Why Did the Cold War End and What Are the Implications for International Security - Essay Example

Why did the cold war end and what are the implications for international security? The cold war which happened from 1945 all the wayto 1991 was a war between two super powers; the Soviet Union and the US. However when it ended there was varying reasons as to what caused it to end. Therefore, this paper seeks to look into the cold war, what caused it to end and the impact of its end it had in regards to international security. The end of the Cold War marked a greater historical transformation compared to any other event; however there have been a lot of controversies as to what caused it. A huge part of the causes can be associated to Mikhail Gorbachev (Bueno, 1998). He aspired to reform communism and not to replace it. Nevertheless, his reform turned to be a revolution that was driven from below as opposed to be controlled from above. In the year 1985 when Gorbachev came into power he made an attempt to discipline the Soviet people so as to do away with the economic stagnation that was there (Craic, 2012). When he found that discipline was not adequate, he resolved to the restructuring idea even though the bureaucrats kept challenging his orders. He therefore, resolved to use the glasnost strategy or democratization and open discussion. However, since glasnost made people speak their minds, most of the Eastern Europeans got more degree of freedom. Gorbachev declined using force in order to stop demonstrations and by the month of November, 1989 the Berlin Wall was put down (Bueno, 1998). The Berlin Wall had been put up in order to prevent East Germany citizens from escaping and going to West Germany (Armstrong & Goldstein, 1991). East Germans compared to West Germans lived in poorer conditions such that they only made one-third of the total wages Western German workers made; and more over they faced shortages of goods (Mariko, 2009). If the Berlin Wall did not exist, many Germans would have fled and gone to look for a better life in the West. As the wall was being opened, huge crowds came from the east such that the West Berlin guards did not know what they would do and so they refused the crowds in. however, in the end they had no option but to open the gates and thousands of people poured in. this was when the communism regime completely crumble and in the month of March, 1990, communists were voted out of office by the East Germans and in September East Germany took pleasure in being the first member to walk out of the Warsaw Pact (Mariko, 2009). Many people were of the belief that communism was the only way that would take them to a successful future. Economic globalization led to world economy turmoil as the twentieth century was ending, however the western economies were able to change labor to services by using market systems so as to reorganize the heavy industries they had and also switch to computers (Craic, 2012). The Soviet Union was unable to keep up in that when Gorbachev came into power, in the year 1985 the Soviet Union had 50,000 personal computers while the US had 30 million. One Soviet economist stated that by the late 1980s the Soviet industry only had eight percent that was competitive as per the world standards. Therefore, it is extremely challenging to remain being a superpower particularly when 92 percentages which comprises of huge part of the industry is not competitive (Sykes, 2010). There had to be an end to the cold war especially since people in the Soviet Union did not enjoy as much rights and freedom as those in US. For instance, people in the US also have the freedom of speech, the right of assembly and right of the press. This is contrary to what happens in the Soviet Union whereby the government is under the Communist party. People there do not own the right to have their own political parties. In addition to this, they do not have the freedom of the press or speech and they have no right of assembly. The fact that these two governments have completely different ideologies, little compromise between them exists (McCauley, 2003). The fall of the Berlin wall significantly played a role in the end of the cold war despite the fact that it took almost three decades for the wall to be torn down. There were quite a number of times when Communist countries tried to rise up against the system of communism but in all times they failed. The soviet reforms also had an impact of several other communist countries like Hungary and Poland. In the year 1989, an iron curtain was opened by Hungary to Austria. Both super powers their expressed their conflict through massive propaganda campaigns, military coalitions, a lot of aid to client states, nuclear and conventional arms races, rivalry during sports events, espionage and so much more. In order to prevent an occurrence of nuclear war, the USA and USSR sought détente so as to calm down political tensions in the 1970s (Kissinger, 2007). After the Berlin Wall fell, Francois Mitterrand the French President ant that time gave a warning to Thatcher telling her that the fact that Germany was now united meant that it wound have more ground compared to what Adolf Hitler ever had and so Europe would have to put up with the consequences. The cold war had a huge impact on the international security and after the Warsaw Pact collapsed, both Eastern and Central Europe were left in a security vacuum. Organizations within the region with an example of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) were unable to fill this vacuum (Baylis et al, 2011). Ukraine’s security and more so in its relationship with Russia, remained to be an extremely important factor when it came to the stability of Europe as well as the relations between the West and Russia. That is why the UN would become an effective center meant for global security. Also as a result of the national and international security potential risk, states that own nuclear weapons took on responsibilities when it came to stabilizing and protecting the nuclear forces they have. In addition t this, other nuclear devices and facilities with an example of the propulsion systems and rectors had to be safeguarded (Baylis & Nicholas, 1992). There are accidental and deliberate risks that still linger when it comes to handling nuclear such as hackers and terrorist’s interfering with nuclear confidence and stability. Before the cold war, Cuban missile crisis that happened in 1962 can be termed as the closest the world was to experiencing a nuclear war; an American U2 sky plane went and took Soviet intermediate ballistic missiles photographs that had the ability of carrying nuclear payloads. This meant that it would send a whole 42 medium range missiles as well as 24 intermediate range missiles all the way to Cuba. There was then a threat by the US to invade Cuba in regards to the issue which mandated the Soviets to take out the missiles under the assurance from Americans that they would not invade Cuba. After the cold was an international arms treaty was signed that would ensure strict control of the arms the world over. The international treaty includes strict rules whereby human rights are protected and preventing arms from being given to the wrong hands. Even after the cold war there are still domination behaviors from the internal national security military in the sovereign countries (Peter, 1993). Also the world is a much safer place after the end of the cold war since threats of the global security system no longer exist even though maintaining the peace is what is challenging. The current global security concerns being culturally and geographically diffuse is also another challenge to international security compared to the ideological and nuclear challenges emanating from the Soviet Union (Peter, 1993). In conclusion, United Nations could make an effective center for the purposes of global security. So as to perform this function adequately, the UN must profound its reforms and this comes in three stages; creating a diplomatic coordination center, making the UN role to be a discussion forum and thirdly coming up with a mechanism that would implement the decision made by UN (Kistersky, 1995). In the near future the United Nations might take the role of administering nuclear weapons that are remaining after the disarmament of the nuclear in the world. Another step that would make the reform much stronger would be the changing the UN charter and this involved making the Security Council expand and grow to 20-21 members. There are those who state that the cold war era will be highly missed, nevertheless its end was a good thing for both the Soviet Union and the US. References Peter, F. 1993. The making of a security community: The United Nations after the cold war. Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 46. No. 2 Kistersky, L. 1995. New dimensions of the international security system after the cold war. Retrieved on 27th November 2012 from http://cisac.stanford.edu/publications/new_dimensions_of_the_international_security_system_after_the_cold_war Baylis, J., Rengger, Nicholas J. 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