The Cold War: Mutually Assured Destruction

The Cold War Spheres of Power: MAD

• Soviet Sphere: 1952-1963: The rise and fall of the Arms + Space Race

  • USSR fighting in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East

• Chinese Sphere: 1964-1968: The Vietnam War (Johnson Years)

  • China fighting US in Asia

• Middle East Sphere: 1950s-60s: Further American Insertion

  • Middle east

Lead up to MAD

• 1949: Soviets successfully tested an atomic bomb

• US response strat: 1952 developed Hydrogen Bomb

• 1953: Soviets develop Hydrogen bomb

US will never have technological upper hand for extended period of time

• 40s, 50s, 60s New deal regime: citizens have great faith in government and don’t question expensive arms race

  • ppl only start questioning in late 60s / Regan

Mutually Assured Destruction

1952-1968:

Foreign policy strategy where neither nation would start war bc it would result in self-destruction

• The US & USSR began stockpiling nuclear weapons & building up their militaries  

• Throughout the Cold War, the USA & USSR looked for ways to gain first-strike capability 

  • Thus, MAD encouraged the development of offensive military weapons (way more than necessary, thousands, to demonstrate force)

Eisenhower

1952-1960

Republican: classic for time, streamline gov, fiscal responsibility

Career: war hero → president

Worldview: operating in New Deal regime, gov has grown → wants to make gov more efficient, fiscal responsibility

• Views war as last resort bc of war background = deters Soviet Expansion through the buildup of nuclear arsenals and the fostering of anti-communist alliances 

• hoping that these strategies would raising cost of war so high that no one will engage/ scare opponent

The Soviet Sphere: MAD

1952-1963: The rise and fall of the Arms + Space Race

• MAD & Fear

• The Space Race

John F. Kennedy + MAD

1. Bay of Pigs invasion 1961

2. Construction of the Berlin Wall 1961

3. Cuban Missile Crisis 1962

4. Nuclear Test Ban Treaty 1963

MAD & Fear

Ineffective/no communication between Soviets + US = misconception and fear

• Stalin dies + Krushev purposely did things to appear crazy to US

• Soviets and they r scared of Eisenhower the war general

US government response: prepare citizens for a Soviet nuclear attack (although none of which would be effective, just to make ppl feel better)

• Citizens built fallout shelters in their backyards

• Cities and schools did building evacuations and “duck & cover” drills  

• Construction of the Eisenhower Interstate System

  • 41,000 miles of interstate highway connected U.S. cities (high speed, transport weapons + ppl)

  • Highways served as a means to evacuate cities during a potential

The Space Race

1957: USSR used missile to launch Sputnik, the first satellite to space

• US resonse: fearful of missile gap + tech gap = loosing cold war

  • inc nulcear weapons production

  • 1958: National Defense Education Act → promoting math, science, and tech education + fund university research (shift from liberal arts to scince, like lil Victory Corp)

  • 1958: Creation of NASA

John F. Kennedy

• Democratic President 1960-1963

  • Youngest person elected president in the US

  • First Catholic elected president 

  • Assassinated in his 3^rd year in office 

• Career: established, WWII vet

• Worldview:

  • Most of Kennedy’s presidency was spent dealing with foreign affairs, in particular American confrontations with the Soviet Union 

  • SHIFT: pro-containment viewpoint to willing to talk and negotiate with the USSR over course of Cold War

  • Inaugural address: was harsher on communism, ideological over practicality

    • VS

  • post Cuban missile: speech humanizing soviets (no one wants to self-destruct)

• Kennedy Presidency (4 major foreign policy events): “pay any price, bear any burden”

Bay of Pigs invasion

1. 1961:

Failed U.S.-backed invasion of Cuba aimed at overthrowing Fidel Castro, resulting in a major embarrassment for JFK's administration.

• Context: pro-Soviet, communist Fidel Castro came to power

• Operation w/ CIA: involving Cuban exiles w/ little training (due to assumption of Cuban inferiority) to start a coup

• Result: no one joins coup, Soviets assist aerially, Castro kills exiles, US + Cuban media discovers CIA’s plan

  • Significance: solidifies Cuba + Soviet relationship vs US, Kennedy skeptical of CIA

Construction of the Berlin Wall

2. 1961:

Context: post division → West Germanies thriving (democracy), East Germans are trapped in poverty (communism) SO East Berlin’s started moving to West Berlin

Action: Khrushchev built wall around West Berlin overnight to keep East Germans out → walking the line of war

• checkpoints where ppl could rarley pass through w/ paperwork

• Nomads land: lined wall where guards shot trespassers

Kennedy response to Berlin Wall

Different reaction under MAD

• Kennedy does nothing “a wall is better than a war”

• + by building a wall Khruschev is accepting the regions boundaries

Cuban Missile Crisis

3. October 1962

Closest USSR & US come to fighting nuclear war due to geography of issue

• Khruschev panic strat: Launch-pads for nuclear missiles + soccer fields (v baseball) discovered in Cuba by US indicating Soviet presence

• US response: just shy of war: blockade Cuba from Soviet weaponry BUT soviets continue to approach

• So, US threatens invasion of Cuba if blockade breached (citizens encouraged to prepare for nuclear war)

  • Soviets approach blockade, then turn around

Meetings behind Cuban Missile Crisis

It is later discovered that there were secret communications between Khrushchev and Kennedy (leaders discover the other is not crazy)

• Post days of negotiation: US removes missiles from Italy & USSR from Cuba

• Turkey Moscow-Washington Hotline: established connecting operator at each capital to each other 24/hrs

Nuclear Test Ban Treaty

4. 1963 The end of an era

Negotiations = agreement between leaders to stop testing nuclear weapons (displays of aggression + fear)

• only Underground testing is permitted. 

• realized that they had come dangerously close to nuclear war + sought to reduce tensions between nations

The Chinese Sphere: MAD

1964-1968: The Vietnam War/Johnson Years

Johnson to power

• Escalation of US in Vietnam under Johnson

• Gulf of Tonkin

• Operation Rolling Thunder

• Search & Destroy Tactics

• Tet Offensive

The Cold War in Asia (repeat)

• After Mao and the CCP came to power in China in 1949 and Kim Il Sung came to power in North Korea, there was a fear that communism would spread rapidly throughout Asia

  • Domino Theory: US theory that communism would spread out of China into neighboring countries and beyond like falling dominos → many small communist rebellions began spawning (w/ financial support from Soviets + China)

  • Communism contained in Europe but now needed containment in Asia 

Lyndon Johnson

Democrat

President From 1963-1968 → VP for Kennedy and campaings as Kennedy 2.0

• The Great Society: improve life → 400+ policies enabled by Johnson's aggressive (life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness) to get rid of obstacles (black, gender, education, housing, healthcare, broadcasting equality)

Worldview

• post WWII: Johnson was committed to the ideology of containment + personal psychology

  • Trying to appear “tough on communism” in the wake of his opponent, Barry Goldwater’s, campaign attacks 

  • masculine, in control

Vietnam Context

After Korea, the next flare up of communism in Asia was in Vietnam

• Vietnam was a French colony from mid 1800s to 1954

• First Indochina War in 1954 =Vietnam defeated france

• The Geneva Peace Accords of 1954, provided for the temporary partition of Vietnam at the 17th parallel

  • North Vietnam: communist regime, supported by the USSR and the PRC, led by of Ho Chi Minh.

  • South Vietnam:  Republican government, led by President Ngo Dinh Diem (Diem is killing Bundists, US eventually teams w/ his brother to kill him)

• History of US involvement

  • Truman = $ to the French vs Vietnam

  • Eisenhower = props up Diem (South Vietnamese authoritarian)

  • Kennedy = Sends military advisors to Vietnam

Escalation of US in Vietnam under Johnson

1963: Johnson decided he wanted to increase America’s involvement in Vietnam bc of:

1. Inertia: Continue involvement because that is what his predecessors had done.

2. Desire to Remembered as A Great President: Johnson did not want to be remembered as a President who lost Southeast Asia to Communism.

3. Fear of being seen as weak: 1963 was an election year, and Barry Goldwater, the Republican candidate, was running on the platform that LBJ was “too soft” on communism. Johnson wanted to prove that he was tough on communism and so he took advantage of a small naval incident in August 1964 at the Gulf of Tonkin

Gulf of Tonkin

FRIST TIME: congress supported war post WWII (previously only supported funding)

• In August 1964, North Vietnam launched an attack against 2 American ships on call in the Gulf of Tonkin. 

  • “1st attack” occurred on August 2, 1964 (in actuality the US attacked the Vietnamese first)

  • 2nd attack was supposed occur but didn’t

• The Johnson administration used the attack to obtain the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution: that gave the president broad war powers (allows him to deploy military w/o being full scale war)

  • Significance: Later revealed (via leek to Washington post) US provoked them and there was no second attack

    • = beginning of tarnishing of LBJ’s rep and American gov cant be trusted

Operation Rolling Thunder

1965: US (Johnson) beings bombing North Vietnam for 6 weeks too:

• clear dense jungle cover, w/ carcinogenic Agent Orange, regular bombs, and sticky napalm bombs = horrific burns

Fails because: Johnson underestimates North Vietnam tactics

• North Vietnamese Regular Army

• Viet Cong: guerrilla warfare (improvised) recruiting civilians to confuse and trick the enemy (grows out of Chinese/Mao strats)

  • Rolling Thunder only targeted military bases leaving massive Viet Cong army remaining

Search & Destroy Tactics

In an attempt to reveal the Viet Cong members villagers while remaining humanizing, villagers were rounded up and interrogated

Ineffective

• Vietnamese were silent due to VC death threats, felt alienated by Americans (bad for democracy)

• Soldiers were exhausted, needed in large amounts, felt defeated: making no progress or treating all as enemy

Significance: Johnsons inability to recognize Vietnamese intelligence = unnecessary brutality

• Communism was embedded in nationalism + pride/independence making it more difficult to squash

• resulted in more drafts

• resulted in depressing death toll counts not land gained

Lottery Draft

1969 drafted majority of young men based on bday

• inc public protest

Tet Offensive

1968: Tet/Lunar New Year expected to be recognized by both sides as cease fire as usual

• North Vietnamese launch major bombings across dozens of cities easily moving supplies under guise of holiday

  • = scramble of South who manages to hold cities successfully

  • public evaluation: Walter Cronkite breaks new rules giving editorial → “we are loosing war” “we’ve been bested by flower carts)

• Protests erupt: pacificists, racialists, college students, assisnations

The Middle Eastern Sphere: MAD

1950s-60s: Evolving Nationalists + American intervention

• Eisenhower Doctrine 1957

• The Six-Day War 1967

Eisenhower Doctrine

1957 Eisenhower Doctrine: America will provide economic aid or military assistance to any Middle Eastern nation threatened by armed aggression from another state

• Build off Monroe + Truman Doctrine: Europe threatening their expansion into Western hemisphere, Wilsonian/containment

• With the Eisenhower Doctrine, the United States emerged as the dominant Western power in the Middle East

Goal: keep nationalism at bay (tamed Mossadegh in Iran w/ coup but desire to continue control)

The Six-Day War

1967: implementation of Eisenhower Doctrine

Context: Israel nuclear weapon program = tension w/ Arab states

• results in terrorist group Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) based in Egypt, Syria, Jordan bc that’s the only way to combat Israel (think Vietnam guerilla war)

6-Day War:

• Israel launches attacks on PLO states: Egypt, Syria, Jordan

Result: Israel gains Gaza Strip, the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and the Sinai Peninsula 

• As Israeli forces closed in on Syria the Soviet Union (an ally of Syria) threatened war if Israel did not agree to a cease fire. 

• Johnson pressures Israel gov = cease fire

Six-Day War Significance

Israel:

• is now the preeminent military power in the region

Arab Nationalism: 

• hurt bc Palestinians would never have defeat Israel to free Palestine = more terrorisim

America:

• US no longer has to deploy troops in the Middle East because of Israel's military strength

Israel has remained a reliable surrogate ever since, allowing the United States to remain an offshore balancer in the region for long stretches of time.

A shift: The Cold War in the 70s

ONTO DETENTE