Table of Contents
The Cold War
The Cold War is the term used to
describe the extreme political unfriendliness that existed from the end of
World War II to the late eighties between groups of communist and non-communist
countries. On one side were the USSR and its communist allies, known as the
Eastern Bloc, and on the other side were the Western powers of the USA and its
allies.
There was mutual suspicion, distrust and
misunderstanding between the two blocs. The USA and its allies felt that the
USSR’s aim of spreading communism throughout the world threatened their
security. The Soviets, on the other hand, accused the USA of practising
imperialism and of attempting to stop revolutionary activities in other
nations. Each bloc had its own political ideals which were diametrically
opposed to the other.
Soon after World War II, the two great
blocs were formed and the Cold War began. It intensified during the 1940s and
the 1950s and reached its peak in the 1960s. World peace was severely
threatened. The arms race began afresh with both sides experimenting with
nuclear weapons. At the same time, there was a space race between the USA and
the USSR: the world watched in astonishment as the Americans and the Soviets
tried to outdo each other in conquering space. By the seventies, both sides
began to recognize the dangers involved in recklessly amassing powerful weapons
that could wipe out large cities and populations in minutes. In the eighties,
many efforts were made to improve relations between the two superpowers.
Most historians agree that the Cold
War began after the Yalta Conference. The Big Three-President Franklin D
Roosevelt of the USA, Premier Joseph Stalin of the USSR and Prime Minister
Winston Churchill of Great Britain met at Yalta (in modern-day Ukraine) in
February 1945 to plan for the peace that would follow the war. Stalin would not
cooperate with the other leaders regarding the peacetime program. Great Britain
joined the USA in criticizing the USSR’s plan to spread communism in Eastern
Europe. During 1945 and 1946, the USSR broke off all contacts between the West
and the occupied territories of Eastern Europe. In March 1946, Churchill warned
that an ‘Iron Curtain‘ had descended across the continent. (The phrase ‘Iron
Curtain’ became a popular expression to refer to communist barriers against the
West.)
In the 1940s, the arms race between the two blocs
began and continued into the 1950s. The Berlin Wall was a symbol of the
confrontation between the two blocs. In the sixties, the world came dangerously
close to a nuclear war. An attempt was made in the seventies to improve
relations between the USA and the USSR. The Cold War took a fresh turn in the
eighties when Mikhail Gorbachev took over the leadership of the USSR.
‘Glasnost’ (openness) and “perestroika” (reconstruction) were the terms which
came to be associated with the campaign of Gorbachev to reform the economic and
political machinery of the USSR.
Great Britain, as one of the countries
belonging to the Western Bloc, had to support the USA in any action that the
latter took against the USSR. Britain had to pay a high price for the Cold War.
She had to face very high military expenditure and there was uneasiness in the
minds of the British that they were playing second fiddle to the USA. In the
seventies, Britain’s role as Washington’s partner was reduced due to her
economic deterioration.
Also, Skim:
Impact of the World War II on English Literature
When Margaret Thatcher became the Prime Minister in 1979, she paved the way for an economic revival and sought to avoid any public conflict with the USA. Through her personal friendship with President Reagan of the USA, she was able to make Britain’s position more respectable. Up to 1982-83, Thatcher continued to repeat the anti-Soviet rhetoric of the Reagan administration. She was known as the ‘Iron Lady in the USSR’. After she was re-elected in 1983, she changed her approach. The British government began to establish contacts with the Warsaw Pact countries.
The Warsaw Pact was a treaty signed by the communist nations of Europe that were under Soviet military command. They were Albania, Bulgaria. Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland and Romania
First, Thatcher paid a visit to Hungary and later she went to Moscow.
Thatcher pursued her characteristic
policy of supporting the USA while at the same time wishing to safeguard
British and European interests. In 1984, she made a visit to the USA and
secured the Camp David pacts which said that the USA would not seek nuclear
superiority over the Soviet Union. The USA agreed to maintain the balance
between the superpowers. Gorbachev stopped over in Britain before going to
Washington for one of his summit meetings with President Reagan. The Soviet
Union believed that Thatcher exercised influence over Reagan through her
personal friendship. In 1987, Reagan and Gorbachev signed an arms treaty
agreeing to eliminate all medium-range missiles in both nations. Thatcher
played a major role in the negotiations leading to the signing of this treaty.
President Reagan spoke of a ‘fresh start in East-West relations.
The breaking of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was a
symbolic act which signalled the end of bitterness between the power blocs. The
Cold War became a thing of the past with the disintegration of the Soviet Union
in 1991.
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