Financial Repression?

I recently read an economics article focusing on the current level of interest rates and how government/central bank policies will effect them in the future. 

The article  was titled "Market Implications of Financial Repression".  It began with an explanation of financial repression:  "official policies that lower artificially a government's cost of borrowing".

I didn't have any real disagreements with the article.  Essentially it highlighted the fact that the Federal Reserve's holdings of government bonds ballooned between 1942 and 1951, under pressure from the Treasury. 

Given the title of the article I am quite sure that the author has a strong "free-market" bias.  I also am sure that he therefore objects to whatever forces impact markets resulting in an outcome that doesn't adhere to his view of what the invisible hand of the market should be dictating.

Now I am reading a lot into the mind-set of this author given the title.

But he is suggesting that government intervention- by the Treasury and/or the Central Bank is "Repression"?  I could understand if he chose to use "guidance" or even "intervention", but "repression"?

I am scared to think what he thinks of regulation let alone taxes.

Anyway, despite his strange choice of adjective I do think that his analysis was interesting. 

The United States had been in the Great Depression and was still suffering from the after-effects of it when it entered World War II.  Given the need to raise funds to finance the war effort it is not strange that the government would endeavour to keep the cost of those funds under control.  It is only rational to me that if there were a mechanism to do so such as having the Federal Reserve purchase a significant portion of the issuance, capping long-term rates at around 2.5%, that they pursue it.

If I fast forward to the Great Recession and the introduction of a government policy intended to both stimulate the economy as well as keep long term rates under control- the "twist" factor in the Quantitative Easing (QE) policy-it seems that the current government is following in the footsteps of its forbears.

The good news is that as the Fed in the 50's started to decrease it's purchases in a well-managed fashion.  It took 8 years for yields to rise from 2.5% to 4%.  Tapering is no different then a managed retreat from QE, something the Fed has successfully done previously.

And the result?  A decreasing debt/GDP ratio, an economy on a stable road to recovery, and yields rising in a rational an orderly fashion.

Doesn't sound like repression to me.