Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Did we really need to engage in an arms race in the first place.
Depends on whose needs you're talking about. In hindsight, an arms race was pretty foreseeable given the presence of nuclear weapons and the attitude of most leaders in the West to the USSR and vice-versa.
Did we really need to engage in an arms race in the first place.
It rid the world of the legacy of one of history's most vicious mass-murderers, and vastly weakened the poisonous philosophy that spawned him; those are reasons enough for me.
It rid the world of the legacy of one of history's most vicious mass-murderers, and vastly weakened the poisonous philosophy that spawned him; those are reasons enough for me.
What Mikhail Gorbachev, the Russians were at times more than ready to negotiate with the West and find a working relationship as Andrew Alexander points out in the initial article I posted and by engaging in a nuclear arms race we very nearly ended up destroying the entire planet through nuclear brinkmanship, misunderstanding or by accident on a number of occasions.
Government papers from the Kremlin archive show that, at that crucial point in 1945, the Soviets were intent on finding a working relationship with the West, not fighting it.
If the Americans had been smarter, if they had grasped the intricacies of Moscow’s mindset, if they had ignored communist rhetoric and concentrated on realities, if they had stopped to think instead of rushing in like blind bulls in a china shop …
Instead, the real possibility of a stable post-war settlement that would reduce tension in the world was blown out of the water by Truman’s wholly unwarranted and ill-informed belligerence.
Moscow countered intransigence with intransigence. The descent began from mutual suspicion to outright rivalry and the brinksmanship of the Cold War.
Behind his Iron Curtain, Stalin — cut off from the world community and with no one to answer to — purged the last vestiges of democracy from those East European nations whose fate Truman had been so concerned about.
Not for the last time, American foreign policy achieved the precise opposite of what it intended.
As one who is old enough to recall the Cold War and who served in the Cold War military, I have a little perspective on this.
In the simplest of terms, it takes two to tango.
It was a rivalry between two powerful systems that were polar opposites and both would go to extremes in order to gain an advantage. Each side was suspicious and wary of the other's intentions and capabilities and acted accordingly. At the time, we in the west thought the Soviets were hell-bent on world domination and we were determined to prevent that. For their part, the USSR was convinced the west wanted them at least isolated and at worst dissolved.
Did we, the USA, make it worse?
Hard to say, accurately. Both sides committed provocative acts designed to test the opponent's reactions. Both sides carried out weapons testing programs that were aimed as much at terrifying the other as they were at "improving" bomb reliability and yields. In retrospect, this saber rattling consumed way too much of the resources of both sides and would have been much better spent on more productive endeavors. But hindsight is always 20/20. At the time, communism fortified by a thermonuclear arsenal presented an enemy with the absolute capability to destroy the western world in an hour's time and through their rhetoric and actions seemed poised to do so at almost any moment.
As I mentioned previously, I'm old enough to remember Kruschev at the UN, taking off his shoe and pounding it on the table, shouting "We will bury you!" And let no one doubt that he certainly had the capability to do just that, and in the blink of an eye. Quite a contrast with today's enemy; religious zealots carrying AK-47s in the back of dusty Toyota pickups or suicide bombers working in the shadows to cook up a scheme to disrupt things in a relatively small way.
In end, the west "won" the Cold War and I hope we can agree on that outcome being much preferable to the alternative.
To me Stalin started the USA and USSR on a path of hating and not trusting each other. Heck in WWII the USA sent tons of weapons and supplies to the USSR and still Stalin did not trust the USA or any country in the west and would not pay the USA back after the war. I realize the USSR could not pay the USA back right after the war but Stalin never even offered to in later years. And he lied and did not keep to his word about the countries of eastern Europe as he did not liberate them he conqured them. How could the USA trust Stailin and Churchill just told the truth about Stalin in the iron curtain speech. And the way Stalin murdered people one has to wonder was he any better then Hitler ! So the USA felt it had to keep a strong military as they did not trust the USSR as the USA felt the USSR wanted to make the whole world communisum. Ron
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Did the US Make the Cold War Worse
