The Contest II: The Cold War

[Anathema]

This is a debate between Emprworm and myself. The subject: the actions and inactions of the United States of America concerning foreign policy, during the cold war period.

My stance is that America did what needed to be done. The motives behind everything weren’t always sheer idealism, but necessary to prevent the enemy from becoming a dominant superpower. Welcome to reality.

Ever since the end of the second world war the Soviets have trampled over other countries. Literally. Stalin took control over eastern Europe and engineered a buffer zone between the capitalist western Europe and Russia. This policy shows the lack of good intent on part of the Russians and alone was reason enough to be distrustful of the Russians.

The US didn’t have all that much reason to fear communism until 1949. But that year it turned out that the Russians had developped a nuclear bomb. They could never have done this so quickly without stealing information from within the US. Merely a month later Mao Zedong grabbed power in China. Communism now posessed a quarter of the worlds population.

The world had changed- a lot. In order to protect the west from communist agression, NATO was founded. The US decided that they would not allow more countries to be lost to communism, and would in the future actively intervene.

Sometimes things got messy during such interventions. But remember that the cold war was a struggle for supremacy, and that the reason behind these interventions were only meant to ensure the safety of the US and their allies. Keep in mind that South Korea has become a wealthy, modern nation only because the US provided them with help against the North Korean invasion. The prosperity and happyness of South Korea is in clear contrast with the lack of freedom and sheer misery in North Korea. At least the US took care of their allies.

[emprworm]

Greetings, Mr Earthnuker. Today I will be representing the position that America failed in its role in the cold war era.

The cold war period was a tense time for all peoples and reached every country, even though it was primarily a static war between the US westernism and communism. I do not say it was between the US and China, or the US and Russia (although they were key players), but it was based upon a rampant paranioal fear of communistic philosophy. America had just blossomed from one of the most fantastic economic, military, social and geopolitical growths of any nation in the history of the world. Literally rising out of a few colonies, they became a global superpower practically overnight.

This new found sense of 'wonder' that America experienced (that they are now world superpowers) coupled with a very pleasent lifestyle and the highest standard of living on earth, was something to be cherished indeed. America could not bear the thought that anything would threaten their ways of life. America was hardly afraid of being physically conquered! To them, guns and bullets only meant a stronger resolve. SO what were they truly afraid of? Russia's weapons? China's armies? Hardly.

They were afraid of the philosophy of communism. To America, communism represented was a dark, vile, and twisted evil- a tiny virulent seed that if planted, could infect and gut a nation from the inside out like gangrenous rotting flesh spreading its pandemic cancer to the furthest reaches of the body.

The fear of communism was so intense that America took on a wild, frenzous and utterly irrational position to chastise and fiercly demonize any and all HINTS of it where it cropped up. Paranoia spred itself far into the upper levels of government, where those that are in charge of making deicsions were doing so based upon irrational fears. As such, America, fueled by its blind paranoia, engaged in a plethora of dangerous actions, trying to snuff out communism wherever they saw it (and many times what they saw wasn't even communism- yet they were too paraniod to even think clearly). These actions, similar to witch hunts, were directly responsible for many "near misses" in global catastrophe. it was simply by sheer luck, or God's grace, that this world didn't wind up a giant field of radioactive ash.

[Caid Ivik]

So, you don't know much. Cold War was a big arming race, nothing else. Stalin was one of the most aggressive leaders in history, he used all production of his countries for arming. Victory of USA was that they have enough production in weapons and still mood (and money) to create something else, what their people appreciated. Thank God his succesors were enough wise to not fire on USA. As a moral fight for human and democratic rights, NATO and USA were the good side, altough even they made some worse decisions. Communistic reign was bad in every view, making people just lazy and dependent on state. It was no problem for us to make a conventional armies able to destroy the world for three times as inspectors of Wiener Convention counted. Just here was with arms race also economical degradation of society, what on the West wasn't.

[Anathema]

I do not believe it was the philosophy that America was afraid of back then. They weren't really afraid of them in the first decades of the 20th century, even when the octoberrevolution was carried out in Russia they weren't shocked in the least.

What they were afraid of was the fact that the Soviet Union quickly became a modern, industrialised war machine that even rivaled their own technology. The US had a monopoly on nuclear technology prior to 1949, and the US citicens rested comfortably as their nation was the uncontested superpower of the world, and in 1949 that all changed.

Then there's space travel. The Russians were the first to launch a satelite in orbit around Earth. This would enable them to deliver a nuke to Washington DC, and the US wouldn't be able to do anything about it! The only thing the US could do was spend billions on research so to keep up with Russsias technology.

Russia also nearly caused a nuclear war during the Cuba crisis. Kruschev installed nuclear missiles merely a few miles from US territory. 10 years afterwards they admitted that they had tactical nuclear weapons on Cuba and that they would have fired them if the US had directly attacked Cuba. This proves that Russia was a provocative and irresponsible nation, and whatever the US did to ensure their safety, was justified.

[Caid Ivik]

Cuban crisis... Khruschev... Strange things. Khruschev bluffed as no one in our history. His space project was unable to set out a site of orbital nuclear bombers and intercontinental missiles. That was proven by spying, but still USA placed their Jupiter missiles to Turkey. Here Khruschev lost his advantage. Politics of liying failed on whole line and he had to act quickly by arming his nukes on Cuba, only communist ally on the West. Active US spying found it and publiced. Weapon transports were intercepted and blocked by US Navy. Best way to ensure equality lost by Khruschev's unresponsible sayings about his doomsday machines able to hit anywhere on the world was to leave weapons in both sides, Cuba and Turkey too, or retreat from them. Because of Castro's aggressivity and lust for power, was chosen the second alternative. Jupiter silos in Turkey were uninstalled and russian rockets turned home. Peace for centres, Washington and Moscow, was only until both sides started using strategic nuclear subs with Polaris, resp. SS-N-6 missiles.

[Dante]

If this is the Contest II, shouldn't Caid not be allowed to post?

[Anathema]

That was sorta the point, yes.

[Caid Ivik]

The eastern side should be involved here too, I think. ;)

[Dante]

Perhaps in another thread Caid? A comments thread?

[emprworm]

Greetings, Mr. Earthnuker.

It is still my position that America was irrationally paranoid and fearful of communist philosophy during the cold war. I believe this is substantiated by a period in American history called "The Red Scare".

in 1947, President Truman gavea a famous speech ined what became known as the Truman Doctrine. This doctrine shaped US foreign policy for the next 40 years. Truman equated communism with fascism, labeling both as "totalitarianism." Truman argued the world was divided into two types of nations, one based on the "will of the people" and another based on the "will of a minority" enforced by "terror and oppression".

February 1950 Senator Joseph McCarthy catapulted himself to national prominence by announcing communists had infiltrated the State Department. THe paranoia became so massive that the fear of communism actually took on a philosophy and a name all unto itself: McCarthyism. (For more information on this national paranoia go here: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAmccarthyism.htm)

This fear of communism "infiltrating" the US at high government levels caused widespread racist and prejudicial attacks on people suspected of being communists. These were irrational fears and since they were so ingrained into the public, it affected the entire democracy of the US. FOreign policy during this time was wrapped around and pushed by, this majority paranoia among American citizens and American media. Having such an irrational fear dictate your foreign policy makes for a diplomatic distaster, thus America's ability to be diplomatic during the cold war was virtually nonexistent, except for a few friends. This further isolated the west from the "evil communists", deepening the chasm, and making it ever more harder for the ice of the cold war to break. I believe if it wasn't for America's rapant, irrational paranoia, the cold war might have ended a decade sooner, or perhaps might have never even existed.

[Anathema]

An excellent point, Mr. Worm but keep in mind that the red scare was an internal case ;)

The USA, being a free country with a decent media system, knew well of the atrocities comitted by the likes of Stalin on his own people and those of other nations. Stalin killed and deported millions of farmers for the sole reason that he hated farmers. Now, he wasn't much of a threat to the USA by then, and during the second world war he was even seen as a trusted ally, but then the arms race began. The Russians even developed their nuclear weapons on basis of spying. After the FBI began hunting down spies, they presumed they were relatively safe, but only two years after the US developed their first hydrogen bomb Russia already had a prototype. Communists were literally everywhere within the US. Allthough most of the victims of McCarthy weren't communists, the red scare was necessary to guard the US from internal threats.

[emprworm]

As you accurately point out, Mr Earthnuker, the permeatation of communist paranoia (McCarthyism) was internal. However, my argument is that in a democratic system, when the majority of the populace holds a certain philosophy, that philosophy will manifest itself in its leaders, which will then ultimately manifest itself in foreign policy. THe people behind the government were paranoid and irrational. As such, this "push" from People --> Political Leaders inevitably end up affecting our top leaders, who were elected by the paranoid people with these same paranoial fears. As such, foreign policy would be permeated with this irrational fear, thereby widening the gulf between the US and the Soviet Union. Had the US not had such irrational paranoia of communistic philosophy, it would have been much better equpiped to have rational diplomatic dialogue with communist leaders, thereby lowering the world risk of war. I believe that the only reason this world never saw WWIII was due to fortune and divine providence. The US was lucky, because its paranoid fears could have easily caused WWIII.