After the London settlement there was indeed an underlying continuity in the ‘Progressive’ approach to European stabilisation that Wilson's successors championed. Yet there was also a marked reorientation, or more precisely a regression, in the State Department's efforts to develop strategies to secure Europe's economically underpinned Pax Americana. Continuity was accentuated by the fact that Ambassador Kellogg, designated to succeed Hughes in January 1925, unequivocally endorsed the principles laid down by his predecessor.

On 7 October 1924, Kellogg had outlined to Coolidge what was to become the credo of his policy. He stressed that he realised ‘how much more influence we will have if we maintain our freedom of action, at the same time co-operating in the friendliest spirit with a desire to help’ the Europeans. He did not believe that the administration ‘could have accomplished so much in the Dawes Plan settlement if we had been parties in the League, the sanctions, and tied up in European politics’. To the detriment of further advances in transatlantic co-operation, Kellogg felt that Europe's consolidation had progressed so far that he could exercise even more restraint than Hughes in fostering peaceful change. In his judgement, there was no structural or pressing security problem demanding US attention, neither in 1925 nor thereafter.

Heeding the advice of his mentor, Senator Borah, who vehemently opposed any US entanglements in Europe, Kellogg never even tried to develop, and legitimate vis-à-vis Congress, a more engaged European policy.