American strategy in the Asia-pacific at this state in January 1950, as outlined by Truman and Acheson, envisaged a perimeter defence stretching from the Aleutian Islands in the north, reaching through Japan and the Philippines down to Australia and New Zealand in the south, but excluding Korea. These were the areas of the highest priority. Acheson did not altogether ignore South Korea, however, as he argued that its defence would be based on collective security through the United Nation. Moscow. Cold War calculations were very much in evidence in American approaches towards the region, even if not yet expressed in terms of containment. For example, despite misgivings, the United State recognized the fragile and less hen independent Indo-Chinese state as ‘ independent state within the French Union’, bout it sought to bolster the French government itself and because it feared the consequences for the rest of Southeast Asia of a communist victory by Ho Chi Minh, especially after the victory of the communists in China.