The Defeated Victor of the Soviet Union
Many historians have argued over the roles different governments and people have played in the fall of the Soviet Union. The Cold War brought fear and divisiveness to both the United States and the Soviet Union; arguably this fear helped keep the threat of immense nuclear destruction at bay. The question of who or what ended the standoff presents itself, and the answer lies within the changes both countries experienced. The Soviet Union especially, saw structural and economic changes within a short period of time. As the Soviet economy was in crisis, The leader, General Secretary, Mikhail Gorbachev implemented perestroika (restructuring) and glasnost (openness) to transform communism into a thriving system
…show more content…
When it was time for a new General Secretary, he allied with a man name Gromyko who advocated for Gorbachev (service 119). He was young, committed to Lenin and the October Revolution. Unlike the other senior politicians, he was in good health and had ideas for the failing economy whereas others brought forth little solutions (Service 121). The state budget had fifty percent of funds spent on military (Seliunin). To make it worse, the Soviets were sixty percent less effective in replacing manual labor than capitalist countries (Service 63). Gorbachev sought economic improvement by taking funds away from military objectives and replaced over half of the senior officials in a year as well including the foreign affairs minister with ally Edward Shevardnadze (Langley 49). One of the markers of change in the Cold War was the intentional and successful push for nuclear arms reduction. Many credit United States President Ronald Reagan for his influence on the Soviet Union; both men can be credited for breaking the useless negotiations of past to making tangible steps forward in weapons reduction. In 1987 the Nuclear Forces Treaty was signed (History.com Staff). Gorbachev failed in getting Reagan to terminate project SDI for it greatly frustrated the Soviets that they were moving to arms reduction but the U.S. was still holding on to a threatening military project. However Gorbachev balanced both the Politburo and the United States. He improved the Soviet image to the world by visiting the Pope when previously the Vatican was a source of suspicion for the USSR. He also maintained an air of confidence in assuring the U.S. Head of State Department, Schultz, that “the Americans should cease to think that the USSR was in economic trouble and willing to yield to them in order to solve its internal problems” (Service 150). Given these challenges he created a clearer path of peace than previous Soviet
The United States and The Soviet Union were originally joined together by the want to defeat The Nazi army, in 1941-1945. The alliance remained, and strengthened, among the two until the end of World War II. At the end of World War II, a rupture between the two occurred. The differences began earlier, but there was a straw that broke the camels back. The reason The United States and The Soviet Union’s alliance did not work out is because The Soviet Union and The United States were complete opposites, The Soviet Union proved to be faulty, and they were never truly allies.
The major factor that led to the true end of the Cold War was the ongoing personal and diplomatic relationship between Presidents George H. Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev. This resulted in the reduction of the Russian military and favorable arms agreements. Key indicators of the substance behind this relationship were the Soviet troop withdrawals from Czechoslovakia, Afghanistan, and Hungary (lifting the Hungarian/Austrian “Iron Curtain” along the border). Subsequently the opening of the Berl...
With the pressure of the Cold War and the rise of tension between the World War II allies, President Ronald Reagan proposed a new defense system, a new missile that was called the (SDI) Strategic Defense Initiative. This made the Soviets more alert and alarmed. President Ronald Reagan was able to meet with the new leadership of the Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, to come to an agreement.... ... middle of paper ...
He wanted to cut taxes and increase defense spending. He felt that the United States of America should take a confrontational approach towards Russia.3 Mikhail Gorbachev was the leader of Russia in 1985. He wanted to improve. the Russian economy. He also wanted to improve relations with the United States.
Gorbachev’s input and his clear goal of eliminating the arms race made it more possible for better Soviet-American relationships. Thus, Gorbachev, domestic politics and economic factors are more important to the end of the Cold War than Reagan. The realization that world peace is not reliant on military power transformed the Soviet-American relationship from the threat of mutual destruction and long lasting stereotype to an equilibrium of great power. Overall, an agreement can only be made when two sides
Ronald Reagan came to the Presidency without any major political qualifications, but his victory in the Cold War was no lucky outcome. Dinesh D'Souza’s new book, Ronald Reagan: How an Ordinary Man Became an Extraordinary Leader, just published by the Free Press, looks at how Reagan helped end the Cold War. Ten years ago Ronald Reagan stood at the Brandenburg Gate and said, “General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and East...
There are many people who have lived through and within the Bolshevik Revolution, so there are a multitudinous variety of perspectives, thoughts, and insights about the revolution. The Bolshevik Revolution is known for many things; some say that the revolution helped women become free of control, and others proclaim that it did nothing but continue to hold women captive of their desired rights. The Bolshevik Revolution article states the side of a history professor Richard Stites, who argues yes the revolution benefited the women whilst the other side is declared no the revolution did no justice for women at all, which was argued by a Russian scholar, Lesly A. Rimmel. The opposing arguments both create an effective view on the revolution, and
The overall collapse of the Communist regime came rather quickly, but there were underlying causes of the collapse that were apparent during the preceding decades. On the surface, the 1970s looked good for the Soviet Union. A lot of certain aspects were still going the Soviet Unions way. However, in 1975, the Soviet Union’s power peaked. In 1975, the Soviet Union’s power began to dwindle and there were six underlying causes of the collapse that can be dated back to that year. In this essay I will discuss these six causes and how they helped bring about the actual collapse of the Soviet regime.
At this time, many other European Communist nations began to fall as well. People pointed out that there was not an obvious winner of the Cold War. However, thousands of Americans lost their lives waging proxy wars in Korea and Vietnam. “People believed the military spending policies of the Reagan-Bush years forced the Soviets to the brink of economic collapse.”
The end of the Cold War was one of the most unexpected and important events in geopolitics in the 20th century. The end of the Cold War can be defined as the end of the bipolar power struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union, which had existed since the end of the World War II. The conclusion of the Cold War can be attributed to Gorbachev’s series of liberalizations in the 1980s, which exposed the underlying economic problems in the Soviet Union and Eastern bloc states that had developed in the 1960s and 70s and prevented the USSR from being able to compete with the US as a superpower. Nevertheless, Reagan’s policies of a renewed offensive against communism, Gorbachev’s rejection of the Brezhnev doctrine and the many nationalities
The purpose of this investigation is to assess how significant Mikhail Gorbachev’s Glasnost, and Perestroika polices contribute to the collapse of the USSR. In order to understand how significant of a factor Gorbachev policies were to the collapse of the USSR, we will investigate from how significant were the reforms emplaced by Gorbachev, to how the USSR was doing economically from the time Gorbachev came into power. The main sources for this investigation range from an Excerpt from The cold war: The United States and the Soviet union by Ronald Powaski who states facts about both the economic and political issues of the time. Excerpts from “New political thinking” from perestroika by Gorbachev which states how he believes new political ideas are for the good for the USSR. Finally in The Dissolution of the Soviet Union by Myra Immell who goes over many of the factors of the USSR’s collapse.
The Soviet Union, which was once a world superpower in the 19th century saw itself in chaos going into the 20th century. These chaoses were marked by the new ideas brought in by the new leaders who had emerged eventually into power. Almost every aspect of the Soviet Union was crumbling at this period both politically and socially, as well as the economy. There were underlying reasons for the collapse of communism in the Soviet Union and eventually Eastern Europe. The economy is the most significant aspect of every government. The soviet economy was highly centralized with a “command economy” (p.1. fsmitha.com), which had been broken down due to its complexity and centrally controlled with corruption involved in it. A strong government needs a strong economy to maintain its power and influence, but in this case the economic planning of the Soviet Union was just not working, which had an influence in other communist nations in Eastern Europe as they declined to collapse.
The cold war was failed by the Soviet Union for many reasons, including the sudden collapse of communism (Baylis & Smith, 2001.) This sudden collapse of communism was brought on ultimately by internal factors. The soviet unions president Gorbachev’s reforms: glasnost (openness) and perestroika (political reconstructering) ultimately caused the collapse of the Soviet Empire. Gorbachev’s basics for glasnost were the promotion of principles of freedom to criticize; the loosening of controls on media and publishing; and the freedom of worship. His essentials of perestroika were, a new legislature; creation of an executive presidency; ending of the ‘leading role’ of the communist party; allowing state enterprises to sell part of their product on the open market; lastly, allowing foreign companies to own Soviet enterprises (Baylis & Smith, 2001.) Gorbachev believed his reforms would benefit his country, but the Soviet Union was ultimately held together by the soviet tradition he was trying to change. The Soviet Union was none the less held together by “…powerful central institutions, pressure for ideological conformity, and the threat of force.
Despite this disagreement, Gorbachev and Reagan reached many agreements on issues regarding disarmament and sent a message to the world that the two biggest conflicting powers had ended their near-40 year dispute. Although at the outset of his presidency, Reagan sought to resolve the Cold War primarily through the use of money, it was his mouth that got the job done. The policy of containment had successfully stifled the Soviet empire and provided an opportune time for Reagan to end the war, and Gorbachev's willingness to comply provided him with the means to do so. Ultimately it was their special relationship, the inevitable implosion of the Russian economy, and President Reagan's fearlessness in demanding progress that brought an end to the Cold War.