‘NSC-68’: The blueprint for permanent war [Socialist History: [S1 Episode 3]

Most empires never write their plans down, but the American empire did. In 1950 a top-secret government document called NSC-68 laid out the blueprint for permanent war: a militarized economy, a nuclear buildup without limit, and a posture of global confrontation that would outlast the men who wrote it. It is the founding doctrine beneath every operation in this series.

In this episode we take a deep dive into how NSC-68 was written and by whom, and its role in shaping the trillion-dollar war economy still running today.

This is part of the first season of Socialist History, our new series on The Socialist Program. In each episode we unpack a different CIA or Pentagon operation or document that shaped US imperialism.