John Lewis Gaddis Hypotheses from We Now Know 1997

Transcription

1 John Lewis Gaddis Hypotheses from We Now Know 1997 The diversification of power did more to shape the course of the Cold War than did the balancing of power. Cold War theorists misunderstood the importance of multidimensional assessments of power. They focused on the bipolar nature of the world and looked at the balance of power between the USA and the USSR, predicting that whilst they remained balanced, the world would be a stable and a safe place. In reality, the Cold War was multidimensional both in terms of international politics (blocs were based on a variety of actors especially in the West (ostpolitik, De Gaulle) but also in the East (Hungary, Czechoslovakia) as well as in terms of internal politics since military strength was just one measure of power (as were economy, society, technology, internal divisions). The USA and the USSR built empires after WWII, although not of the same kind. Most Cold War historians point out that despite its ideological dislike of imperialism, the USA constructed an Empire in the wake of WWII. The debate is over the nature of this empire and whether it was intentional or inadvertent. Was the empire the result of the drive to dominate markets and capitalize on investment opportunities abroad, in much the same that Britain had done (according to Hobson! and Lenin!) Or was it an accidental by product of having to fill a power vacuum in Europe, a reflexive response to perceived Soviet expansion? Interestingly, theories now suggest that the Soviets too was partly driven by an ideological desire to spread their system, but also to the opportunities which presented themselves. Stalin hoped to bring China on board, Khrushchev hoped for the same in the Third World. Gaddis argues that the almost irrational fear of losing ground and the falling dominoes that would be sparked influenced the Russians just as much as the Americans, which is why Stalin pressured Mao to prop up North Korea and why Castro suicidally intervened on behalf of Castro. Lundestad proposed the idea that the Americans were invited to dominate Western Europe and the Soviets imposed their will. Gaddis readjusts this idea by suggesting that Stalin hoped for an invitation which never came, which explains his haphazard approach. Of course, Lundestam s empire by invitation has been criticized as ignoring the reality in Western Europe after WWII which meant that the Europeans had no choice but to accept the conditions placed upon their acceptance of US aid. Most commentators accept that in the Third World, both sides coerced, repressed and responded to invitations depending on the time and the place. However, the key battleground of the Cold War, i.e. where it began and ended was not the Third World, but Europe, so Gaddis asks why the US empire generated so much less hostility in Europe than the Soviet empire.

2 Many people on both sides saw the conflict as one of good versus evil, even if historians since have rarely done so. Gaddis uses the case study of Germany to try to answer the question posed in section 2. It is beyond doubt that the Soviets were more brutal towards the Germans than the western allies, which determined a pro western tilt from the beginning of the peace. He argues that this is why the West German regime established itself as legitimate government, but the East German regime did not. It seems to me, however, that this ignores the history of the fear of communism in Germany. Having said that, his main point is more that historians of the Cold War have to remember that the perceptions of the ordinary people involved in the events tend to get ignored by academics and that in many cases their perceptions of their conquerors played an important role in how those conquerors were able to (or were forced to) act towards locals. Democracy proved superior to autocracy in maintaining coalitions Realists tend to view democracy as leading to compromise deals such as the League of Nations and the Kellog-Briand pact which fail to take the realities of the balance of power into account. The most important realist in the Cold War story, George Kennan, couched his view of the post war world in an appreciation of the realities of the new world order and the importance of realpolitik. Kennan compared democracy to a dinosaur with a body the size of a building and a brain the size of a pin; however, he expected America to contain the rise of Communism whilst maintaining her Wilsonian- Liberal principles which he had criticized for being weak!!! This has more to do with Kennan s role as a policy maker rather than an historian. Gaddis claims that Kennan s fear that the US would become like those with whom we are coping never fully came true. He claims that the US remained fairly true to her principles and often used them to shape policy. He argues that democratization gave the colonised a stake in the success of the process. He uses Germany and NATO as examples, claiming that the Americans adapted their policy to the local conditions, giving the Europeans a surprising amount of influenceover structure and strategy.it is difficult to imagine the Soviet Union acted similarly. The Russians failed to gain popular support in most of Eastern Europe and the Warsaw Pact was much more centralized, there was little sense of mutual interest, especially after the events of 1956.

3 This leads Gaddis to claim that the centralized nature of the Soviet empire was much more like the traditional formal empires of old, whereas the cooperative nature of the US empire was a new kind of empire a democratic empire for the simple reason that they were, by habit and history, democratic in their politics. Nuclear weapons exchanged destructiveness for duration. Nuclear weapons supposedly kept the Cold Ward from escalating. As a result, crises that in other periods would have led to war, were no longer worth the cost of war. Gaddis accepts that the Nuclear deterrent worked, but thath there was a price, albeit one worth paying. He claims, with some justification, that by the early 1960s the Soviet Union had become the monodimensional dinosaur that could never win the Cold War. If that was the case, why did the conflict last for another 30 years? Nuclear weapons encouraged the monodimensional measurement of power In 1962, the USA had a 17-1 advantage in Nuclear warheads. McNamara (Kennedy s advisor) pointed out that this amounted to an effective deterrent as the threat of one nuclear explosion on US soil would deter Washington. The Soviets did not accept this and spent the 1960s seeking real parity. The Cuban crisis convinced western leaders that their survival depended on a balance of fear. There was a tacit agreement to calculate strength in terms of nuclear warheads which led to the fixation on the nuclear arms race as the focus of Soviet-American relations This fixation preserved the image of a formidable Soviet Union long after its actual decline had set in. Gaddis then posits that it was only when Reagan put pressure on the Soviet system that it was finally shown for the veneer that it was. Of course the system was failing before SDI and US aggression may well have helped prolong the inevitable as conservative forces in the politburo pointed to the need to be strong in the face of the new threat, but it seems fair to suggest that the American acceptance of the rules of engagement helped entrench the two sides and thus prolong the stand-off. Given the fact that they [Nuclear Weapons] did exist, the Cold War could have ended with a bang at any point. It took decades to arrange a whimper. (Gaddis 1997)

4 As long as Stalin was running the USSR, a cold war was unavoidable. Gaddis claims that Stalin s foreign policy cannot be separated from his domestic practices or even his personal behavior He suggests that Stalin waged Cold Wars on several fronts, internationally, within his party, within his country, even within his family. The cold war that we became to know was simply one of many from his point of view. He does not suggest that the USA bears no responsibility for the nature of the conflict, or that the US were not stupid to become drawn into feckless conflicts like Vietnam and Nicuaragua, or the expenses of the development of unusable weapons. He does, however, suggest that with other leaders out of the picture, the war could have been avoided, but Stalin s unique personality and unique situation within an authoritarian regime made some kind of clash inevitable. Détente was an illusion, there was no long peace, both sides continued to practice brinksmanship despite talking of rapprochement. The simple fact that the arms race was at its most intense throughout the late 1960s and early 1970s; that Vietnam was in full flow; that the Third World clashes continued in earnest suggests that détente was simply a means to an end. The Cold War developed its own rules of engagement It mattered little who was in power, both sides fostered the notion that they would go to war if necessary, despite not being willing to do so (brinksmanship dominated relations between the two sides, even during so called thaws). Gaddis argues that it mattered little who was in office, whether they had a good personal relationship, the conflict existed outside the sphere of personalities. For example, Eisenhower talked of a thaw, yet flew spy missions and developed the idea of massive retaliation. Khrushchev may have wanted peaceful coexistence, but he got Cuba and Hungary.

5 The Cold War Questions Why did the Cold War not become hot? Was it Nuclear weapons? Rational leadership? Had war become too expensive? How was the C.W. fought by non military means? Propaganda, espionage, non-cooperation etc. Why did the C.W. last so long beyond 1963? Was the C.W. an ideological confrontation or simply a contest for supremacy between Great powers? Was the struggle based on politics? Economics? Strategic interests? What role do personalities play? Did it matter who was in the Kremlin or the White House, or did the C.W. develop independently of leadership? To what extent did smaller powers influence the policy making of the Superpowers? (Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, West Germany, France, Britain, Cuba)? Was the C.W. an imperial conflict, simply a 20 th Century scramble for Africa? Was the C.W. the culmination of the age of empire? How important was the power of perception? To what extent was Soviet military strength a smokescreen for a monodimensional entity which was rotten internally. By the 1980 s Soviet society could no longer maintain the expense of the arms race, especially in the face of the potential costs of matching US technological advances and the SDI. Instead of US aggression in the early 1980s hastening the end of the conflict, it simply hardened the Soviet response and prolonged the last days of the Cold War.