Mao criticised Khrushchev for his policies such as de-Stalinisation and his secret speech. He was also very critical of the policy of Peaceful Coexistence as he believed it was a way of being friendly with the United States (the enemy) and also Mao saw it abandoning millions of comrades struggling to free themselves of capitalist and imperialist oppression. This, therefore, made the USSR an ‘enemy’. How could two countries work together if they had such differing beliefs about how to run their countries? This problem had a big contribution to the split as they couldn’t agree on anything, and if they did, it was because their national interests were at risk.
This certainly fights against the view that Alexander II was reluctant in his reforms on the surface – however, once investigated, the limits of emancipation are clear. The 49 year redemption payments were a huge limiting factor in allowing peasants economic freedom to then have social freedom, and class was still a major issue even if it had been reduced. The highly inflated land prices that ensued meant that very few peasants could afford land, and Alexander II did nothing to resolve this. It does lend to the idea of his ‘radical’ reforms being fairly reluctant as he did not go further with them. Alexander III took an even more conservative view during his reign, repealing many of Alexander II’s social
Although both Truman and Stalin helped increase tensions in Europe and East Asia in the years immediately following World War II, the Cold War itself was likely inevitable. The alliance that had formed between the United States and the USSR during World War II was not strong enough to overcome the past decades of suspicion and unease between the two nations. Moreover, as both leaders sought to achieve their postwar security objectives, which were often mutually exclusive, neither was willing to compromise. The United States and the USSR had always generally disliked and distrusted each other, despite the fact that they were allies against Germany and Japan during the war. Americans had hated and feared Communism ever since it had appeared in the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and had refused to recognize the new Soviet government, especially after Bolshevik leaders promoted the destruction of capitalism.
Certainly these changes were massive, quite abrupt and differed drastically from the norm; however that does not necessarily make them bad. Except, that is how they are viewed by many historians today. The historian N.Reeves believes Akhenaten was unsuccessful, but more in his religion reforms. 'For ordinary folk, there is little doubt that Akhenaten's actions as king over time inflicted the greatest misery: the people were confused by the man's religious vision, frightened by the ruthless manner in which it was imposed and quite likely appalled by his personal behaviour.' Reeves believe that the changes would have confusing and scary for the common people.
Another reason to why America is to blame is after the success of the atomic bomb the members of the Grand Alliance began to see changes in Truman’s behaviour as he started to control the meetings they had and Stalin refused to be bossed around so arguments between Stalin and Truman started, they started. The USSR is to blame for the breakdown of the Grand Alliance for many reasons. One reason is that the USSR wanted to impose big respirations on Germany but America and Great Britain refused as they knew how it would affect Germany and could cause another war. A second reason is that Stalin wanted most of Europe to become communist, Roosevelt and Churchill didn’t agree. After Truman became Americas new President there was a lot of tension at the Potsdam Conference.
American strategy remained torn between simply containing Communism or rolling it back by actively supporting the Soviet Union’s opponents. For historians of the Cold War, the great debate has been between traditionalists who tend to see the United States as the defensive power in the Cold War (and the Soviet Union as the aggressor) and revisionist historians who tend to see the United States and the Soviet Union as equally aggressive and equally at fault. Revisionists (those critical of American foreign policy) are usually accused of forgetting the ‘lessons of Munich’. It is argued that World War Two arose partly because too many historians thought Germany was unjustly treated after World War One by the Treaty of
There was a time where he opposed the interests of the Communist Party these interests were projects started by Bolsheviks and Stalin so he was greatly outnumbered in making any decision. He argued that if large projects were going to be undertaken they had to be safe, and have considerable conditions for the workers, but the Communist party was willing to sacrifice those regulations to output the projects more quickly. Palchinsky continued to disagree and criticize the projects so he was eventually arrested on April 1928, and then executed from his political position. There was a project in particular that Palchinsky warned the USSR about, and that was the
When his rivals were expelled from the Politburo, they were removed because the majority of the members voted for this. Therefore, Stalin’s action in order to gain power were quiet legal. After he was invited into the main committee of the Bolsheviks, he then gained other beneficial minority posts such as being an executive of the committee and becoming head of their party newspaper “Pravda”. Stalin, did not take part in any major roles during the October rising. During the civil war, he was consistent in disobeying orders made from Lenin and Trotsky, as they were the main organisers.
The Cold War is a war without guns and bombs amongst the Allies during 1945 to 1991, after World War Two. As the common enemy Germany and Japan were defeated, the balance between allies was no longer be there and a high level of tension was brought by the end of the war. USA and the USSR were the major two parties in the Cold War, their arguments were based on their different political opinions, which is capitalism and communism and it was the disagreement with each other caused the high level of tension between the Allies by the end of World War Two. The main difference between USA and the USSR is that they have a different point of view of politics. The USSR was a communist country and the USA is a capitalist country, just like China and USA now.
The reality of Soviet control of EU was very different from what people expected. Countries that had a long tradition of free speech and democratic government suddenly lost the right to criticize the government. Newspapers were censored and non- communists were put in to prison for criticizing the government. People were forbidden to travel to countries in Western Europe. Between 1945 and 1955 EU economies did recover.