The Cold War:The United States’ Ideologies

The Cold War:The United States’ Ideologies

The Cold War was one of the most significant events in the 20th century from the end of World War II in 1945 until the beginning of the 1990s.

Although it is recognized that the Cold War was a period of major events, including major wars in Vietnam, Korea, and the Cuban crisis with missiles and the rise and fall of the Berlin Wall, the war is also noted for its political conflicts. By its existence, the Cold War was a face or conclusion by the U.S. and the Soviet Union following the Second World War. The Soviet Union was then a communist nation focused on collectivism values, while the United States was a modern liberal nation based largely on individualism ideals. So the Soviet Union was on the extreme left of the economic spectrum, whereas the U.S. was on the right-hand side. The disparity of philosophy was a significant source of conflict between the two countries. The Soviet Union tried to expand communism in other nations throughout the Cold War, and the United States tried to stop the spread of communism through the Cold War’s containment policies. Most individuals still consider the Cold War, among other issues, as a left-wing versus right-wing dispute.

The United States’ Ideologies

Capitalism, in its nature, is an economic system based on individual values that encourage individual freedom over the rule and control of the government. For example, laissez-faire capitalism is a type of philosophy that implies let us alone, implying that the government should stay out of economics and allow people to perform their own economic affairs openly. The emergence of liberalism and capitalism as an economic system is based on avoiding the idea of government control of the economy and rely rather on the people. In terms of its economics, capitalism is a fundamental right-wing ideology: private ownership, monopoly, free trade, self-reliance, self-interest, and supply and demand values. Capitalist firms focus on the development and adoption of free-market policies. This system is different from socialism, in which the government usually regulates the means of production and governs politically.

Democracy is a political system related to the belief that control or legitimacy is with people in a society. Also, through elections, people exercise their right to represent their interests in a structured legislative system. This system is different from dictatorships in which the president is often the only one individual and a single political group to make certain decisions.

The Soviet Union’s Ideologies

Communism is a philosophy of economics founded upon socialism, particularly the earlier development of communism and the concepts articulated in the Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx. Compared to Marxism, the idea of building a society based on the ownership of collective means of production and the abolition of any social classes is fundamental to communism. Besides, communism focused, for instance, on working-class problems and the large wage difference that prevailed in capitalist laissez-faire societies. Sometimes dictatorships are the common form of government in communist countries like the Soviet Union. Communism varies from capitalism as it concentrates on the government has much more economic control and is often considered a leading system. A dictatorship is a type of government in which a single person controls most or all of the country’s authority, the ruler. Whereas the word has been used several times in the history of these countries, the most commonly employed concept is in the 20th and 21st centuries in reference to different kinds of dictatorships. For instance, well-known dictators include Nazi-German Adolf Hitler, Soviet Union Joseph Stalin, Italy’s Benito Mussolini, North Korea’s Kim Jung-un, and Cuba’s Fidel Castro. In a democracy, people have the power and duty to nominate their representatives in theory over all aspects of government.

By comparison, dictatorship involves a single person who usually acts to maintain his own position and control over the public welfare rules a monarchy.

The Principle Countries Involved

Instead of two individual countries, the Cold War represented a rivalry between two sets of nations. It was recognized as the Cold War as its great powers were not actually engaged in a direct military confrontation, but they did fight what was perceived as Proxy Wars, which involved supporting various sides in smaller conflicts. Geopolitical alignments tended to be influenced by the sequence of the proxy war between the two main parties. The Soviet Union, for example, sponsored Mao and the Communists, who were technically the mainland government during the Chinese Civil War. On the other hand, the U.S. provided its support to KMT, which was driven from the mainland but retained a stable Taiwanese republic. Numerous proxy wars existed in various regions of the world, with tensions between small countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America through funding for opposing political parties or nationalist groups. These countries include Bulgaria, Poland, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, China, North Korea, Cuba, Ethiopia, Vietnam, Mongolia, Romania, and Albania. These countries had either an affiliation to the United States or the USSR.

Areas that Cold War Tensions Escalated

Korea

In an attempt to unify the countries under the northern government, North Korea invaded the South. The efforts collapsed, and Korea remained to be separated into two. Since then, both sides retained their armies along the border with war threats emerging yearly. The Korean conflict claimed over two million people and destroyed Korea’s economy for 20 years. The Korean war also had implications for a larger war. The Soviet Union and the U.S. participated in the Korean War as the main protagonists of this diplomatic, cultural, military, and moral battle. North Korea was supported by the Soviet Union and its partner China, while the United States put a coalition to support the South under the alliance of the United Nations (U.N.). Australia, with almost 18,000 troops, navy, and air force members, was one of 21 U.N. countries that provided assistance.

Cuba

On 1 January 1959, at the height of the Cold War, the US-backed Batista government was overthrown by a guerrilla army commanded by Fidel Castro. Castro, together with differences in philosophy, was pushed into the arms of the Soviet Union by attempts of the United States administration to overthrow the new government. Years of dangerous political games continued, resulting in the 1962 missile crisis and marked the day that the world almost entered into a nuclear war.

Vietnam

The Vietnam War has been a lengthy, wasteful, and destructive war between the Northern Vietnamese Communist Government and South Vietnam and their key U.S. partner. The Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union worsened the dispute. In the Vietnam War about three million people were killed and more than half of the casualties were Vietnamese citizens and over 58,000 Americans. America’s opposition to the war remained sharply divided even after the withdrawal of U.S. troops in 1973 under President Richard Nixon. Through taking power in South Vietnam in 1975, the Communist forces ended the war, and, as the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, the government was reunited the next year.

China

The civil war began in China at the beginning of 1946. Increasingly opposed to the Japanese, the revolutionaries headed by Mao Tse-tung vowed to redistribute property to the peasants. In 1950, the government of General Chiang Kai-shek had to abandon the mainland and take refuge in Formosa Island amid American assistance that had already started focusing more on Europe. The People’s Republic of China was declared on 1 October 1949, and Mao was elected president. All the key government positions were filled by the Communists. Opponents were arrested or killed routinely. This success greatly strengthened the role of global communism, which now expands from China to the Elbe. But the Communist China, which in the early years of the People’s Republic certainly needed soviet economic assistance, was not just a Soviet satellite. In some Cold War disputes, it joined forces with the USSR but did not join the Soviet bloc.

How and Why the Cold war Ended

The Soviet Union battled in Afghanistan during an increasingly frustrating conflict during the 1980s. The Soviet economy also suffered from ever-increasing weapons costs. Domestic conflicts increased as the stagnant economy plummeted under collective pressure. Attempted internal changes found the Soviet Union unable to resolve the power problems in Eastern Europe. Between 1989 and 1990, the Berlin Wall collapsed, boundaries were opened, and free elections took over in Eastern Europe among communist regimes. The Soviet Union collapsed in its constituent republics at the end of 1991. The Iron Curtain was raised at an unprecedented intensity, and the Cold War ended.

The defeat of the Soviet Union in the Afghanistan War

The Soviet Union had invaded Afghanistan in late 1979. The Soviet invasion was protested by Islamic groups. They became protestants who rejected the repression of religion under Communists. Although it was not well educated and was not properly prepared, the Afghan military supported and advised the Soviet Red Army (SRA). The Mujahidin were Sunni militant forces that were prepared to battle the Soviets. They were heavily armed, supported by China and the U.S., and educated by the CIA. They used Guerrilla tactics against the Red Armed Forces and took over the plains and mountains of Afghanistan. The United Nations required the Soviet Union to leave Afghanistan and withdraw its troops. On the other hand, the United States placed economic sanctions to put the Soviet Union under pressure. Several countries in the Middle East opposed the occupation, and the USR became chaotic as it had significant Muslim populations. Soldiers were forced out of Afghanistan after Mikhail Gorbachev came to power in 1985. A 1988 peace treaty was signed by the Soviets. By 1989, they had left the country.

The Failure of Communism in Eastern Europe

In other Eastern European affiliated states, resistance to Soviet policies rose. Several people opposed the Soviet invasion and the Red Army’s involvement in the Eastern Bloc. Countries such as Poland, Hungary, and East Germany, where communism has thrived earlier, began to oppose the regime. In Poland, the United States acted secretly to dismantle Soviet domination over Poland in cooperation with the Catholic Church. The west provided funding and necessary Finances. Pope John Paul II, aided in the rescue and release of solidarity leader who had been captured due to their stand against communism. To keep the revolution going, the CIA established unity with communication technology. An agreement was reached in early 1989 that new elections should take place with a decreased power promised for communists. Solidarity was legalized, an alliance was created without the Communist Party, and an anti-communist government was founded.

Economic Weaknesses and Gorbachev’s leadership

The economy in Russia was weak as it looked to keep up with the arms race with the U.S. The resources necessary to maintain the arms race could not be allocated. The USSR’s living standards dropped as they grew rapidly in the west. Consumer goods were significantly poorer because industrial production has slipped behind the west. Gorbachev had the USSR modernized, and relations with the United States strengthened when he found out that Russia was to become modernized to race with the Americans. Under his leadership of Gorbachev, Russia found ways to stop military aggression and improve relations between superpowers.

Containment, détente, and deterrence

At the end of World War II, a number of policies were selected from among multiple American officials as the most effective defense against the Soviet invasion. These policies formed part of President Truman’s Containment Policy. ⠀The policies entailed deterrence and containment. Containment required the creation of a mid-term role between Détente and Rollback, which forced improvements in the core State policy, but it permitted opposition to choose the timing and location of any conflict. It also involved the relationship between the U.S. and its partners in the fight to stop the spread of communism. Deterrence was the power of nuclear superiority that the U.S. had after the Second World War, which was used by the U. S. to monitor Soviet violence in the light of nuclear supremacy.

Conclusion

In the emergence of the Cold War discussed here, political ideologies played a major role. The ideological aim of politics was to legitimize violent movements. But it was also important to create the internal structures and power apparatuses of the insurgent movement in territorial areas under their jurisdiction, to mold their policies of the government and to lead to strategic and tactical gains in combat. The Cold War was inevitable, focused on how the Soviet Union and the USA regarded each other as superior. Although it is fair to say that they reflected opposite world views, they had something in common, which scholars should not overlook, while making a great attempt to avoid global conflict. By the end of the Second World War, the rivalry between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was evident and led them to enemies from postwar partnerships.