Dean Rusk

David Dean Rusk was born into poverty in Cherokee County, Georgia, on February 9, 1909. His father, a Presbyterian minister, was forced by illness to leave the pulpit and then worked as a farmer and mail carrier.⁠[1][2]

He attended Lee Street Elementary and Boys High School in Atlanta, graduating from Boys High School in 1925.⁠[3][4]

After high school he worked for two years for an Atlanta lawyer before entering Davidson College in North CarolinaNorth CarolinaNorth Carolina is a state in the South Atlantic region of the United States; its capital is Raleigh and its largest city is Charlotte. One of the original 13 states, it ratified the U.S. Constitution on November 21, 1789, becoming the 12th state, and its population in the 2020 census was 10,439,388.Open the full entry, where he worked all four years to pay his way, served as freshman class president and commanded the ROTC battalion. In 1931 he graduated Phi Beta Kappa with an A.B. in political science and became Davidson’s sixth Rhodes Scholar.⁠[4][1]

At St. John’s College, Oxford, he received the Cecil Peace Prize and a B.S. in 1933 and an M.A. in 1934.⁠[4][3]

Returning to the United States in 1934, he became an associate professor of government at Mills College in Oakland, CaliforniaCaliforniaCalifornia is a U.S. state on the Pacific coast; its capital is Sacramento and its largest city is Los Angeles. California was admitted to the Union on September 9, 1850, as the 31st state. Its population at the 2020 Census (April 1, 2020) was 39,538,223, the largest of any state.Open the full entry, and was dean of the faculty from 1938 until 1940; while there he studied law at the University of California, BerkeleyUniversity of California, BerkeleyThe University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley) is a campus of the University of California system; the University of California was founded in 1868 through a merger of two institutions and moved to Berkeley, California, in 1873.Open the full entry.⁠[1][4]

In 1940 he was called to active duty as a captain in the Military Intelligence Branch of the War Department; during World War II he served in the China-Burma-India theater from 1943 to 1945 as deputy chief of staff to General Joseph W. Stilwell, rising to colonel before his discharge in 1946.⁠[1][3][5][2]

In 1946, at George C. MarshallGeorge C. MarshallGeorge C. Marshall (1880–1959) was a five-star U.S. Army general and statesman. He was Army chief of staff during World War II and later served as secretary of state and secretary of defense, and he received the 1953 Nobel Peace Prize for proposing and supervising the plan for Europe’s economic recovery, the Marshall Plan.Open the full entry’s request, he joined the State Department as assistant chief of the Division of International Security Affairs; several months later he became special assistant to Secretary of War Robert P. Patterson. In 1947 he returned to the State Department as director of the Office of Special Political Affairs.⁠[2][1]

From May 26, 1949, to March 27, 1950, he served as deputy under secretary of state.⁠[1]

From March 28, 1950, to December 9, 1951, he was assistant secretary of state for Far Eastern affairs. The New Georgia Encyclopedia records that he urged President Harry S. TrumanHarry S. TrumanHarry S. Truman (1884–1972) was an American politician who served as a U.S. senator from Missouri and as vice president in 1945, succeeding Franklin D. Roosevelt on his death that year and serving as the 33rd president of the United States from 1945 to 1953, a period spanning the end of World War II and the early Cold War.Open the full entry to resist communist aggression on the Korean peninsula; BritannicaEncyclopædia BritannicaEncyclopædia Britannica is a general English-language encyclopedia first published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1768; the name also refers to its publisher, Chicago-based Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. (which presents itself as The Britannica Group). The print edition ended in 2012, and the company’s main businesses since then have been the online encyclopedia Britannica.com, digital education products for schools and libraries, and Merriam-Webster dictionaries.Open the full entry notes that he supported the U.S. prosecution of the Korean War but opposed Douglas MacArthurDouglas MacArthurDouglas MacArthur (1880–1964) was a five-star general of the U.S. Army. He served as Army chief of staff, commanded Allied forces in the Southwest Pacific in World War II, directed the postwar occupation of Japan, and led United Nations forces early in the Korean War until the president relieved him of command in 1951.Open the full entry’s push to expand the fighting into China.⁠[1][3][5]

In 1952 he left the State Department to become president of the Rockefeller Foundation, a post he held until 1961.⁠[1][4][2]

On December 12, 1960, President-elect John F. Kennedy named him secretary of state. He was appointed and entered duty on January 21, 1961, as the 54th U.S. secretary of state.⁠[4][1]

The State Department’s Office of the Historian judges that John F. Kennedy chose him because he believed Rusk would not challenge presidential control of foreign policy; Rusk never became part of Kennedy’s inner circle and later found Lyndon B. Johnson the more compatible boss.⁠[6]

Within a year of taking office he faced crises in Cuba, Indochina and Berlin, and he took part in conferences on the Berlin situation. During the Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 he was a key adviser. He took part in negotiating the 1963 test ban treaty, which halted above-ground nuclear testing.⁠[5][2][6][3]

After John F. Kennedy’s assassination, Lyndon B. Johnson retained him as secretary of state. From 1964 to 1968 he consistently defended U.S. military involvement in Vietnam, which made him a target of growing antiwar sentiment. The New Georgia Encyclopedia calls him the primary architect of U.S. intervention in Vietnam, and the Miller Center describes him as one of the leading defenders of American policy during the war.⁠[5][3][2]

He left office on January 20, 1969, after eight years spanning the entire Kennedy and Johnson administrations.⁠[1][7]

From 1970 to 1984 he was Samuel H. Sibley Professor of International Law at the University of Georgia School of Law in Athens, Georgia.⁠[1]

In 1990 his memoir As I Saw It, written with his son Richard Rusk, was published.⁠[3][1]

He died of congestive heart failure in Athens, Georgia, on December 20, 1994, and was buried in Oconee Hill Cemetery.⁠[3][5]

On June 19, 1937, he married Virginia Foisie; their children were David Patrick, Richard Geary and Margaret (Peggy) Elizabeth.⁠[4][3]

Institutions and programs named for him include the Dean Rusk Center at the University of Georgia School of Law, established in 1977 and now the Dean Rusk International Law Center, housed in Dean Rusk Hall; the Dean Rusk International Studies Program, established at Davidson College in 1985; and Dean Rusk Middle School in Canton, Georgia.⁠[8][3]

The State Department’s Office of the Historian describes him as “Quiet, self-effacing, and supremely loyal without being a ‘yes’ man.” Britannica judges that his cool, reticent personality contributed to the State Department’s reduced role in national policymaking, and that his long opposition to diplomatic recognition of communist China reinforced his image as an inflexible Cold War stalwart.⁠[6][5]

Office of the Historian, U.S. Department of State: Official website: https://history.state.gov/ (opens in a new window).⁠[1]

Davidson College: Official website: https://www.davidson.edu/ (opens in a new window).⁠[4]

University of Georgia School of Law: Official website: https://www.law.uga.edu/ (opens in a new window).⁠[8]