how did the events of the cold war help to achieve or threaten world peace thesis

In many respects, Soviet policy during the premature fourth phase was imitative of the American during the third phase; American reliance on "massive retaliation" and "the policy of liberation" were later matched by Soviet nuclear threats and promises of support for "national liberation struggles." The Cold War roughly lasted between 1947 and 1991. By 1967, the U.S. GNP stood at $762 billion; the Soviet at $372 billion, or 49 percent of the U.S. total, although the Soviet economy continued to be plagued by operational inefficiency and lack of adequate technological innovation. Phases three, four and five saw the gradual emergence of polycentric politics, conducted in the context of bipolar but still rather asymmetric power. On the political plane, the new phase saw also a more active U.S. interest in developing closer ties with Eastern Europe. Precisely because by 1958 the United States had given overt indications of a willingness to settle for the status quo, there seems to have existed an "objective" opportunity for a real détente. On May 22, 1947, President Truman signed a congressional bill committing the United States to support Greece and Turkey against Soviet designs, and the United States thereby assumed overtly the direct leadership of the West in the containment of Soviet influence. Each has avoided pushing the other beyond the point of no return. In contrast, the United States has tended to become more assertive only when all or most of these factors were favorable, as the following table indicates: Phase I 1945-1947 Preliminary Skirmishing 1 international standing U.S. advantage 2 military power probably a Soviet advantage 3 economic power overwhelming U.S. advantage 4 domestic policy base uncertainty in both, Phase II 1948-1952 Soviet Union Assertive 1 international standing U.S. advantage 2 military power marginal Soviet advantage? And there is little likelihood that in the years ahead China will cease to be a source of great Soviet concern. It has already induced major Soviet strategic investments and troop redeployments. In this regard, both sides were plagued by major intangibles. Stalin was not opposed to a unified Germany, but one that was completely deindustrialized and demilitarized. Thus we simply do not know to what extent Soviet prudence in the past was primarily a function of Soviet weakness rather than an enduring aspect of Soviet behavior. This page was last edited on 25 August 2019, at 23:59. These improvements-much more difficult to verify than quantitative expansion-could eventually threaten the parity arrangement. This prompted heightened pressures on them to develop more stable rules of behavior (e.g. In effective manpower, the Soviet Union still retained a considerable edge (almost 2 to 1), since by 1955 its armed forces numbered some 5.7 million men, with Soviet defense spending for this period estimated as roughly equivalent to $30 billion per annum. In 1975, the Vietnam War ended with a victory to the communists. The Soviet rate of growth also began to wobble in the early 1960s. Soviet involvement in the Middle East was widened and politically deepened; Soviet ties with North Africa expanded; the Soviet Union became deeply involved in the Congo crisis, and it developed close political and even some ideological links with the new African governments of Mali and Guinea; the Soviet Union provided extensive support to President Sukarno of Indonesia, and-most symbolic of its new policy-the Soviet Union began to aid, though at first rather cautiously, the new Castro government in Cuba. The dates May 22, 1947, and May 22, 1972, span exactly 25 years. The U.S. nuclear monopoly as well as the vastly superior American economy-not to speak of the general exhaustion of the Soviet society-boded ill for the Soviet Union in the event of any protracted conflict. A more active policy, combining a willingness to contrive a new European relationship (including perhaps a neutralized Germany) with a credible inclination to exploit Soviet difficulties in Eastern Europe, might have diluted the partition of Europe and maybe even transformed the rivalry into a less hostile relationship. Cloudflare Ray ID: 5dd5809feb1c03dc As Europe and Asia prepared for a long rebuilding process both sides offered their own visions for a postwar reality and security. The biggest change, however, was to come in the military relationship. All of this contributed to an atmosphere which seemed to pit an energetic and assertive Soviet Union against a fumbling and defensive America. the 1972 agreement on avoidance of naval incidents), but it also increased the probabilities of friction. PHASE VI-THE SHAPING OF A MIXED RELATIONSHIP, 1969-. such as Hungary. Assignment 5. At the height of cold war, several crises which include the Suez Crisis of 1956, the Berlin Crisis of 1961, and the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. Moreover, the Moscow agreements of 1972, while not terminating the rivalry, do involve a significant codification of "the rules of the game" under which the rivalry is to be conducted, and thus signify a change toward a more mixed relationship. None the less, this most recent phase in the American-Soviet relationship also saw increased Soviet optimism concerning longer-range economic prospects. U.S. ineptitude during the abortive invasion of Cuba was followed shortly thereafter by American passivity when the Soviet Union took unilateral action to partition Berlin effectively. American defense spending did not rise until the Korean War (having dropped precipitously from over $70 billion in 1945 to under $12 billion by 1950), but then it did so rapidly, exceeding by 1952 in total dollar value Soviet military allocations. [1]. If in the early fifties it was primarily designed to shore up a threatened status quo, in the late fifties it was meant to help effect a change in it. Ngo Dinh Diem regime in Saigon, Egyptian nationalist president who seized British-controlled however, because it effectively left Eisenhower without any options The international gains of the preceding years appeared everywhere to be in jeopardy, with the prematurely assertive Soviet globalism prompting not only the massive U.S. military build-up but the global political American counteroffensive. During this phase, the United States continued to enjoy the decisive advantage in economic power and international influence, though its relative military position in some respects actually worsened. On the Soviet side, the number of men under arms actually decreased during these years. federal funds to fighting Communists in Vietnam; resolved Suez crisis, Secretary of state who helped devise Eisenhower’s In 1968, the Prague Spring liberalization program ended. The Soviet Union under dictator Josef Stalin had several overarching goals and fears in the waning days of the Second World War. Cold War into a nuclear war over the interests of a small nation Furthermore, the rapid increase by the United States in NATO's nuclear strength (by some 60 percent in 1961 to 1963, as a consequence of deployment, according to Secretary McNamara, of "thousands of U.S. warheads") meant that a European confrontation would quickly become a strategic one. Soviet military power was effective only in shielding the Soviet political predominance in Eastern Europe, an area not even actively contested by the West. American recognition and military assistance, Eisenhower’s hands The doctrine of massive retaliation proved to be dangerously flawed, Unsettled political and social conditions in the West as well as the Soviet advantage on the ground favored the Soviet Union in the event of hostilities in Europe. Twenty-five years later to the day, another American President landed in Moscow, declaring to the Soviet leaders that "we meet at a moment when we can make peaceful coöperation a reality.". That meeting was held within days of an act of U.S. military compulsion directed largely against the Soviet Union: the mining of North Vietnamese ports. There were similar seeds of conflict in East Asia. Probably a more accurate measure of international attitudes was provided by the February 1951 vote condemning the Chinese intervention in the Korean War. Moreover, in both societies there is mounting awareness of the overwhelming complexity of social change in the developing parts of the world and a growing concern about the ability of existing international arrangements to cope with these problems effectively. In the words of the official organ of the Italian Communist Party (August 4, 1967): For the policy of the status quo and the attempts to divide the world into zones of influence between the two super-powers, U.S. imperialism is gradually substituting a revised and corrected re-edition of the old policy of roll back, giving birth, within the framework of nuclear coexistence with the USSR (caused by reasons of force majeure), to a series of local interventions (economical, political, military) designed to modify the world equilibrium by means of setting up reactionary regimes, or by support given to them, and liquidation of the progressive forces and movements in individual countries. The former were designed to deny the Soviet Union the advantage of strategic threat; the latter were designed to meet head-on the new threat of insurgency and to enable the United States to wage the so-called 2½ wars, i.e. [i] Congressional Record, Vol. Both U.S. strategic and conventional forces were reinforced. In effect, Khrushchev's policy seemed emulative of Dulles': "massive retaliation" would deter U.S. counteractions, enabling the desired changes to be effected at a lower threshold of risk. Furthermore, Germany was largely destroyed by the current war, with nearly twelve million killed in the conflict. This provided an important counter to the American atomic monopoly, perhaps inhibiting the American side from exploiting it politically. The Cold War affected European economies. In the context of the bipolar checking relationship and of the emerging multiple state interplay, both societies are facing increasingly articulate social demands, and in both societies a new planetary consciousness is emerging, focusing on the common stakes of all mankind. The Cold War roughly lasted between 1947 and 1991. What did the China Ambassadorial talks of 1955 accomplish? After Russia relinquished its hold on Eastern Europe, the governments that took over were burdened with poor economies and debt. Soviet Red Army troops now occupied almost half of Europe and were the largest military force in the world. The Cold War continues to have a significant influence on world affairs today. The US possessed weaponry power with the advent of a nuclear bomb that had ended the Second World War. The historical significance of the Korean War, in addition to its crucial impact on U.S. rearmament, poses an especially tantalizing question: to what extent was it merely a Soviet miscalculation, based on the assumption of U.S. disengagement from the mainland of Asia and perhaps also stimulated by Stalin's desire (reflecting long-standing Russian interests) to transform a united Korea into a Soviet dependency (instead of a Chinese or eventually a Japanese one), and to what extent was it a calculated move deliberately designed to stimulate American-Chinese hostility? Soviet ground forces were being built up rapidly in order to offset any Western atomic threat. The United States had not intended to become involved in the conflict in 1939. The war was "cold" because there was never a direct military engagement between the two leaders, the U.S. and the USSR, although shots were exchanged in the air during the Korean War. 1945–1952: The Early Cold War. After taking office in 1953, The combination of domestic and international strains led the Soviet side to initiate a series of steps pointing toward a détente in East-West relations. Afraid that the popular, nationalist, Soviet-friendly prime The USSR, a Marxist state, was trying to gain supremacy over their rival, the United States, a capitalist state. PHASE V-THE CRESTING OF AMERICAN GLOBALISM, 1963-1968. [2]. Neither the American nor the Soviet leaderships can fully control domestic change or superimpose their will on international developments, though for the time being the Soviet leadership is in a better position to manipulate and contain its domestic pressures for change. The Soviet Union thus adopted offensive postures when opportunity seemed to beckon, even if at a relative disadvantage in two or even three of the four comparable elements noted during each phase: relative international influence, respective military and economic power, domestic cohesion on behalf of national policy. Distrust between the two sides continued as each zone of occupation solidified around their occupying forces. Berlin on the Brink: The Blockade, the Airlift, and the Early Cold War. There is little reason to doubt that the Soviet leadership is sensitive to it. both in Asia and Europe simultaneously. The drift contributed to a rather widespread sense of malaise, and perhaps even emboldened the Chinese to step up both their anti-Soviet polemics and border tensions. In the longer run, the process of accommodation could dilute Soviet ideological militancy, provided that the relationship of strategic parity is not upset. In some places, the exiled government returned and limited elections were held. Stalin kept in mind the devastation that Russia faced in successive crises including the First World War and Russian Civil War. Newly appointed Relatively, the Soviet Union moved up somewhat, with a GNP about 36 percent of that of the United States. Heretofore German reunification had been held to be the precondition for a European settlement; henceforth, East-West reconciliation was seen as laying the basis for a European settlement, eventually pointing to some resolution of the German question. After World War II why did the Soviets and Allies mistrust each other and how did this apprehension lead to the Cold War? When And How Did Segregation End In The US? Politically, the change in the U.S. leadership did bring to the top a new and younger élite, which gained increasing self-confidence and which proceeded rapidly to build up U.S. military powrer. Khrushchev's accommodation with Jugoslavia terminated that particular crisis, while "the spirit of Geneva"-following the 1955 summit meeting-prompted on both U.S. and Soviet sides publicly announced troop cuts. Assignment 7. Within the Soviet Union, on the other hand, Khrushchev's personal position remained far from consolidated, with internal political struggles surfacing again, with unprecedented public displays of continued disagreement within the leadership manifesting themselves at the Twenty-second Party Congress. After the war, Truman was crucial in the implementation of the Marshall Plan, and implementing his policy of containment to top communism during the Cold War. The United States propped up a number of democratic capitalist states in Europe. However, Soviet dilatory tactics during the India-Pakistan war of 1971 stood in contrast with the Soviet behavior during the earlier warfare of 1965, not to speak of Soviet eagerness to dampen the Middle East war of 1967, and their unwillingness to provide Egypt with offensive arms. In that strategic relationship the agreements had the effect of halting the quantitative momentum of the Soviet deployment while leaving open the competition in its qualitative aspects, where the United States remains clearly superior; in the longer run, however, the existing Soviet quantitative advantage could become quite significant if the qualitative U.S. lead is erased. PHASE IV-PREMATURE SOVIET GLOBALISM, 1958-1963. Thousands of CIA operatives were assigned to Find an answer to your question How did the Cold War arms race help to achieve, maintain, and/or threaten world peace? those abstaining as well as opposed to the U.S. position were now more numerous), and on the defensive on such issues as Cuba or the Congo. Suez Canal when economic aid negotiations among Egypt, Great Britain, Join now. The United States emerged from World War II as one of the foremost economic, political, and military powers in the world. American intelligence services heavily leaned on elections held in Europe, especially in Italy and France to avoid a Communist Party victory. However, it is noteworthy that in the two phases in which the United States has appeared to be the more assertive partner in the relationship, it was the United States that enjoyed an unambiguous military advantage. The two sides were at an impasse, leading Stalin to ratchet up the pressure. Admin and TheMayor. The war had the effect of increasing disproportionately the U.S. stake in Soviet good will, and at the same time it significantly decreased American international standing. The first is to identify the principal phases of the cold war, viewing it as a process of conflict and competition. SQ 6. Countries By Percentage Of World Population, The Smallest Countries In The World By Total Land Area. Assignment 5. Within both societies active debates concerning the likely nature of postwar developments were yielding conflicting estimates and advice: in the United States the issue came out in the open with the Truman-Wallace split; in the Soviet Union there were overtones of it in Zhdanov's more militant posture, while the Varga debate about the postwar prospects of capitalism-though more muted than the corresponding discussions in the United States- indicated analytical disagreements concerning the future of the capitalist system. What is even more important, the Soviet leaders probably knew what American leaders at the time could not yet know: that during the next several years the strategic gap would further widen in U.S. favor. The Cold War arms race was a costly business for the superpowers. Their insecurity was doubtless heightened by a series of internal crises, the cumulative effect of which was to sharpen the contrast between the self-confident and, on the whole, self-satisfied America of the early Eisenhower years and the troubled Russia torn by post-Stalin dissensions, A grave and enduring political crisis ensued in the wake of Stalin's death, with internecine conflicts consuming the energies of the top Soviet leaders. The United States also introduced the Marshall Plan, a massive rebuilding project across Europe starting in 1948. Soviet leaders had cause to view this change in American tone with some anxiety. The United States proclaimed itself committed to the doctrine of massive retaliation, and the modernization and expansion of the Strategic Air Command (SAC) did create during this phase, probably for the first time, a situation of high Soviet vulnerability to a large-scale U.S. atomic attack. Join now. Missed opportunities: It is only natural that in a highly complex relationship between two remote powers, divided not only by distance but by ideology and culture, there should occur a number of instances in which one side has misinterpreted the intentions of the other, or miscalculated the anticipated reactions (or nonreactions) of the other, or simply interpreted as key signals actions or statements which perhaps were not meant to be key signals. Soviet defense spending continued to rise (crossing the $55 billion mark by the late sixties), while American defense expenditures outside of the Vietnam War remained unchanged. 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