...essay on cold war ‘Account for the phenomenon, known as the cold war, which dominated world politics between 1945 - 1989. Evaluate the extent to which the principal nations involved fought proxy wars as a substitute for armed conflict with each other. In this essay I will discuss the extent to which the principal nations, mainly the USA and the Soviet Union fought proxy wars as a substitute for armed conflict with each other during the Cold War between 1945 – 1989. As the Second World War ended in 1945 with the victory of the allies, a new war was launched. It was a battle predominantly between the USA and the Soviet Union, between two conflicting ideologies: America’s capitalism versus and the Soviet Union’s communism. Ranging from two of the most devastating wars; the Korean War (1950) and the Vietnam war in the 60s, to the smaller conflicts in the Middle East and Africa in terms of the scale of the battle, every corner of the globe was involved in the Cold War. (Dunbabin 1994) The USA and the Soviet Union were the sole super powers at the end of the Second World War. There are a number of views regarding why the Cold war was unavoidable, and one of the reasons is that both countries were expansionist. The USA in particular was afraid of the Soviet sphere of influence over Europe in particular, believing that it needed to be contained. (Mowry, 1962) But on the part of the Soviet Union, it was also afraid of the USA’s power and its ideology which it believed to...
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...an Essay - a couple paragraphs discussing the following. The Cold War ran from the end of World War II in 1945 to the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. That is a lot of history, and a great many events occurred in the world during those 44 years. One of them, but only one of them, is the proxy war that we call the Vietnam War. There was always a danger that a rather low-level proxy war could escalate and even rise to the level of nuclear confrontation and war. The dangers were perceived as great – that the Cold War could get hot and out of control. To start, what other events of the Cold War years fit this idea of “proxy war?” What kind of steps did world leaders take to keep Cold War proxy wars from heating up? What were such leaders thinking? Due on Monday 10:00am ( I would prefer this by tonight 10pm) Discussion question #2: not an Essay - a couple paragraphs disccing the following. Not long before the Vietnam War is considered to have started – around the time period we focus on this class week, 1963 and 1964 – Dag Hammarskjøld of Sweden was serving as Secretary General of the United Nations. He is quoted to have said, “Peacekeeping is not a soldier’s job, but only a soldier can do it.” This quote is often the driving logic behind what came to be known as mlitary operations other than war. With the years prior to this week’s discussions, American forces in southern Vietnam were relatively few and were called “advisors.” They brought American...
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...The Cold War Celena Daley Kaplan University SS211: Prof. Jennifer Schmidt 03/12/2016 The Cold War began as a result of a dispute between The United States of America and The Soviet Union. Although the war was never “officially” declared, it began somewhere around 1947 and ended roughly around 1991. The term "cold" is used because there was no large-scale fighting directly between the two sides, although there were major regional wars. The first phase of the Cold War began in the first two years after the end of the Second World War in 1945. Throughout this period, the rivalry between the two superpowers unfolded in multiple arenas: military coalitions; ideology, psychology, and espionage; sports; military, industrial, and technological developments, including the space race; costly defense spending; a massive conventional and nuclear arms race; and many proxy wars. There was never a direct military engagement between the US and the Soviet Union, but there was half a century of military buildup as well as political battles for support around the world, including significant involvement of allied and satellite nations in proxy wars. Although the US and the Soviet Union had been allied against Nazi Germany, the two sides differed on how to reconstruct the postwar world even before the end of World War II. Over the following decades, the Cold War spread outside Europe to every region of the world, as the US sought the "containment" of communism and forged numerous alliances...
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...Peloponnesian War vs. Vietnam War -Both were initiated because of the difference and collapse of conventional values. In the Peloponnesian War (metaphorical/symbolic) and Clouds aspect (physical) -Main message that if you stray away from traditional values or challenge the authority of old values, it will lead to consequences -Importance of key alliances – those with more power always won (Sparta and South Vietnam won) -There is the parallel of Pericle’s death in the Peloponnesian War and John F. Kennedy’s assassination in the Vietnam War – both were respected and held as important political leaders -In Clouds, Pheidippedes is forced to attend the Thoughtery by his father Strepsiades in order to win a debate against creditors. However, instead of acting exactly as his father wanted, Pheidippedes turns against his father and argues that he should be able to hit his father and mother like how his father hits him. On the other hand, North Vietnam was creating havoc by trying to unify Vietnam under communist belief but failed causing a huge number of fatalities. These two are similar in that in both situations two parties who didn’t want to be involved were forced against their will and it caused a bigger conflict than before. -In both Lysistrata and Hair, it talks about individuals who don’t want to partake in the war. In Lysistrata it talks about women who want their husbands and sons to be withdrawn from the war while in Hair it’s about individuals themselves who want...
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...A Cold War, Indeed Lisa Lloyd Kaplan University The Vietnam War, otherwise known as the Cold War, was one of the worst of so many tragic experiences for the United States, (U.S.) during the 20th century. It is odd how differently this horrific war is viewed through various eyes. The following is the account of what comes to the minds of three individuals when asked about the Cold War. Vietnam Vet, Bob Hutson stated “that was the nastiest war I’ve ever been in. It was definitely brutal, and I don’t know of anything good that came of it.” (B. Hutson, personal communication, December 14, 2012). Mr. Hutson discussed and explained in great length and detail, the traumatic incidents occurring in blood shed that he witnessed during the war. During a second interview held with a young coworker, I realized how uneducated younger generations are on the events of our past, to include Vietnam. “I don’t know a thing about the Vietnam War,” was the young man’s reply. (B. Raynor, personal communication, December15, 2012.) He is 26 years old and could not recall actually studying this particular happening in U.S. history, and added that “he was sure it was briefly mentioned.” (B. Raynor, personal communication, December 15, 2012). An expression was presented to me by Rick Harwood, fifty year old nephew of a Vietnam veteran. It was one that I had never heard, but immediately found interesting. Harwood’s Uncle John served in Vietnam, and Harwood remembered him...
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...The Vietnam War (Vietnamese: Chiến tranh Việt Nam), also known as the Second Indochina War,[32] and also known in Vietnam as Resistance War Against America (Vietnamese: Kháng chiến chống Mỹ) or simply the American War, was a Cold War-era proxy war[citation needed] that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955[A 1] to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War (1946–54) and was fought between North Vietnam—supported by the Soviet Union, China and other communist allies—and the government of South Vietnam—supported by the United States and other anti-communist allies.[37] The Viet Cong (also known as the National Liberation Front, or NLF), a South Vietnamese communist common front aided by the North, fought a guerrilla war against anti-communist forces in the region. The People's Army of Vietnam (also known as the North Vietnamese Army) engaged in a more conventional war, at times committing large units to battle. As the war wore on, the part of the Viet Cong in the fighting decreased as the role of the NVA grew. U.S. and South Vietnamese forces relied on air superiority and overwhelming firepower to conduct search and destroy operations, involving ground forces, artillery, and airstrikes. In the course of the war, the U.S. conducted a large-scale strategic bombing campaign against North Vietnam, and over time the North Vietnamese airspace became the most heavily defended in the world. The U.S. government viewed American...
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...the 1960s Unit 2 – Cold War By: Carey LaFour Historians to date have not reached an agreement of when exactly the Cold War started but it safe to say that the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union began when President Truman declared the Truman Doctrine and launched the Marshall Plan in 1947. The Cold War would last for over forty years; during that time, unforgettable events took place. During my research, I found that it would be important that we understand some known facts about the Cold War before comparing them with the interviews of three people. In the 1940s the war was mainly a more political war than a military war however, each were dangerous to the affect that they possessed nuclear weapons and the means to launch them. They were the two superpowers of the world following World War II. In 1950, Dwight Eisenhower was the first Republican president elected to office in twenty years. “I like Ike” (GlobalSecurity) was the campaign slogan we all remember. However, Eisenhower shared Truman’s views on the foreign policy and communism. During his term, he tried to ease tension between the two nations by working with the new Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev; however, in 1959 the relations went south when an American military plane was shot down and the United Stated admitted to spying on the Soviet Union. By 1960, John Kennedy became president and during his term, he faced the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Vietnam War. During his second year...
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...Cold War: Postwar Estrangement The Western democracies and the Soviet Union discussed the progress of World War II and the nature of the postwar settlement at conferences in Tehran (1943), Yalta (February 1945), and Potsdam (July-August 1945). After the war, disputes between the Soviet Union and the Western democracies, particularly over the Soviet takeover of East European states, led Winston Churchill to warn in 1946 that an "iron curtain" was descending through the middle of Europe. For his part, Joseph Stalin deepened the estrangement between the United States and the Soviet Union when he asserted in 1946 that World War II was an unavoidable and inevitable consequence of "capitalist imperialism" and implied that such a war might reoccur. The Cold War was a period of East-West competition, tension, and conflict short of full-scale war, characterized by mutual perceptions of hostile intention between military-political alliances or blocs. There were real wars, sometimes called "proxy wars" because they were fought by Soviet allies rather than the USSR itself -- along with competition for influence in the Third World, and a major superpower arms race. After Stalin's death, East-West relations went through phases of alternating relaxation and confrontation, including a cooperative phase during the 1960s and another, termed dtente, during the 1970s. A final phase during the late 1980s and early 1990s was hailed by President Mikhail Gorbachev, and especially by the president...
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...the period of 1949 to 1963, the Arms race was a period were there which saw two superpowers the USA and the USSR increasing their nuclear technology developments. The arms race ultimately prevented tensions from escalating into an actual fully fledged war. On the other hand there were de-stabilising factors that put both countries on the brink of nuclear warfare and the world at risk of annihilation, such as the pressure of domestic politics, hot wars in Korea and Vietnam, and the Cuban missile crisis. Regardless of these factors the war remained a Cold war. This is because the arms race created the most important stabilising factor which was mutually assured destruction. Both superpowers realised the devastating capability of Nuclear weapons and as a result they did not use Nuclear weapons. Therefore the arms race (and fear of the consequences of an arms race) outweighed the other de-stabilising factors to a large extent from 1949 to 1963. An important reason why the arms race was a stabilising factor in the Cold war is because it led to Mutually Assured Destruction. This is based on the idea that the existence of massive nuclear arsenals prevented the conflict between the Soviet Union and the United States from devolving into outright war between the superpowers. The arms race helped to keep the war cold because both Kennedy and Khrushchev's administrations knew that due to the massive nuclear stockpiles on each side, outright war between the two sides would result in both...
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...as the “Berlin Airlift,” lasted for more than a year and carried more than 2.3 million tons of cargo into West Berlin. Korean War The Korean War was a war between North Korea and South Korea (with the principal support of the...
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...The Cold War (Russian: Холо́дная война́, Kholodnaya voyna) (1947–1991), was the continuing state of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition existing after World War II (1939–1945) between the Communist World – primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies – and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States and its allies. Although the primary participants' military force never officially clashed directly, they expressed the conflict through military coalitions, strategic conventional force deployments, extensive aid to states deemed vulnerable, proxy wars, espionage, propaganda, conventional and nuclear arms races, appeals to neutral nations, rivalry at sports events, and technological competitions such as the Space Race. Despite being allies against the Axis powers, the USSR and the US disagreed about political philosophy and the configuration of the post-war world while occupying most of Europe. The Soviet Union created the Eastern Bloc with the eastern European countries it occupied, annexing some and maintaining others as satellite states, some of which were later consolidated as the Warsaw Pact (1955–1991). The US and its allies used containment of communism as a main strategy, establishing alliances such as NATO to that end. The US funded the Marshall Plan to effectuate a more rapid post-War recovery of Europe, while the Soviet Union would not let most Eastern Bloc members participate. Elsewhere, in...
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...in history was in an extremely cautious state; the Red Scare was at its peak and the Cold War was all but getting better. Two political opponents arose in this new Vietnamese regime: the communist backed Ho Chi Minh of North Vietnam, and Southern Vietnam’s Ngo Dinh Diem, who had a more Republican view. Shortly after the Korean War, America saw another communist threat that could lead to the impression of Communism being able to easily rise across Asia, otherwise known as the Domino Theory. Soon, war broke out between the North and South Vietnamese which would lead to...
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...Thomas Zervas Vietnam Wars 4/29/12 Final Essay Winning The Vietnam War When most people think about winning a war they usually base their opinions on death counts and conquered territories. When looking at the Vietnam War, it is clear to see that the Vietnamese had a larger death count, however this does not mean that the United States was victorious. The United States entered the war to reach an objective, and that objective was to stop communist expansion. The goal was not achieved; therefore, the United States lost the war. True, there were more casualties in the North, but that does not determine whether or not they lost, especially when considering the superior technology and training of United States forces. When looking at the Vietnam proxy war fought between the United States and Soviet Union, the United States was impacted a number of ways, both domestically and internationally. There was a huge lack of public support for the stagnating war effort combined with a lack of support for soldiers that adversely affected the morale of the troops. There were body bag counts on the evening news showing the large numbers of lost soldiers to the population. There were also many protests, which created much tension and heavy scrutiny on the United States government. On a global scale, the United States began to look weaker than the Soviet Union, which created many more issues for the United States. The North Vietnamese won the Vietnam War through a combination of factors...
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...The Cold War By Gloria Rodriguez Exploring the 1960s: An Interdisciplinary Approach December 17, 2012 Hector The first person that I interviewed was my Uncle Hector. He was in the Vietnam War as a Marine and served his country for 20 years. I remember as a child when he had told me that his best friend died in his arms he was split in half. I will never forget the sadness in his eyes. I started to cry because it broke my heart seeing my Uncle so sad. Every year on that day of the death of his best friend he is quiet and wants to be left alone. That is why I chose him and he was willing to talk to me about his thoughts about the cold war and what it means to him. What the Cold War means to my Uncle Hector, is that it reminds him of all the terrible things he witnessed in the Vietnam War. Watching innocent people dying, civilians and soldiers. And then whole villages being moved whenever the leadership figured they were in the way. For Uncle Hector the Cold War was very hot. He continues to say that the troops could not wait to get out and return home to their families whom they missed so much. The soldiers would talk to each other and they would say, “If I don’t make it send this letter to my family so they would know how much I love them.” “I Thank God that I came home and had a chance to see my children grow up, get married and that they did not have to enter into the military like I did.” George George is my roommate and best friend. He was in grade...
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...The anti-Vietnam war movement in the late 1900’s played an incredibly important role in American history due to the powerful combination of young students with drive, radical leaders, and the way the movement aimed to involve the whole country. The Kent State Shooting was a major catalyst for the anti-Vietnam war efforts and could be considered a symbol for the movement because it exemplified the incredible ambition of the movement’s supporters but also the tension and violence which arose as a result of it. The Vietnam War was the most unpopular war in United States (US) history. This was due to many factors: its length, arguably unnecessary amount of death and destruction (in the US and Vietnam), and the establishment of aggressive media coverage for anti-war protests. It was essentially a proxy war between the United States and Soviet Union. Following a policy of containment designed to keep Communism from spreading, the United States provided military and financial support for the anti-Communists in South Vietnam. Opposing them was North Vietnam, which at the time was primarily controlled by the Vietcong, Communist-led guerrilla fighters. By 1963, the US had...
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