Checks out. 100%.
Dunno why the author wants to credit "a small group of Marxists" with the planning, other than signaling to his Boomer subscribers.
I see no reason to suspect anything remotely ideological or idealistic. More like a diffuse network of careerists, budget-seekers and partisan patronage-beneficaries, backstopped by negative support from an elite suffused with TDS and born-to-rule entitlement.