Many would question how a country like Afghanistan could have had any impact on the strongest communist nation of all time, the United of Soviet Socialist Republics, and most people would answer by saying that U.S.S.R was already on the verge of falling apart and Afghanistan was the final conflict that pushed it. I believe that Afghanistan was a strong role in the fall of the Soviet Union. The outcome of the invasion of Afghanistan had proved that the Red Army was in fact not untouchable. Thus, this had caused many Russian republics to demand independence and challenge the Red Army. And most importantly, the economy of the Soviet Union was in ruins after the U.S.S.R had chose to spend massive amounts of money on wars and the arms race.
Stalin's foreign policies contributed an enormous amount to the tensions of the Cold War. His aim, to take advantage of the military situation in post-war Europe to strengthen Russian influence, was perceived to be a threat to the Americans. Stalin was highly effective in his goal to gain territory, with victories in Poland, Romania, and Finland. To the western world, this success looked as if it were the beginning of serious Russian aggressions. The western view of the time saw Stalin as doing one of two things: either continuing the expansionist policies of the tsars, or worse, spreading communism across the world now that his one-state notion had been fulfilled.
In his work, Fleming explained that if the Soviets wanted to attack the united states of America they had done it because they had all the necessary equipment but at that period the nation was more interested in its inner politics than conquering the world. Seeing the Soviet Union as its biggest threat and being afraid of the “Domino” effect, the American government decided to take actions by supporting the rebels in Latin America and countries that were gaining their independence in a hope that these societies will adopt the capitalist ideology. The decisions that the USA made where not always elaborated and in some cases they did more harm than good. Isolating the U.S.S.R from the world politics was
Ronald Reagan: His Doctrine for U.S. Diplomacy during the Cold War in Central America Strayer University International Problems PHI 300 Professor Lorna Maloney 5 August 2012 Ronald Reagan: His Doctrine for U.S. Diplomacy during the Cold War in Central America On April 27, 1983 , in his address before a joint session of the congress on Central America, President Ronald Reagan made a powerful statement on his view of the things that were occur south of the American border. How statement was: “If Central America were to fall, what would the consequences be for our position in Asia, Europe, and for alliances such as NATO? If the United States cannot respond to a threat near our own borders, why should Europeans or Asians believe that we're seriously concerned about threats to them?
They thought a departure from this model would signify a Soviet surrender to the Capitalist West in the ideological war. However, not all policies resulted in failure and devastating suffering (Allen 1964). One notable exception was the policy of Peaceful Coexistence instituted by Khrushchev. Until then, the country had been led by Josef Stalin. Under Stalin’s leadership, many oppressive and rigid policies were put in place.
I will be talking about President Reagan’s Doctrine and some of what happened during his administration. President Reagan was our 40th President (Jan.1981-Jan.1989). During his time in office, the United States used their diplomatic resources to stop Soviet expansionism in the developing world. President Reagan wanted to overthrow pro-Soviet regimes, so his administration focused on supporting proxy armies to stop the Soviet influence (Roskin, 1999, p. 58). One of President Reagan’s biggest achievements was the end of the Cold War.
From this prospective Russian expansionism was a key factor in the developments of the cold war. To the West Stalin was perceived as the “Red Tsar” seeking to extend the Soviet Union’s border and influence, the reason for this perception was because of the Soviet union’s: rigging of elections forming a communist government
The Cold War had essentially started as a split between USA and the USSR due to ideological and strategic differences between the two countries. During the course of the Cold War, the official US foreign policy was of containment of communism. This policy fuelled by the fear of communism in USA was designed to prevent further expansion of communism. The policy emerged at a time when Eastern Europe was under the military, and increasing political, control of the Soviet Union, and when Western European countries appeared to be wobbling from their democracies because of socialist agitation and collapsing economies. Containment was a foreign policy introduced at the start of the Cold War by the United States, aimed at stopping the spread of Communism and keeping it 'contained' and isolated within its current borders, otherwise the 'domino effect' would occur, where if one nation became Communist, the surrounding ones would follow.
The main effect was to crystallise Truman's desire to take a very hard line, anti-communism approach to the Soviet Union and for Stalin it symbolised an increase in opposition to the USSR. The speech effectively signalled the end of the alliance between America and the Soviet Union and described the establishment of a Soviet sphere of influence. The impact of this was initially negative because during WW2 American propaganda showed the Soviet Union as a faithful ally working alongside America to defeat the Nazi regime so the speech was met with hostility from American citizens. Writing in the book The Cold War, John Gaddis comments that “most Americans had had enough of war and were not in the mood to maintain their armed forces”. This shows a reluctance to fight another war – a reluctance that would have undoubtedly been heightened by Churchill’s speech which looked to provoke hostilities.
What sparked this “manhunt” was the 9/11 attacks but this war effort has also caused a political uproar in Afghanistan as well. The Taliban, a baby Al-Queda headquartered in Afghanistan, want to violently push their own political agenda and have been continuously quarreling ever since. That aspect brings up a very important question, when will this war effort actually be over? Is it when there is political stability or a decrease in crime rate, or consequences for crime or better yet, a combination of all three? Only time will