Although the Cold War had many negative influences on global society, it also helped to create a stable political world, as evidenced by the fact that during the Cold War era, civil wars, nationalistic uprisings, and ethnic cleansings were almost non-existent. As well, the world economic situation was subsequently greatly improved by the military build-up caused by the Cold War. The implementation of the American "Marshall Plan" and the Communist "Molotov Plan", the nuclear arms race, and the global military build-up all served to create global political stability and economic prosperity.
The "Marshall Plan" created by United States Secretary of State George Marshall and the "Molotov Plan" created by Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov were
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The Missile Crisis developed in 1962 because Fidel Castro believed that America would soon try again to invade his country. He asked the Soviet Union for help in defending his island nation. The Soviet Union replied by sending small arms, tanks, and infantry units to Cuba, as well as secretly transferring nuclear missiles to missile silos that were under construction in Cuba. The Americans were shocked when one of their U-2 spy planes discovered the nuclear silos under construction in Cuba because it meant that for the first time the Soviet missiles were within range of most major U.S. cities, including Washington, D.C. This created a very difficult problem for American President John F. Kennedy for which he needed to find a solution. He could not allow the missile silos to finish being constructed because that would place the United States in danger. That meant that either he would have to try diplomatic means to attempt to negotiate the removal of the weapons, or he would have to use the might of the American military to remove the weapons by force. Neither option looked particularly favourable. The Joint Chiefs of Staff (the President's military advisors) urged a swift and strong military invasion to destroy the silos before the Soviets could react. Kennedy was concerned, however, of the possibility of Soviet nuclear retaliation for the invasion because invasion was clearly an act of war. Up until that point, neither side had been willing to risk direct
The Cuban Missile Crisis all started in October, 1962, when an American spy plane spotted and secretly photographed missile sites being built on the island of Cuba by the Soviet Union. President Kennedy did not tell the Soviet Union right away that we had found their nuclear missile site. But days later, President Kennedy meet secretly with his advisors to discuss the situation. President Kennedy and his advisors though long and hard about what to do and the finally came up with an idea. Kennedy decided to put a naval blockade around the island of Cuba. The purpose of this was so Cuba could not get anymore military supplies for the Soviet Union. President Kennedy demanded that the missiles that were already there be disabled and that the sit be destroyed. Later on, Kennedy told America what was happening on a televised address. Everyone was anxious about what the Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev, would say about the naval blockade. But both President Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev recognized that the devastation that a nuclear war will bring is too much.
Following World War II, Europe was in ruins. Between bomb damage, economic downturn, and natural disasters such as droughts and blizzards it seemed nearly impossible to restore Europe to its prior greatness. America facilitated the recovery of Europe with military and financial aid and helped prevent the spread of communism. This aid crushed the Soviet dream of a communist Europe and started the Cold War. Over the next 45 years, the United States and the Soviet Union would resemble two angry women, avoiding each other at all costs and exploding into a furious rage at the first sight of the other. Many events contributed to and were derived from the Cold War such as the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan, the Civil Rights movement, the Space
In 1962, Cuba was convinced that the USA was planning to attack them and asked the Soviet Union for military assistance. The USSR sent Cuba materials to build missile bases and launch sites. When President Kennedy realized that Cuba could launch missiles into America, he demanded that the USSR remove its weapons and troops. The Americans formed a naval blockade as the world stood nervously on the edge of a nuclear war. The USSR removed its weapons despite protests from Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
President Kennedy came to office with warnings of a missile gap. The Soviets had achieved or were achieving a significant advantage in strategic nuclear weapons. Though tensions ran even higher, "Eisenhower’s strategy of massive retaliation made little sense and did not account for the rapidly growing Soviet nuclear arsenal4. Kennedy's nuclear strategy became known as flexible response. The idea was to acquire the military forces that could deal flexibility with varying levels of Soviet Aggression3. The most serious confrontation between Russia and the US was the Cuban Missile Crisis. (Link to Stephanie's page) Soviet leader Khrushchev attempted to place intermediate range missiles in Cuba. Kennedy responded by imposing a quarantine on Cuba. This resulted in the removal of the Soviet missiles and led to Kennedy making the decision to dismantle U.S. missiles based in Turkey. Some analysts argue that the successful outcome was due to the United States’ nuclear superiority, which proved that strategic superiority offered important political advantages5.
On October 22, 1962, President John F. Kennedy “informed the world” that the Soviets were building secretive missile bases in Cuba, very close to Florida. President Kennedy decided to take the peaceful route in handling is major crisis. As
The Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 lasted thirteen days and was one of the major events during the Cold War, when the United States and the Soviet Union were brink of a nuclear world war. Fidel Castro had become leader of Cuba and had turned the country into a communist state, similar to the Soviet Union. The USSR was given permission to place nuclear missiles in Cuba to target major cities in the United States, the reason was because the Soviet Union was threatened by the missiles placed in Italy and Turkey by the Americans. However, neither of the nation's fired their weapons; and an agreement between Nikita Khrushchev (leader of the USSR) and President John F.
The Cuban Missile Crisis is one of the most impactful events in the Cold War due to the effect that it had after it happened. The effect of the Cuban Missile Crisis created many changes on the direct and indirect relations between the United States and Soviet Union. The Cuban Missile Crisis spanned 13 days in October 1962 that almost brought the world into a nuclear war. This all began when a United States U-2 spy plane Cuba took photos of Soviet SS-4 medium range ballistic missiles getting setup for the ability to launch.This caused the U.S leaders to be thrown into a panic because the Cuban Government had very strong ties with the Soviet Union who are the United States biggest enemies at the time. Another reason the United States was very fearful is because the coast of Cuba is only 90 miles of the coast of Florida. When President John F Kennedy was told of the missile threat in Cuba he immediately called a meeting with his closest advisors on how to react. There were many ideas on how to react to the missiles, some of Kennedy’s advisors wanted to invade Cuba, others wanted to send a warning to the Soviet Union. JFK finally decided to send a naval blockade to cuba for the purpose of stopping more supplies reaching the Cuban military from Russia. The blockade even though the blockade did not include attacking anyone, it was still seen as an act of aggression by the Soviet Union. The U.S was
Imagine that you are John F. Kennedy in 1962, and you find out that your ally, Cuba, has your enemy, Soviet Union, has ICBMS (intermediate- range ballistic missiles) & Ilyushin Il-28 light bombers, that could reach the United States and aimed toward the United States. The Cuban Missile Crisis was a thirteen-day confrontation between the United States, Cuba, and the Soviet Union. Cuba had the missiles there for like three months before one of the U.S had a spy plane that figured out that Cuba had the Soviets Missiles. For a while, the U.S had Intel that Cuba had the missiles but JFK did not believe that Cuba was betraying them. These missiles were only ninety miles away from Florida the U.S. issued a military blockade to prevent further missiles from reaching Cuba. When all the offensive missiles and light bombers were taken from Cuba the blockade was initially ended on November 21, 1962. Although the Cuban Missile Crisis ruined relations with the United States of America and Cuba, it impacted the blockade between the United States of America and Cuba, the respect for the United States of America, and the Bay of the Pigs.
In conclusion, the Cold War of the 1900’s resulted in the United States gaining more power over other nations. The US was able to defeat the USSR by outsmarting them in events such as the Berlin Blockade and the Marshall plan. The US was able to also gain lots of support from other countries due to causing and persuading lots of nations to convert to the democratic way of government. The
The Cold War had a huge impact on America and it eventually caused Americans to live in complete fear or danger of war due to the arms race. For example, the Cuban missile crisis caused tension within the United States because the missiles were able to reach Americans at any given time. Unfortunately, the Cuban missiles threatened the United States' security, which caused several Americans to live in fear that the war would begin. Additionally, the Cold War instigated strong anti-Communism within the United States and eventually led to McCarthyis. Americans wanted to remove all Communists from American society after identifying the Communists. Overall, the entire situation was created by the Cold War and had a lasting impact on the
On April 15, Kennedy launched a mission known as the Bay of Pigs Fiasco. The CIA had informed Kennedy of a plan they had to train Cuban exiles to invade Cuba. The goal was to overthrow Fidel Castro and establish a non-communist government. The invasion occurred on April 15, 1961, when the cuban exiles set off to bomb their homeland. The fourteen hundred exiles were eventually captured or killed. Kennedy paid over $53 million to get the captured exiles back. The Bay of Pigs invasion was a disaster, and it embarrassed Kennedy greatly. This wasn’t the last crisis of Kennedy’s. What became known as the Cuban Missile Crisis took place in October of 1962. An American spy plane secretly spotted nuclear missile sites being built by the Soviet Union in Cuba. Kennedy did not want the Soviet Union or Cuba to know that he found out about the missiles. After much thought, Kennedy decided to place a ring of ships around Cuba. He called it a quarantine because he wanted to prevent the Soviets from bringing in more military supplies. Kennedy made demands for Nikita Khrushchev to remove his missiles from Cuba. They both decided that a nuclear war would cause great devastation. A public deal was made between the two countries that the Soviets would dismantle the weapons site in exchange for a pledge from the United States not to invade Cuba. A secret deal was made between the Nikita and Khrushchev; the United States also agreed to remove nuclear missiles from Turkey. The Signing of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty took place on August 5, 1963. This treaty limited the production of nuclear weapons by the Soviet Union, the United States and the United Kingdom, and it gained back President Kennedy’s reputation with the American
Americans were afraid one day,that they would wake up to a blinding flash and destruction. This is exactly what President Kennedy wanted to prevent. Once Kennedy was projected onto the televisions of millions of people worldwide, Americans began to pack their bags and started to plan to head out west, out of the nuclear missiles way (“Cuban Missile Crisis”).As this went on, He knew that his actions could bring the world into nuclear war, this is why he and his cabinet had to go through many options before they could act on the situation. His choice was a blockade or in other words, “A Quarantine” (Mieczkowski). This blockade expands all around the island and is to stop Soviet ships from bringing weapons to Cuba (“Cuban Missile Crisis”). Along
The world was at the edge of a third world war. This was the result of a variety of things: the Cuban Revolution, the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion, US anti-communism, insecurity of the Soviet Union, and Cuba's fear of invasion all made causes for war. However, war was not the result due to great cooperation from both President Kennedy and President Khrushchev and each of the decisions made by the leaders was crucial in the outcome of The Crisis. Kennedy's choice to take action by means of quarantine instead of air-strike and Khrushchev's decision to abide by the quarantines were perhaps the two most significant decisions made by the leaders in order to prevent war. The Cuban Missile Crisis showed the
The Cuban Missile Crisis was a frightening moment for the entire world. It started October 14th, 1962 after the Soviet Union planted nuclear missiles inn Cuba. The U.S. found out that these missiles were being planted without their knowledge, but the Soviet Union continued the construction of these nuclear missile sites, even after President Kennedy, the president of the U.S., sent out a warning against these weapons in Cuba. Even after this warning, Kennedy once again found out that the construction was still happening. Following the discovery of the ongoing construction, Kennedy wanted to meet with people at the White House to solve the problem that they were encountering. There were multiple sides during their talk about the missiles. Some of the people at the meeting wanted to take a more aggressive approach and destroy these missiles and then follow up with an attack. Kennedy eventually decided to quarantine Cuba. After Kennedy quarantined Cuba, there were many messages sent between the White House and the Kremlin to try and solve the problem. The Cuban Missile Crisis lasted for thirteen extremely tense days. At the end of these thirteen days, the Cuban Missile Crisis ended with an agreement between the United States and Soviet Union. The Cuban Missile Crisis greatly impacted history. It strengthened the bond between the United States and Soviet Union, showed people how to come to a
The end of the cold war signified a new era of history that has changed the entire world. The face of Europe and Asia has changed dramatically. Vast changes have been felt socially, politically, and especially economically. Also the effect the cold war had on foreign policy was paramount. The effect of these changes is not only felt across the ocean but can be felt here in America. The goal of this paper is to define what the cold war specifically was, and reflect upon the various choices throughout the world as a result of the end of the cold war.