Frank Wisner drafted plans for the Office of Policy Coordination to implement NSC 20/4 and establish the campaign. The National Committee for a Free Europe formed in May 1949 with Abbott Washburn and Nate Crabtree hired as public relations experts.
General Dwight D. Eisenhower spoke at 11:15 PM EST on Labor Day 1950 to officially inaugurate the Crusade for Freedom. His address defined the ideological battle against Communism and introduced the concept of signing a Freedom Scroll.
The CIA provided $5 million in direct funding over five years which is equivalent to upwards of 55 million today. This contribution established the CIA as the largest single political advertiser on the American scene during the early 1950s.
The Freedom Bell made a circuit around the country by truck before returning to New York by the 8th of October 1950. Clay dedicated the bell in West Berlin on the 24th of October 1950 after it arrived there on the 21st of October.
The Crusade helped create public legitimacy for ex-Nazis who collaborated with the U.S. government calling for USSR downfall. Before the middle of the 1950s the agency found itself entangled with dozens-and probably hundreds-of former Nazis leading Eastern European emigre political associations.