NATIONAL SECURITY ACT SIGNED

National Security Act signed

Two years later to the day, President Harry S. Truman signed legislation that fundamentally reshaped how the United States organizes for war and peace. The National Security Act merged the Department of War and Department of the Navy into a unified National Military Establishment under a Secretary of Defense, later renamed the Department of Defense. It created the United States Air Force as a separate service, formalizing the central role of air power that had been proven in the Second World War. The act also established the National Security Council to coordinate strategy across military, diplomatic, and domestic lines, and created the Central Intelligence Agency to gather and analyze information worldwide. For officers and civil servants, this meant new chains of command, new staff processes, and a more permanent, peacetime structure for managing global commitments. The framework born on that July day remains the backbone of American defense and intelligence organization into the twenty-first century.