OCR History GCSE Paper 1 - Cold War Interpretations

US Orthodox View

Dates:
- 1940s-60s

Summary:
- Totally blaimed the USSR
- Argued USSR wanted world domination - caused CW by actions in East EU after WW2
- Argued Stalin needed a threatening enemy to prove his people they needed a strong dictator
- To do this he provoked the USA
- Argued USSR was trying to spread comm. across world, and USA had to respond w/ Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan etc

Context:

Red Scare -
- Since 1917, USA was worried of communist revolution
- Had been a few previous 'Red Scares' in 1920s and 1940s
- 1950S, Senator McCarthy exploited fear by spreading rumours of Soviet spies in US gov.
- If any academic, politician etc supported USSR or even didn't support USA, could be arrested and imprisoned
- Made it impossible for any historian to offer an alternative argument to this view
- Some even wrote books agreeing out of fear of being seen as comm. spy for not publicly agreeing
- eg William Appleman Williams didn't accept this view and wrote book on it
- Showed it to colleague at Uni of Wisconsin (1959) who told him not to publish it as it would damage his career

Personal Experience -
- Many US orthodox historians writing about start of CW were involved in those events
- George Kennan - senior gov. official involved in developing policy of Containment
- Herbett Feis - US gov. advisor a tstart of CW

Lack of Sources -
- Always limited no. of sources after any major event
- US sources were v. sensitive and secret
- Sources open to public were too influenced by propaganda
- For US historians, no chance of getting Soviet sources

Impact:
- Widely accepted by historians & politicians for most of CW
- Also mainly accpeted by US public
- Partly due to propaganda in media - many Hollywood films reinforced this view
- eg 'War of the Worlds' and 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers'
- Dramatisation of comm. invasion was common in books, comics, newspapers etc

Historians:
- Thomas Bailey
- George Keenan
- Herbet Feis

Agree:
- Post Revisionist View
- New Cold War historians

Disagree:
- US Revisionist View
- Post Revisionist
- New Cold War historians

US Revisionist View

Dates:
- 1960s-70s

Summary:
- Claimed that orthodox historians exagerrated Soviet threat
- Argued orthodox historians weren't writing history, they were writing justification for US foreign policy post-WW2
- Said that USA provoked USSR by trying to acheive economic dominance in EU and Asia
- States Marshall Plan was only done so that USA would have other markets to trade in in case of an economic depression
- Argued Truman's 'get tough' attitude made Soviet feel threatened, so they reacted aggressively

Context:

Cuban Revolution -
- Orthodox view was first questioned when US actions in Cuba after revolution in 1958 were studied
- Claimed USA acted more like an aggressive, empire-building power rather than a morally right force stopping Soviet empire

Vietnam War:
- 1960s, more academics started supporting this view, due to Vietnam War
- USA were supporting a corrupt regime, killing thousands of innocents, using chemical weapons and neglecting social issues back home
- Changed the trust people that the US public had in the gov.

Impact:
- Created big debates and arguments amongst historians and academics
- Politicians didn't really accept it - partly because many were involved in the events and didn't want to appear bad
- Public opinion differed - older people supported orthodox view more as they were v. patriotic
- Many young people supported revisionist due to youth-counterculture in USA at the time

Historians:
- William Appleman Williams

Agree:
- Post-Revisionist View
- New Cold War Historians

Disagree:
- Orthodox View
- Post-Revisionist View
- New Cold War Historians

Post-Revisionist View

Dates:
- 1970s-89

Summary:
- Rejected revisionist view that CW was caused purely by US aggression
- Argued that a large cause of CW was the belief and actions of the USSR
- Accepted that US policy was based on a misunderstanding and exagerration of Soviet power and intentions
- Didn't see CW as inevitable, but as a result of misunderstanding, fear and confusion by USA and USSR

Context:

Historical Debate -
- Was a time of intense historical debate
- Historians were looking for new ways to interpret all history, inc. CW
- Whils revisionists were challenging orthodox, post-revisionist historians were challenging both for being too simplistic in blaming just one side

Thawing of Cold War -
- After Vietnam, in early 70's, Nixon and successors began détente
- This was trying to build better relationships with USSR and China
- eg agreement to SALT in 1972, and met in Helsinki in 1975 to discuss human rights
- Influenced historians to think less in terms of blame and more in terms of understanding

Impact:
- Had a massive impact on historians
- Many had acknowledged weaknesses in orthodox view but didn't agree with revisionist
- Post-revisionist gave a more comlex approach that was more widely accpeted

Historians:
- John Lewis Gaddis

Agree:
- Revisionist View
- Orthodox View
- New Cold War Historians

Disagree:
- Revisionist View
- Orthodox View

New Cold War Historians

Dates:
- 1989-present

Summary:
- 1989, CW ended with fall of Berlin Wall
- By mid-1990s, historians had access to Soviet archives
- However it didn't give a new insight or interpretation, it just reinforced old beliefs
- eg John Lewis Gaddis went from post-revisionist to a more orthodox viewpoint

Context:

End of Cold War -
- This led to ...

New Soviet Sources -
- During CW, Soviet sources weren't accessible to Western historians
- Even most Soviets couldn't access them
- Now millions of new sources to consider

Reagan Factor -
- Would expect there to be no more allocating the blaming seeing as CW was over
- However, in USA, debate mirrored the recent changes in their politics under Ronald Reagan
- In final years of war, he held a v. aggressive policy regarding the USSR - referred to it as 'Evil Empire'
- Orthodox historians agreed with Reagan and found sources that showed he was right in his beliefs