Cold War and the Third World War - Research Paper Example

? s Cold War and the Third World War The Second Great War ended after sowing the seeds of another conflict that came to be known as the ‘Cold War’. The conflict created a wide schism between the communist and capitalist nations of the world; the major contenders in this conflict turned out to be the super powers: the United States and USSR. Though the conflict never led to the declaration of a full-blown ‘Hot War’ but the animosity between the two nations kept on brewing and led to many proxy wars. The tension disrupted the international accord and the evidence of its existence was quite ostensible through subsequent wars that took place between other countries. Any mutual understanding between the two super powers was highly unlikely this was vastly because of the great difference between the political ideologies of each of these nations and some of the previous events that led to great feelings of distrust. The hostility between the two countries was triggered during the First World War and then after the Second World War, it became even more pronounced. In the Potsdam conference, Truman’s depiction of the Soviets in his memoirs and Stalin’s attitude put down any hopes of good relations. The relations between the Soviets and American had become so turbulent that many historians began calling the Cold War as the ‘Third World War’. Although, it is indeed true that the fluctuating relations led to discord on an international front, but dubbing it as the Third World War may seem like an exaggeration and may not be an accurate representation of the entire event; therefore this aspect is quite debatable. The conflict between the United States and USSR though never made it to the battlefield but the countries were in fact on the verge of engaging in an open warfare during the entire event. 1 Roosevelt’s agreements and stance on the matter was quite controversial and contradictory that prevented the establishment of an agreement to safeguard peace and mutual cooperation between the two nations. However, during this period the world saw some of the most conspicuous methods of warfare and espionage that further exacerbated the relations and increased the countries suspicions towards each other. The cold war lasted for almost 4 decades, which took place after the complete shift in the political ideology of the Soviet through the dissolution of the USSR. The Cold War Era led to some very intense events that finally determined the fate of the USSR as well. I. Background of the Cold War The relationships between USSR and the United States started off as an uneasy alliance, for Joseph Stalin had a reputation for not honoring agreements and treaties. However, the west needed the influence of the USSR in order to counter the atrocious nature of the Nazis. Following the atomic bombings of the Japanese cities; Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the war was brought to a conclusive end, but not without triggering intense feelings of hostility between Russia and United States. After word got around through Einstein’s letter that the Germans were busy developing nuclear power that could be weaponized and capable of inflicting colossal damage on the enemy, the United States began to work tirelessly in order to obtain Nuclear technology thus starting what historians called the ‘Nuclear Arms Race’. 2 Fortunately, United States managed to get their hands on this weapon first after months of an intensive research program that was known as the ‘Manhattan Project’ and a successful testing in the New Mexico desert was an ego boost to the Americas that had just entered the war. The USSR and America had always been competitive towards each other and in some way Truman attitude towards Stalin during the Potsdam Conference is also responsible for destroying any chance of mutual agreement between the two nations; as the United States were quite rigid in their dealings with the soviets during the entire conference. Modern historians often accused Truman of exaggerating some of the events that escalated the resentment. Stalin was suspicious of America’s leads regarding the Nuclear Power, but failed to comprehend some of the hints Truman gave him during their dialogue and felt that he was duped by the Americans. The United States have stated on countless occasions that the use of Nuclear power was strictly meant to put a speedy end to a costly war, but recent analyses have shown that the real motive behind this operation was far from as noble as putting a quick end to the bloodshed. It was a blatant ‘display of power’ on part of the United States and according to Hasegawa (2005), the decision-making of the American government was greatly affected by the Soviet entry in the war than the growing Japanese imperialism. 3 With the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the United States came out as the victors of not only the war but the arms race; the latter becoming one of the biggest reasons behind the cold war. Moreover, Stalin was viewed as a ruthless dictator and was quite infamous amongst the rulers of the Western world. Due to the widespread resentment against Stalin, the communist ideology was seen in a negative light and rightly so, for some of the policies and regulations imposed by Stalin on his people were quite harsh and unfair that spurred a major uproar by other nations. Stalin refused to hold free elections and established satellite states throughout the entire eastern bloc. The rising influence of the Soviets was quite alarming for the Americans and the Soviets were resented the American for outwitting them in the arms race. Moreover, after the surrender of Japan, Stalin became even more apprehensive about America as they continued to expand their capitalist influence over Germany and Japan. Long after the war the resentment continued to grow and desperation on part of the communist regime was ostensible as they tried extremely hard to exhibit their power and influence that they even built a wall. It came to be known as the ‘Berlin Wall’ and its stated purpose was to keep capitalism out of their country, but in reality the wall was only symbolic of the totalitarian communist regime that required every individual in Soviet States to conform to their government’s demands and prevented them from escaping the harsh living conditions in Soviet territories. As a result of the growing friction between the two nations, there were a number of major events through which the animosity became more and more perceptible and a number of events were affected by the existence of the cold war. These events were simply viewed as minor skirmishes of a bigger war, but the damage and the outcome of these issues brought the cold war to an abrupt closure and the Soviet empire to its downfall. The next section will discuss the major events that followed the Second World War in which the Cold War played a pivotal role in shaping the global identity of many nations. II. Major Events of the Cold War Era The origins of the Cold War are indeed older than the Second World War but the hostility only gained momentum after the victory of the Allied Forces. The greatest source of apprehension for capitalist bloc was that countries sharing a border with communist states were likely to fall prey to the ideology. Their fears materialized in the form of the Korean War, which was fought for three years from 1950 to 1953. It was the first time in history that the communist and capitalist ideology clashed with each other in an armed conflict. North Korea was declared as a Communist state, whereas South Korea had long opted for capitalism following the end of the World War II. North Korea was backed by the Soviets during the war and even Mao Zedong’s China supported the North Koreans that brought them to the forefront of the war. Naturally the United States sided with the South Koreans and there was widespread tension throughout the globe, because the use of Nuclear weapons in the warfare seemed imminent at that time. After the Korean War, Stalin’s alleviated some of the tension, but the peace was short-lived, as his successors continued to earn the ire of the United States and similar circumstances as the Korean War arose in Vietnam during the early 1960’s. 4 Similar to the conflict between the two Koreas, the Communist northern region invaded the capitalist South; the conflict had the same contenders but a different battle ground. Korean and Vietnam War, both ended without declaring any one ideology as the sole victor, but the United States attracted heavy censure from the public for causing many of the American men to lose their lives and caused significant amount of damage to the men’s mental stability, thereby increasing the social cost of the war. The United States were forced to soften their stance on the Russians but any form of agreement or peace seemed improbable. Around that time, the rivalry between communism and capitalism had become so intense, that each contender of the Cold War acted more or less like greedy land grabbers. This aspect was epitomized by the behavior of USSR, China and the United States after the Portuguese withdrew from Angola after signing the Alvor Agreement in 1971. The civil disturbances in Angola were exacerbated by the support of these super powers to the two popular liberation movements. Westad (2005) postulated that the civil war in Angola was indeed instigated by the superpower for their own ‘self Serving purposes’ and made the liberation of Angola even bloodier than it should have been. 5 One of the greatest events that further underlined the animosity between USSR and America came in the form of the Cuban Missile crisis in the year 1961. Fidel Castro; being a communist himself, sided with the Russians to get economic and political support from the Empire. The soviets had already expanded their domain in Eastern Europe and the US experienced a major setback after a failed attempt in invading the Bay of Pigs, which escalated the pressure on the capitalist nations of the world. 6 After an alliance between Cuba and the USSR had been established, the Soviets began installing and developing missile bases in Cuba. As soon as the rumors reached the United States, there was a major confrontation between the two nations as the USA demanded the removal of these weapons as per the Nuclear Disarmament agreement that had been drafted out following the end of the Great War. The entire world was on the brink of a Nuclear War and it was only understandable that all countries would become a part of this conflict for both USSR and US held the status of a super power. Despite the rising tension, the Cuban Missile crises finally reached a conclusion after lengthy dialogues, but the negotiations soon fell apart when the Soviets invaded Afghanistan to expand their communist control in Central Asia. However, the occupation of Afghanistan was the last the world would ever see of the Soviet Union, for the Cold War turned out to be an expensive affair for the communist bloc and significant amount of drawbacks became quite evident in their policies and framework of their society. III. The Fall of Soviet Union Soviet rule was becoming increasingly unpopular amongst the masses and the heavy cost of these sporadic wars had left them ill-equipped and financially crippled. Therefore, the collapse of communism in Soviet Russia was inevitable. Many of the satellite states established under the Soviet Union were now beginning to revolt against the government and the efforts of the rebels were brought to fruition with the collapse of the Berlin Wall. Soviet leaders were often criticized for neglecting their own citizens while trying to expand their control in other regions and by intervening and investing in foreign wars. The Russians continued to lose control in many of their territories; the coup initially started in Poland and from there on, the rebellion reached Soviet controlled Germany. By the end of the 1980’s soviet leaders introduced many reforms but none of them were received well by the public and the authorities blamed the then Soviet leader, Gorbachev for the decline of the empire. The biggest setback came with the Russian Revolution of 1991 led by Boris Yeltsin, who was not only the biggest critic of the Gorbachev regime but spurred nationalistic pride amongst the Russians and called for an organized resistance against the government. It is understandable that the Russian masses were so eager for a revolution and supported Yeltsin’s ideology for the government was becoming more and more decrepit by the day and was unable to fulfill any promises. The standard of living declined with the passing of each year and this was largely because the government had devoted their entire revenue for the sake of developing their armies. The Soviet army was indeed in perfect shape, but this military superiority came at the price of the resentment of the public and the depletion of economic resources. The widespread corruption in the Soviet politics had further crippled them as a nation and it was ostensible that the union along with its ideology was on a path to rapid ruin. The Americans had a major role to play as well; while Russia Revolution was in full swing, the Americans took this opportunity to developed massive reserves of weapon and arsenal. The revolution overthrew the empire and subsequently the union broke off. With the fall of the Soviet empire, the cold war era ended. The Soviet controlled states began to adopt policies based on capitalist notions and for once it seemed like a good opportunity to make peace with the western world. IV. Cold War tactics Despite the precarious relationship between the two countries, the United States and the USSR never engaged in a full blown hot war. Their warfare tactics were more discreet and largely entailed major political espionage and spy missions. As a matter of fact, one of the greatest reasons that prevented the American government from declaring war on the soviets was due to their impeccable military espionage and infiltration division that caused the leakage of crucial data pertaining to US intelligence. This was one of the fundamental reasons behind the establishment of government agencies that were designed to safeguard national security and the organization came to be known as Central Intelligence Agency, whereas the Russians established the KGB or Committee for State Security. The United States became even more susceptible to Russian intrigue and espionage for they had always been complacent regarding any threat from foreign nation due to their geographical advantage. However, that Russian spy network was so vast that highly classified data ended up in Soviet hands and it was only then that the Americans began to acknowledge the threat that USSR posed to American national security. This triggered a significant amount of paranoia amongst the Americans and the government of United States further laid out stringent policies and screening procedures to make sure that the Federal employees were not involved in any espionage activities. Moreover, the US was seeing such war tactics for the first time therefore, they were quite ill-equipped when it came to dealing with them. Truman, in particular had come up with extremely obsolete measuring for ensuring security that included making the new employees take an oath of loyalty and simply involved subjecting them to a lengthy background checks. Moreover, there was another threat from double spies and many Federal employees had turned to the enemies simply because of greed. The Department of Defense carried out a research from the year 1947 to 2001, in order to determine the number one factor that caused the Americans to betray their own country and they discovered that the motive behind such behavior was purely financial. 7 Even the Americans were not completely innocent and also carried out espionage missions in return. The Soviets were accused by the CIA of spying on America through satellite reconnaissance, electronic eavesdropping and code-breaking8. Moreover, the Russians had even collaborated with American spies, who had given them valuable pieces of inside information. This greatly jeopardized America’s defense system because of which America treaded with extremely caution when dealing with the Soviets. Not just Soviet spies, but the Russian KGB had also discovered many American spies in their midst. Throughout the Cold War Era, there hadn’t been a single instance whereby the United States and USSR entered into direct conflict. The rivalry was largely indirect and became noticeable in the form of the nuclear arms race and the development of a vast arsenal by the Americans and Russians in order to intimidate each other. Although from a military point of view, the Americans were not at all on par with the Soviets but they had a much more important weapon in their hands; the American Media. The United States used the power of their media to gather support for their ideology and instilled intense hatred towards Russians and the entire concept of Communism. There were many publications, general literature, TV programs and news that portrayed the Russians vastly as spies and led to an entirely negative perception. Both countries were also head to head with each other on their economic policies, while the USSR was busy developing their military divisions; the Americans had consolidated their economic position to make them better able to contend with the Russians. Most notably, the American developed the Marshall Plan that enabled the United States to achieve economic independence in the global society. The Marshall plan further dissuaded other strategically crucial countries like Germany from turning to communism because of the devastation and destitution. The plan involved the United States providing post-war aid to several European countries and invested in the country’s infrastructure and reduced countless trade barriers against that further maximized the annual income of the countries. Marshall Plan was initially developed as a way of containing communist influence in all the neighboring regions. They had realized that the war severely crippled all regions of the world and the only way to gain control was to buy their way in and financially control the world. As a counter strategy, Russia’s came up with a policy called the COMECON was designed to spur trade within the communist bloc to ensure a steady cash flow. The strategies seemed quite simple from the surface but in fact, it simply revolved around the super powers fighting with each other on the economic front. Therefore, the warfare was largely indirect and never made it to the battlefield, but unfortunately instigated many other conflicts throughout the world because of its clashing ideology. V. Cold War or the Third World War? Many people have argued that the Cold War was no short of a full-fledge hot war and have even called it the Third World War, but the truth is that the primary contenders of this conflict never faced each other in the battlefield but did manage to instigate many bloody conflicts within other nations. Critics have even described that the Cold War was not so ‘cold’ after all and even if they did not engage in a full-blown armed conflict, the proxy wars, which they fought in were sufficient enough in keeping the entire world on the edge and causing widespread alarm. Though the countries never officially entered into war against each other, but many American and Soviet Soldiers lost their lives while fighting in regional wars; such wars in Korea and Vietnam as described earlier and some of proxy wars included Guatemala, Angola and Afghanistan. (Westad, 2005) Therefore, considering all the facts it can be stated that the Cold War was not a Third World War in essence, but these turbulent relations did indeed shape contemporary politics and stances. The damage caused by the Cold War is unprecedented but looking at all the events in totality, the Cold War Era failed to reach the limits of the previous two wars and indeed showed the world various other ways of fighting other than that on the battlefield. In Westad’s book (2005), he has systematically summarized the origins of the cold war and how it came to an end. It is no doubt that the Cold War indeed had great potential of turning into third world war but it did not because after Stalin’s death, no Soviet leader was as notorious as him. The animosity remained but both countries were trying to win support from other nations and that is why it tried desperately to establish a good international reputation. Moreover, America was too perturbed about their international reputation. The country attracted widespread criticism from the general masses and even the authorities for the mindless bloodshed in Vietnam and the two Koreas; all for the sake of two antithetical ideologies. Therefore, America had to curtail their interventionist policies greatly in order to appease their public as well. Since, the Americans had to save their face, these social and political dilemmas often deterred them from entering into war with USSE. It was not only the Soviet Leadership that underwent several changes, but even America was ruled by different presidents throughout the Cold War Era and this changing policy constantly helped them to soften their stance on the USSR, which led to short-term peace between the two nations. However, the fluctuations continued and during the era both nations were never on stable terms. Also, even if the cold war had somehow turned into a third world war, none of the countries had enough funds to support another war for their funds had been depleted completely and the USSR knew the kind of risk they would have taken, had they declared war on the United States. The downfall in their economy quickly led to the collapse of the Soviet Union and soon enough the cold war after nearly 4 decades was brought to an end and thus America was quickly to replace the Soviets as the unchallenged Super Power of the world. However, the collapse of the USSR did not mean that communism had ended for good, but by that time communism had spread to many small countries and many former satellite states of USSR held on to the ideology despite the fact that their mother nation was no more, as a result even with USSR gone, the threat from communist nation still prevailed. All in all, the rivalry between Russia and the United States never surpassed the limits of a Cold War and therefore, it was just simple rivalry between two nation and a not even a war. After the Cold War Era, Communist states were indeed outnumbered by the capitalist states but the animosity stayed. Ever since the cold war, capitalist states have been on precarious terms with other nations like North Korea, China and Vietnam. The hostility towards communism is as real as ever and therefore, it cannot be surmised that the cold war is over for sure and as a matter of fact the dissolution of the USSR just meant one less country to contend with America on a global front. Looking at the degree of violence and the level of organization in the previous two Great Wars, the Cold War was not even close to it, this is why it is an exaggeration on part of the historians, if they call it a third world war. VI. Conclusion Considering all the events that have transpired in contemporary, the unsteady relationship between the US and North Korea are proof enough that the world is still bearing the repercussions of the cold war or more accurately, it seems that the Cold War had never ended. Though, with the fall of USSR, the rivalry between US and Russia was brought to a much-needed end but Capitalism and Communism are still unable to see eye to eye. After the world witnessed the devastation caused by the Nuclear weapons, the world no longer felt safe. 9 This was especially because the weapon lied in the hands of a country like the United States and even after the nuclear disarmament agreement, other countries could not help but feel unsafe and that seems like a plausible explanation for countries like North Korea to invest in a Nuclear Program. In conclusion, the Cold War is not the third world war and in fact it just had potential to become one, which it did not vastly because of heavy financial constraints. As a matter of fact, even with the Cold War Period long gone, the threat of a Third World War or Nuclear War still remains as the contenders have changed but the political rat race remains the same. Bibliography Duiker, William J. Contemporary World History. New York, NY: Cengage Learning, 2009. Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi. Racing the enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan.Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2004 Westad, Odd A. The Global Cold War: Third world Intervention and the Making of our times. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007. Ribnick, Joel. O.A.Westad: The Global Cold War. H-Net Reviews. 2008. http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=21432. (April 8th , 2013) Schlesinger, Arthur. The Russian Revolution – Fifty years after: Origins of the Cold War. Council of Foreign Relations/JSTOR. 1967. http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/20039280?uid=2&uid=4&sid=21102104943297. (April 8th, 2013) Sulick, Michael J. Spying in America: Espionage from the Revolutionary War to the Dawn of the Cold War. Washington, DC: Georgetown Press, 2012 Read More