The United States in the Cold War: 1945–1989
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History is dramatic—and the renowned, award-winning authors Christopher Collier and James Lincoln Collier demonstrate this in a compelling series aimed at young readers. Covering American history from the founding of Jamestown through present day, these volumes explore far beyond the dates and events of a historical chronicle to present a moving illumination of the ideas, opinions, attitudes, and tribulations that led to the birth of this great nation.
The United States in the Cold War examines the history of the United States from 1945 to 1989. Beginning with the effects of World War II, the narrative follows the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and the rise and fall of Communism.
Christopher Collier
Christopher Collier is an author and historian. He attended Clark University and Columbia University, where he earned his PhD. He was the official Connecticut State Historian from 1984 to 2004 and is now professor of history emeritus at the University of Connecticut. He is the brother of James Lincoln Collier, with whom he has written a number of novels, most of which are based on historic events. His books have been nominated for several awards, including the Newbery Honor and the Pulitzer Prize.
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The United States in the Cold War - Christopher Collier
HISTORY
PREFACE
OVER MANY YEARS of both teaching and writing for students at all levels, from grammar school to graduate school, it has been borne in on us that many, if not most, American history textbooks suffer from trying to include everything of any moment in the history of the nation. Students become lost in a swamp of factual information, and as a consequence lose track of how those facts fit together and why they are significant and relevant to the world today.
In this series, our effort has been to strip the vast amount of available detail down to a central core. Our aim is to draw in bold strokes, providing enough information, but no more than is necessary, to bring out the basic themes of the American story, and what they mean to us now. We believe that it is surely more important for students to grasp the underlying concepts and ideas that emerge from the movement of history, than to memorize an array of facts and figures.
The difference between this series and many standard texts lies in what has been left out. We are convinced that students will better remember the important themes if they are not buried under a heap of names, dates, and places.
In this sense, our primary goal is what might be called citizenship education. We think it is critically important for America as a nation and Americans as individuals to understand the origins and workings of the public institutions that are central to American society. We have asked ourselves again and again what is most important for citizens of our democracy to know so they can most effectively make the system work for them and the nation. For this reason, we have focused on political and institutional history, leaving social and cultural history less well developed.
This series is divided into volumes that move chronologically through the American story. Each is built around a single topic, such as the Pilgrims, the Constitutional Convention, or immigration. Each volume has been written so that it can stand alone, for students who wish to research a given topic. As a consequence, in many cases material from previous volumes is repeated, usually in abbreviated form, to set the topic in its historical context. That is to say, students of the Constitutional Convention must be given some idea of relations with England, and why the Revolution was fought, even though the material was covered in detail in a previous volume. Readers should find that each volume tells an entire story that can be read with or without reference to other volumes.
Despite our belief that it is of the first importance to outline sharply basic concepts and generalizations, we have not neglected the great dramas of American history. The stories that will hold the attention of students are here, and we believe they will help the concepts they illustrate to stick in their minds. We think, for example, that knowing of Abraham Baldwin's brave and dramatic decision to vote with the small states at the Constitutional Convention will bring alive the Connecticut Compromise, out of which grew the American Senate.
Each of these volumes has been read by esteemed specialists in its particular topic; we have benefited from their comments.
CHAPTER I: THE CAUSES OF THE COLD WAR
IN HISTORY WE very often see events caused by well-meaning people doing things that seem right at the time, but unhappily lead to tragedy. Such was the case with the Cold War between the United States and the USSR: Both sides thought they were doing the right thing, but in the end it brought death and destruction to millions of people.
The Cold War—a term in wide use as early as 1949—ran from the end of World War II to 1989, when the Communist system in Russia collapsed. Put in the simplest terms, the Cold War was a standoff between the two dominant powers in the world. Because both Russia and the United States had huge stockpiles of nuclear weapons, enough to destroy much of human civilization, they were deterred from starting a real—or hot
—war between them. But neither could they find ways to live in peace and harmony with each other. Indeed, instead of engaging in good-faith negotiations, they often engaged in propaganda wars over the virtues of capitalism and communism.
In the years since the First World War the original Russia had swallowed up most of the small surrounding lands, like the Ukraine to the west, Kazakhstan to the south, Lithuania to the north, and many more. By the end of World War II these had been welded into one great nation, dominated by the Russians: the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics—called the USSR, or the Soviet Union. But many of the peoples of the lands in the USSR continued to speak their own languages and follow their own folkways; they often felt more like captive nations than equal members of a great union. (In this volume we shall use the term USSR, or Soviet Union, for the period between 1918 and 1989; otherwise we shall use Russia.)
The Soviet Union drew—or forced—into it many small nations that had not yet been industrialized and were still peasant cultures. From the start the Soviet Union was thus well behind the other industrialized nations. These crockery menders in the fabled city of Samarkand in Uzbekistan, were at the time of the Russian Revolution still using bow drills in their repair work.
How, then, did these two wartime allies against Hitler become enemies? In order to understand why, we need to try to look with a clear, objective eye at two emotionally charged words: capitalism and communism. We have a tendency in America today to see capitalism as all good and communism as all evil, but as is usually the case, the story is not quite that simple.
Historians have traced the roots of capitalism quite far back in time, but it clearly was in existence by the 1500s. Before, and indeed