Final answer:
President Dwight Eisenhower's foreign policy was characterized by the New Look strategy, focusing on nuclear deterrence, emphasizing peace and massive retaliation instead of building a large conventional military force.
Step-by-step explanation:
A key element of President Dwight Eisenhower’s foreign policy was the expansion of the nation's nuclear arsenal coupled with a strategy known as “New Look,” which emphasized nuclear deterrence through the potential of “massive retaliation.” Eisenhower sought to avoid large-scale conventional wars and instead leveraged the power of nuclear weapons as a deterrent to Soviet aggression, marking a shift to rely more on nuclear capabilities and less on a large standing army.
This approach allowed for a more cost-effective defense strategy by not matching the massive size of the Soviet Union's Red Army with equal conventional forces. Although Eisenhower was committed to maintaining peace and avoiding conflicts, his administration’s focus on nuclear strength was central to the New Look policy, intending to use the threat of massive nuclear retaliation as a way to prevent actual conflict and maintain a balance of power during the Cold War.