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The Cold War

How I learned to start worrying and hate the bomb.

By Mack DevlinPublished 3 years ago 13 min read
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The Cold War
Photo by Dan Meyers on Unsplash

In the summer of 1945, an American B-29 bomber, the Enola Gay, set a course for Hiroshima, on the southern tip of Japan’s Honshu Island. The Enola Gay, it would soon be revealed, was no ordinary bomber plane. Her mission was to deliver a payload so powerful, so violent, and so devastating, that it would forever change the course of human events. In the wake of World War II, the world would see the rise of two nuclear superpowers. The United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, known informally as the Soviet Union, would soon become locked in a ‘Cold War’ that would push the world to the brink of disaster, and the human race to the edge of extinction.

After ‘Fat Man’ and ‘Little Boy’ leveled the Japanese cities of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, Stalin immediately recognized the United States as a true threat to his expanding industrial empire. This was not an oversight on the part of the United States. Frightening the Soviets was an ulterior motive for the nuclear attacks on Japan. The United States wanted to keep the Soviet Union in check, knowing full well that Europe in the wake of World War II was a carrion feast. With Hitler finally deposed, there was ample room for a new totalitarian regime to gain prominence. While the American display of power made the Soviet Union think twice about conquering Europe, the attack also created an additional reaction. Seeing how devastating the atomic bomb could be, the Soviets knew that the only way they could protect themselves from such devastating power was to gain similar power.

The Soviets had been involved in the study of nuclear physics since the 1930s. When nuclear fission was discovered in 1938, the Western world decided to keep the discovery under wraps. Stalin and his advisors found this ‘physics blackout’ peculiar, and, fearing the discoveries the Americans were making, pushed their nuclear program forward. There was, however, a complication that kept the Soviet program several years behind the American program. The Soviet Union was contending with the Nazis along the expansive Russian front. At the time of the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Soviet Union possessed no power to match the atomic bomb. Four years later, that all changed. In 1949, the Soviet Union tested its first nuclear weapon. This forced the Americans to increase their nuclear stockpile, and eventually, they would add something even more devastating than the atomic bomb. In 1952, the United States tested the first hydrogen bomb, with the Soviet Union following suit a year later. There would soon be no turning back. Nuclear proliferation, the acquisition of nuclear technology for practical and hostile applications, had begun.

The fear with nuclear proliferation has always been that certain ‘rogue nations’ may develop nuclear technology and use it for hostile applications. In 1957, the United Nations, an international organization formed twelve years earlier, created the International Atomic Energy Agency. The agency’s main purpose became the promotion of positive applications for nuclear technology. However, the United States and the Soviet Union, despite being members of the United Nations, continued to stockpile first-strike nuclear weapons. The balance of power had been struck and could only be maintained through demonstrations of strength. There was, however, more at the heart of this rivalry than simple pride or political differences. For both sides, an entire way of life was at stake. The United States and the Soviet Union were as far apart ideologically as they were geographically. Since the latter days of World War II, Western democracy and Eastern communism were at odds.

Near the end of the war, both the Soviet Union and the United States contributed to the reconstruction effort, hoping to increase their influence throughout Europe. This fact was not lost on either party. While relations between the US and Soviets were somewhat strained at the Yalta conference, a meeting to decide how best to reorganize Europe, the tension at the Potsdam conference was apparent and palpable. The Potsdam conference was a chance for the Allied nations to decide the most appropriate punishment for the Germans after the atrocities of World War II and to finalize the plan for European reorganization. The tensions at Potsdam were due, in part, to the Soviet Union’s refusal to withdraw from the Balkans even after the Nazis had been defeated. Truman, the American president, took a hard line against the Soviets, accusing them of ‘aggressive expansionism.’ When the intentions of the Soviet Union became abundantly clear, the United States made no attempt to mask their disapproval. Truman was a staunch “anti-communist” and vehemently distrusted Stalin. Soon, a line was drawn in the sand, separating the democratic societies of the West and the communist societies of the East. Winston Churchill said that an “iron curtain” had fallen, dividing Europe along political and ideological lines, halting the dissemination of “revolutionary” Western concepts. Western ideas were, after all, considered anti-socialist, and there was no greater sin for those under the protection of the sickle and the hammer than to buck the political standards of the communist party.

To further protect their interests from American imperialism, the Soviet Union formed an alliance with other communist nations. This was known as the Warsaw Pact. This alliance was in direct response to the alliance forged by the nations of Western Europe and the United States, known as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Some would call the formation of these two alliances the beginning of the Cold War.

Tensions between the Soviet Union and her chief rival, the United States, abated for a while in 1953, following the death of Joseph Stalin. In his time as ruler, Stalin had come to be viewed by some of his subjects as more than a man, gaining his own personality cult that elevated him above a mere ruler. Stalin’s rule went untested, and because of this, he enjoyed absolute power. After his death, there was much debate as to who would assume his mantle. The political leaders of the Soviet Union found themselves locked in an intense power struggle. Nikita Khrushchev, one of Stalin’s chief advisers, emerged the victor. It was not long until Khrushchev began denouncing Stalin for his brutality. For the first time since the start of the Cold War, the Western world anticipated a change in Soviet policy that would raise the iron curtain and lead to the spread of democracy throughout Russia and the Balkans. This would not, however, be the case.

While Khrushchev was more progressive than Stalin, he was prone to taking hard-line action against subversive forces. In 1956, Khrushchev used the might of the Red Army to crush the Hungarian revolution. Following the death of Stalin, parts of the USSR descended into chaos, allowing the seeds of revolution to be sewn. The Soviet Union that Khrushchev inherited was in serious danger of tearing itself apart. Khrushchev was trying to prevent subversive elements from assuming control of a Warsaw Pact nation. During Nikita Khrushchev’s rule, the Cold War underwent a considerable thaw, and Khrushchev opened communication with the Western world for the first time since the Second World War. The relationship, however, would soon undergo intense strain, as the Soviet Union and the United States entered a standoff that would introduce everyone to the prospect of nuclear holocaust.

The devastating power of atomic weapons had become a frightening reality in the aftermath of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. As soon as the Soviet Union entered the nuclear arms race, regulating nuclear research and development became an immediate imperative. Without competition from the Soviet Union, the United States may very well have used their destructive new weapon to overpower the nations that stood in opposition to their ideologies. With this in consideration, the Soviet Union’s need to stockpile similar weapons becomes understandable. When discussing the Cold War it is important not to think in terms of good and evil. Instead, the focus should be on the facts. Each nation, having harnessed the power of the atom, had an unprecedented responsibility to keep events from spiraling out of control. For the most part, both parties worked diligently to guarantee the survival of their societies. There was never heated combat between the nations. Instead they engaged in aggression by proxy, using other lesser nations to do their dirty work. Such was the case in Cuba in 1962.

During the summer of 1962, Nikita Khrushchev, then Premiere of the Soviet Union, dispatched a military arsenal to the tiny island of Cuba, located 90 miles south of Key West, Florida. A number of the missiles sent to the island were armed with nuclear warheads. Cuba had been a communist nation since 1959 when Fidel Castro and his army of nationalist revolutionaries took control of the government. The threat Castro posed to the United States was considerable since communism was viewed as a great oppressive force by most democratic nations. Whether or not communism is oppressive, however, depends completely on the interpretation of Marxist ideas.

The reason communism was such a threat to the United States was that communism did not mesh with the capitalist ideology. What is for certain is that in the communist society, the line between the rich and the poor is blurred, thus any United States citizens who benefited from privatized industry would find themselves sharing the same burdens as the less fortunate. The close relationship between American politicians and the so-called “barons” of industry was undeniable. Everyone in a position of power had much to lose if the communist influence spread to the Americas. Cuba’s proximity to the United States and its ties to communism made it a welcome target for invasion. Such was the case in April of 1961 when Cuban exiles trained by the United States were deployed to overthrow Castro’s government. This gloriously unsuccessful attempt to subjugate the new Cuban government would come to be known as the Bay of Pigs invasion. The Cubans, fearing another invasion, requested aid from the Soviet Union. Along with conventional weapons, Khrushchev also sent a battery of nuclear missiles. His prime motivation was not, however, the safety of his Cuban allies. He used the missiles to pressure the United States into withdrawing their own nuclear missiles from Turkey. This bold move nearly had devastating repercussions.

When the United States discovered that the Cubans had missiles aimed at the American mainland, they had no choice but to act. Kennedy soon opened channels of communication with the Soviet Union. At first, he found himself stonewalled, but eventually Khrushchev agreed to the dialogue. He insisted that the missiles were for defensive purposes and nothing else. The Americans did not believe him. Cuba afforded the Soviet Union with a first strike battery of nuclear weapons in close proximity to the United States. The United States had similar missile arrays in Europe that were aimed at Moscow and other strategic Soviet targets. As the talks proceeded, Khrushchev finally played his hand. He demanded that the American missiles be removed from Turkey. Kennedy was unwilling to comply at first. Meanwhile, Cuba was surrounded by a US naval blockade. The purpose of the blockade was to prevent any more missiles from being delivered to Cuba from the Soviet Union. The tensions between the capitalists and the communists created a situation that could have easily slipped out of hand. The collective citizens of the two nations held their breaths, awaiting the nuclear holocaust. But such a holocaust would never come. Eventually, Kennedy conceded, withdrawing the missiles from Turkey. True to his word, as soon as the agreement was struck, Khrushchev ordered the removal of the Cuban missiles. For the most part, the Cuban missile crisis of October 1962 came to a peaceful conclusion, resulting only in the death of a single American pilot. And although his abilities as a diplomat were remarkable, Kennedy was not blameless. His Bay of Pigs invasion made an enemy of the tiny Caribbean nation of Cuba, giving them no choice but to enlist the aid of their communist allies. Khrushchev is guilty of being an opportunist, but he only did what any leader would have done.

In the annals of history, Khrushchev would indeed be remembered as a great leader. His successor, Leonid Brezhnev, on the other hand, was a much different ruler. His controversial doctrine discouraged the members of the Warsaw Pact from adopting so-called ‘anti-socialist’ views. The Red Army was used to crush subversive elements, like the ‘Prague Summer’ movement to end censorship in Czechoslovakia. Despite his reputation as a great leader, Brezhnev’s time as Premiere of the Soviet Union was an era of great economic and political decline. Life behind the iron curtain was not as prosperous as Soviet propaganda indicated. No people suffered more during the Cold War than the citizens of the Soviet Union. Not only did they face incredible economic hardship, they also suffered the consequences of isolationism.

In 1986, the Chernobyl nuclear power plant underwent a nuclear meltdown. The fallout that resulted from this meltdown was much more devastating than the fallout seen in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The region most profoundly affected was Belarus. Upwards of ten thousand deaths are attributed to the Chernobyl fallout, many of those deaths occurring years later. While the Supreme Soviet did declare Chernobyl a disaster area, they did not ask for nor would they allow anyone outside of the Soviet Union to render aid. More lives might have been spared had political and ideological differences not created such a vast division between the two superpowers.

In the years leading up to, and following Chernobyl, the Cold War underwent a considerable thaw. In November of 1989, the Berlin Wall dividing East and West Germany was torn down. The destruction of the wall symbolized the end of communism in Eastern Europe, and can also be viewed as the symbolic yet unofficial end to the Cold War. After forty years of mostly non-violent conflict, the capitalist West had finally defeated the communist East.

No two ideologies were as different as capitalism and communism. It seems that the United States, the capitalist utopia, and the Soviet Union, the communist motherland, were destined for some type of conflict. Fortunately, the conflict never erupted into all-out war. Such a war would have devolved into a nuclear conflict, and both sides had too much to lose. Instead, the two superpowers repeatedly engaged in conflict by proxy, using lesser nations to act out their massive power struggle. Such was the case in Cuba in the 1960s and Afghanistan in the 1970s.

The Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, a nation formed from loose tribal alliances, in December of 1979. The conflict lasted nine years. The United States, in an effort to halt the Soviet invasion, provided weapons and training to the Afghan rebels. Once the Soviets had withdrawn from the nation in 1988, at the end of the Cold War, a new government came to power – the Taliban. The oppressive Taliban government would later become a major enemy of the United States.

It was not unusual for the United States during the Cold War to give aid when it was beneficial, and then withdraw aid once the benefits had been exhausted. This worked against the United States in a number of ways. The Americans armed and trained the people of various nations, and then, once American interests were satisfied, abandoned those same people. Training and arming someone for revolution is only useful as long as you provide them other necessary skills, such as reading, writing, medical expertise, and the framework for nation-building. The rise of the Taliban and other despotic regimes are but a few consequences of the Cold War.

Since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the people of the world have lived in a shadow of fear. The Cold War taught us that everything human beings have built and worked toward can disappear in a nuclear flash. The Soviet Union is gone and the United States has matured to the point of uncertainty, but that fear that occupied the minds of so many for nearly fifty years still lingers. With the Cold War over, the United States became the dominant superpower. That power has not, however, gone untested. With the number of American enemies overrunning the number of American allies, a second Cold War may be in the works.

Historical
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About the Creator

Mack Devlin

Writer, educator, and follower of Christ. Passionate about social justice. Living with a disability has taught me that knowledge is strength.

We are curators of emotions, explorers of the human psyche, and custodians of the narrative.

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