To Th Thu Hin

Student ID: 1311140034

Class: A28 - Advanced program

Homework of International Relations

THE COLD WAR
1. What is the Cold War?
The Cold War, often dated from 1947 to 1991, was a sustained state of political and military
tension between powers in the Western Bloc, dominated by the United States with NATO among
its allies, and powers in the Eastern Bloc, dominated by the Soviet Union along with the Warsaw
Pact. In other word, The Cold War is the name given to the relationship that developed primarily
between the USA and the USSRafter World War Two leading to international affairs for decades
and many major crises occurred the Cuban Missile Crisis, Vietnam, Hungary and the Berlin
Wall being just some. For many, the growth in weapons of mass destruction was the most
worrying issue.

2. Role of USSR and USA to the conflicts in the Cold War (have specific examples)
In some ways, the name 'Cold War' that was given to the 20th century's tension-filled standoff
between the United States and the Soviet Union is deceiving. Sure, the United States and the
Soviet Union never officially fired shots at each other, but the two states fought numerous proxy
wars intending to foster the growth of capitalism or communism in certain parts of the world.
When you couple these wars with the continuous spying and espionage the two countries took
part in against each other, the Cold War begins to look very hot indeed!
Russian objectives are central to controversy about the origins and development of the Cold War.
For the Cold Warriors of the 1950s and 1960s the Soviet Union was a messianic and predatory
power, as threatening to the Western democracies as Nazi Germany had been in the 1930s and
1940s. For others, including revisionist scholars from the late 1960s, Soviet Russia was an
insecure empire preoccupied with internal matters and, in its external relations, concerned only
with security. Problems of evidence prevent a firm answer, but this is a case in which the truth
probably lies somewhere between two extremes. No serious scholar now argues that Russia after
1945 aimed at world conquest or military invasion of Western Europe. Even the construction of
the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe was marked by hesitation and caution. While Stalinist
regimes were imposed on Poland and Rumania from 1945, Hungary and Czechoslovakia avoided
this fate until 1947 and 1948, while Finland was permitted to retain its independence on the
condition of its acceptance of a non-aggression pact with the Soviet Union in 1948. We also
know that Stalin, the architect of socialism in one country, showed a marked lack of
enthusiasm for the revolutionary causes of the Greek and Chinese communists. None of this is to
suggest, however, that the West Europeans and Americans did not have legitimate concerns about
the extension of Russian power into Western Europe in the late 1940s and after. The disruption of

European economies by the Second World War, the strength of communist parties in France and
Italy, and the size of Russias conventional armed forces all suggest that, even without a Soviet
blueprint for aggression, the Marshall Plan and NATO were reasonable precautions. They were,
moreover, fully supported by the West Europeans.
It is often argued that in Europe and the Middle East, Stalin and his successors acted in the
tradition of the Tsars - with insecurity and imperial expansion both important impulses - and that
this continuity, rather than communist ideology or even the experience of German invasion in
1941 in itself, gives the clue to Moscows behaviour. Beyond Europe and the Middle East there
may well be a useful analogy between Russian policies and those of pre-1914 Germany. As
Michael Howard has pointed out, both the Soviet Union and the Germany of Wilhelm II
represent cases of a recently emerged great power determined to assert its equal status with the
leading power of the day, first by building up its military and naval power and then by using it.
This insight helps account for Soviet adventurism in Africa in the 1970s, when nuclear parity and
detente should have helped the USSR feel more, not less secure.
Although it is not helpful to see the Cold War as a conflict between freedom and tyranny (both
American and Russian policies were too often inconsistent with such an interpretation), it was
nonetheless the case that American leaders often saw the contest in these terms. Internationalist
aims were central to American policy. After 1945, with the isolation of the inter-war period no
longer an option for the United States, Washington sought to replace the old European order
(based on alliances, spheres of influence and the balance of power) with a new order based on
American leadership through the United Nations Organisation, one true to the principles of
democracy and self-determination. The initial Cold War clash over Eastern Europe arose from
Russias failure to accept American internationalist values. The image of the USSR as an
expansionist, ideologically motivated power had much to do with this clash. From this image, in
turn, sprang the doctrine of containment. Originally containment reflected assumptions about the
essential unity of the communist world. When recognition grew of divisions in the communist
bloc, it continued to be the case that American officials saw ideology as more important than
national interest in accounting for the behaviour of communist governments.
American policy remained one of containment rather than liberation or rollback, despite the
Republicans rhetoric in the presidential elections of 1952. By the mid-1950s there was no
serious hope of undoing the Soviet empire in Eastern Europe, and at least by the 1970s it could
even be said that American leaders welcomed the stability afforded by Soviet control of Eastern
Europe. Two other important influences on American policy were lessons of history and a
preoccupation with prestige. Ernest May and other scholars have pointed to the role played by
experience of the 1930s in persuading American policymakers to compare the totalitarian
features of the USSR and the Peoples Republic of China with those of Nazi Germany, to jump to
the conclusion that in its international behaviour red fascism would act as Hitler had done, and
to apply the lessons of geopolitics to the post-war world.[3] Many scholars have emphasised the
influence of a psychology of prestige and credibility in convincing policymakers to regard as
vital American interests in areas which possessed relatively little tangible strategic or economic
importance.

Something must also be said about the role of economics in American policy. For the New Left
school of history which arose in the 1960s, the internationalist rhetoric associated with American
foreign policy amounted to no more than a guise behind which American corporate interests
were able to spread their control and influence abroad. Of this it can be said that while American
governments have always sought to protect what they regard as the nations economic interests
(this is, after all, a normal function of national governments), American economic interests
simply cannot explain the extent of United States involvement in the post-war world. This is
especially the case in the Third World, where the American economic stake was far less
important than in advanced industrial countries. And if we look not at the needs of the American
economy but at policymakers own understanding of what they were doing, it is clear that
economic concerns were subordinate to political and military interests, even to the point where
the United States, in its support for the economies of Japan and Western Europe, was prepared to
sacrifice its own trade interests in order to create Asian and European bulwarks against
communism.

3. How did the Cold War influence international relations?

The Cold War has affected international relations in different ways first and for most the Cold
War divided the world in to three distinct camps, the NATO camp, the Warsaw camp, and the
nonaligned the first two camps were armed with nuclear weapons. The rivalry between the two
super powers quickly spread to the rest of the world. Thus, the Cold War become global and
directly affected international stability. Although the Cold War caused and exacerbated conflict in
some parts of the world, it also maintained order and peace that existed (Mearsheimer, 1990) and
made possible the reconstruction and assimilation of defeated powers of Germany, Italy
The Cold War led the division of Europe in general and Germany in particular it also as pointed
by Cornwell (2001) made possible the modernization and reintegration of the defeated powers
of Germany Italy and Japan (Cornwell, 2003) Its impact was felt especially in Africa where as
further stated by Painter ( 2001) made possible the emergence and creation of new nation states,
as the colonial masters no longer able to sustain those colonies. The Cold War considerably
affected Europe where it originated as well as internationally. It led the Berlin Blockade, created
the divisions of Vietnam and Korea, resulted the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 which
furthers exacerbated the relationship of the West and the Soviet Union it further exacerbated and
fuelled other conflicts and wars in the middle East (Painter, 2001).
Another bad effect of the Cold War was the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 that internationally
created fears of an imminent nuclear war between the US and the USSR this clearly further
increased tension between the two super powers and their allies. Nuclear attack against the
Soviet this further led the Soviets to believe that America is preparing to attack them and they in
turn took steps to prepare their Nuclear forces this further exacerbated tension in the region as
the tension developed a possible war between them meant that the entire world might be
destroyed in an all out nuclear war (Murphy, 2003).

and the transformation of Japan from a war-torn country to the second most powerful economy
in the world (McWilliams & Piotrowski, 2005). But this positive aspect cannot be compared
with the negative impact it had on the Third Word specially that of Africa where the Cold War
fuelled the civil war and caused many deaths and destructions through proxy wars and civil wars.
Decolonisation and the emergence of new nations-states attracted the attention of the super
powers, arms and other support poured into continent and the result was disastrous (Mcmahon,
2003).
The Cold War led to major impact to International order; because the post Cold War order of
bipolarity and the balance of power has ended making the US the only super power in the world
and therefore can take whatever actions she desires with impunity this change ended an era of
peace in the world this view is held by Mearsheimer (1994) as cited by (Baylis et al., 2008)
Mearsheimer held the idea that, the Cold War era was a period of peace and stability.
Furthermore, towards the end of the Cold War in the 1990s, the Soviet Union suffered
considerable economic decline as a direct result of the Cold War because of huge military
spending. (Young & Kent, 2004) thus the effects of the Cold War are far-reaching and they
added to the ultimate fall down of the Soviet Union in 1991 and the end of bipolarity, which left
the United States as the only hegemony power in the world.

REFERENCES:
Abdi Hassan. In what ways did the Cold War affect international relations between 1945 and
1990? https://nassirhassan.wordpress.com/2011/11/30/in-what-ways-did-the-cold-war-affectinternational-relations-between-1945-and-1990/
David Mclean. The Cold War 1945-1991: Overview of US-Soviet relations and the Cold War
http://hsc.csu.edu.au/modern_history/international_studies/cold_war/3275/cold_war_overview.ht
ml