “soft power”. Together with the “climate of opinion” of the American public during the Bush administration, the “soft power” at domestic level could serve as a valuable new explanatory variable in understanding how the US foreign policy was formulated in the early 21st century