COLD WAR: DIFFERENT PHASES

INTRODUCTION
From the dying embers of the Second World War rose the Cold War.
Even before World War II had reached its conclusion, the
foundations of a new hostility were laid. These hostilities took the
form of a major ideological rivalry between the United States and the
Soviet Union, which was reflected in a major arms race between the
two superpowers (these weapons, however, were never employed
against each other directly). This intense rivalry could also be
witnessed in the attempts by these two superpowers to meddle in
the affairs of other countries to check the other’s influence while
increasing their own. However, the war can be considered ‘cold’ only
in the limited sense that it never took the form of another ghastly
world war, or that the two superpowers never directly faced each
other on the battlefield. For all other purposes, the world at large
remained embroiled in complications resulting from the intense
Soviet-American rivalry and their thirst for global domination. The
term ‘Cold War’ was first used by the British writer George Orwell in
1945 and has since been used to describe “the undeclared state of
war” that had existed between United and Soviet Union since the
end of World War II.
THE BEGINNING OF THE COLD WAR
The exact date of the start of the Cold War cannot be ascertained the
way one would pinpoint the commencement date of conventional
war (for example, the Second World War started on 1st September
1939). Instead, the origins of the Cold War can be seen in the pattern
of interactions between the Western powers and the Soviet Union,
which roughly began in 1945.
The end of World War II saw major shifts in international politics.
From being multi-polar, the world became bi-polar. This essentially
meant that before the World War, there were many powerful
countries which were capable of extending their influence beyond
their borders - for example, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union,
France, United States etc. The Second World War, however, brought
with it a decisive wave of decolonisation around the globe which
heralded the end of formal empires. Britain and France, in particular,
were spent forces after the war and could no longer claim a
superpower status. Their severely depleted material resources
forced them to now primarily look after their affairs first, instead of
influencing the course of world events.
The power vacuum left by colonialism was filled by the dynamics of
the Cold War. In this new phase, neither the USA nor the Soviet
Union occupied or created colonies in the way the European powers
had done. However, they did try and create their respective zones of
influence that would ensure their security, by primarily checking the
influence of the other. This behavioural pattern was first witnessed
in Europe during the war, at the Yalta and Potsdam conferences,
where the Western Allies and the Soviet Union divided Europe into
their respective spheres of influence. Under this arrangement, most
of Eastern Europe came under formal Soviet influence, and most of
Western Europe was under American influence by extension.
Similarly, Germany was divided into East and West Germany, and the
German capital of Berlin was also similarly divided. USSR, however,
was not completely happy with the division of Berlin which was deep
in the territory under Soviet influence. In 1948, it put a blockade on
the ground between Western Germany and Berlin. This was known
as the Berlin Blockade and lasted for about a year during which the
Western allies airlifted supplies to West Berlin to curtail Soviet
expansion. This blockade was one of the first major confrontations of
the Cold War.
To rebuild Europe after the massive destruction wrought by the
Second World War, the United States embarked on a massive
mission under the Marshal Plan to pump in money and resources in
order to rebuild infrastructure in Europe. In 1949, it also signed a
pact with prominent Western European nations called the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). This was a significant move and
would remain a major feature of the Cold War for decades to come.
It is vital to understand the importance of this alliance. This treaty
formally committed the United States to ensure the security of its
Western allies. Henceforth, if any country were to declare war on a
NATO signatory, the US was bound to treat it as an act of hostility
against itself as well and jump into the war. In essence, NATO
ensured that Western Europe remained under the security umbrella
of the United States.
A similar treaty was signed by the USSR with its allies in 1955, known
as the WARSAW Pact. This essentially meant that for decades the
world again stood at the brink of another deadly world war, this time
under the shadow of nuclear weapons.
During 1945 and 1953, which is generally considered the onset of the
Cold War, there were instances of conflict and tensions that saw the
USSR and USA involved in conflict although never directly. Two
significant instances in this phase were the Berlin Blockade
(explained earlier) and the Korean War. Since the end of the Second
World War, the United States had officially followed a policy of
containment, i.e., containing the spread of Communism. It was
primarily propagated by US President Truman, and generally known
by the name of the Truman Doctrine. This doctrine resulted from the
perception that Soviet actions towards the end of World War II were
aimed at spreading their ideology around the world.
The creation of an Eastern European buffer zone between Western
Europe and Soviet Russia fuelled Western suspicions that the Soviet
objective went beyond merely a benign attempt to secure their
country from future aggressions. This zone comprised of territories
that were either formally a part of the Soviet Union, or had
governments which had ideological ties with the Soviet Union. The
Korean War reflected the clash of these two strategies.
The Korean War
Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the Chinese Communist Party
(CCP) had seized control of China in 1949 after a prolonged civil war.
At the same time, tensions were growing in neighbouring Korea
between its Communist Party and non-communist forces. Both these
forces wanted control of the entire Korean peninsula. Guided by
their strategic interest and the dynamics of the Cold War, both the
USA and the USSR supported different sides. Negotiations didn’t
yield any results, and in 1950, with the approval of the USSR, North
Korean forces crossed the 38th parallel and attacked South Korea.
USSR initially gave orders to China to send its forces to reinforce the
war effort of the regime in North Korea while choosing to not send
the Red Army there directly. Mao at that juncture was eager to
please Stalin who was the undoubted head of Communist regimes
around the world. USSR wasn’t very sure of Chinese loyalty and of its
commitment to supporting communist revolutions in other
countries, hence, Stalin decided to test the Chinese resolve by
instructing them to send their forces into North Korea. Mao Zedong
obliged and at this crucial juncture, Chinese troops overturned the
advances of UN troops led by the USA. This now meant that a war
that everyone thought would be over in under a month stretched to
over three years, claiming millions of lives. Eventually, with Stalin’s
death in 1953, the opportunity presented itself for the hostilities to
end, and both forces withdrew to either side of the 38th parallel,
which became the official border between North and South Korea.
The war demonstrated how a conflict in this new phase of global
history would look, with the two superpowers being directly or
indirectly involved. This also solidified the military alliances of the
two blocs and precipitated an arms race that the world is still trying
to control.
SECOND PHASE OF THE COLD WAR
Stalin, the man who led Soviet Russia from the Second World War
into the Cold War, died in 1953. He was succeeded by Nikita
Khrushchev, and with that began the second phase of the Cold War,
marked by many crises, some of them quite grave, like the Berlin
Crisis in 1961 and the Cuban Missile crisis in 1962.
The Berlin Crisis
As Kennedy became the 35th President of the United States of
America in January 1961, he was confronted with a major challenge
in the form of the Berlin Crisis of 1961. After the Second World War,
Berlin had been divided between the victors of the war into zones of
influence. West Berlin, like West Germany, was to remain within the
Western sphere of influence, and the Eastern half of Germany, as
well as the City of Berlin, was to remain within the Soviet sphere.
This separation was seen as critical to maintaining the delicate
balance of power in Europe. However, as time passed, West
Germany developed economically at a higher pace compared to its
Eastern counterpart. This resulted in a situation where many people
staying in Eastern Berlin preferred to work in the western part of the
city as they were getting higher wages. Besides being humiliating for
Soviet rule, this also resulted in East Berlin losing skilled labour to
West Berlin.
Officials in East Berlin knew that the issue would not be solved
merely by increasing the wages of workers in East Berlin since the
Soviet market did not offer consumer goods at levels adequate to
satisfy that kind of purchasing power. Wanting to do something
about this situation, yet not wanting to provoke it to the point of
war, Khrushchev resorted to building a wall in Germany and putting a
concrete line between the zones of influence. Overnight the lives of
people changed, families were split, neighbourhoods were split and
at times even the streets were split with houses (with their doors
sealed by the wall) being on one side and the street on the other.
People were not allowed to cross from one side to another. Those
who attempted it were either punished or shot. As glaring a human
rights violation as it was, it did not fundamentally alter the balance of
power in Germany, and hence the Western Allies could not do much
about it, short of opening hostilities and declaring a war. Since that
would have been too extreme a step, Kennedy essentially left the
wall standing, much to the anguish of his other Western Allies. The
wall was erected on 13th August 1961 and remained an enduring
symbol of Cold War politics for nearly thirty years. Consequently, the
most lasting image of the end of the Cold War is the breaking of the
Berlin Wall in 1989.
Cuban Missile Crisis
A pressing problem which came very close to triggering a nuclear war
was the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962. The United States had very bad
relations with Cuba (a state just 90 miles from the coast of Florida)
and its Communist government under Fidel Castro. Khrushchev had
pledged support to protect Castro’s regime from repeated American
harassment. However, his options for doing so were limited,
considering how close Cuba is to the US mainland. He resorted to a
radical step that he thought might show the Americans the extent he
would go to, to fulfil his resolve and protect an ally. Between July and
October 1962, the Soviets built multiple missile sites in Cuba with
both defensive and offensive capabilities. This was extremely
dangerous, and any wrong move by any leader could have plunged
the world into a world war - which would now have meant a nuclear
war. Through sheer tact and diplomacy over a span of 13 days, the
crisis was brought to an agreeable end, with the Soviets withdrawing
their missiles from Cuba. The USA agreed to not invade Cuba, and
also removed its missiles from Turkey, which could have been
employed against the USSR. Khrushchev was eager to avoid a nuclear
war and accepted these terms, dissipating the immediate tensions.
This phase had many active conflicts which can be looked at as
setting the tone of the Cold War. The Korean War had shown what it
would mean for external powers to get involved in the internal crisis
of a state, and it didn’t paint a pretty picture. A similar situation
would later be seen in Vietnam, too. One crisis however that was
slightly different in its scope at the beginning of the Cold War was
the Suez Crisis.
Suez Crisis
Egypt under President Nasser had nationalised the Suez Canal, which
was previously (primarily) owned by Britain and France. It was a
crucial and strategic waterway, ensuring short and safe passage for
their naval and merchant ships. This overnight nationalisation was a
big jolt to Britain and France, and they planned a military solution.
Under this plan, Israel attacked Egypt in the Sinai Peninsula, and the
British and French forces followed. There was one fatal flaw in the
plan: Britain didn’t inform the Americans, who were furious.
This became a source of considerable tension in the British-American
alliance. Under American and Soviet pressure, Britain, Israel and
France had to end hostilities. Britain learnt the hard way that Cold
War dynamics were here to stay, and it could no longer afford to
unilaterally call the shots in the world anymore.
This second phase of the war also coincided with a very important
change in world politics: the massive wave of decolonisation in Asia
and Africa. Although the Cold War did not trigger this process, it
nevertheless complicated it.
THIRD PHASE: DETENTE
As the 1960s ended, a major shift in Cold War patterns could be
observed. This is often described by the French word ‘detente’,
which means releasing stress or tension, and is used to denote a
thaw in tensions between hostile nations. The détente between
USSR and USA also had a French connection. In the 1960s intending
to reduce American influence in Europe, Charles de Gaulle pushed
for the greater integration of Europe. The economic strength and
stability of West Germany and France laid the foundations of the
European Economic Community (EEC). The French President began
to actively reach out to Eastern European nations to forge a broader
European identity. Detente, or a period of reduced tensions between
the US and USSR, was crucial to this effort. During the 1965 elections
in West Germany, Willy Brandt (the head of the Social Democratic
Party) also called for building bridges with Eastern Europe and the
Soviet Union. He put some of these views into action as Foreign
Minister in 1966. In 1969, Brandt became head of the government
and continued this effort through a policy that he called Ostpolitik.
Brandt knew that a credible détente could not be managed without
engaging the Soviet Union, so he openly negotiated with the Soviet
leader, Leonid Brezhnev. Willy Brandt could afford to do so without
seeming treacherous because the USA under President Nixon was
embarking on a similar mission of détente with the Soviets. Nixon
was eager to disengage the US from Indo-China, and to do so he
knew that he had to approach China and the USSR, and not just by
negotiating with Vietnamese factions in Hanoi.
A key feature of this phase was the increase in tensions between the
USSR and the PRC and a corresponding improvement in relations
between the USA and PRC. The trajectory of the changes in these
relations is very interesting. As shown earlier, the phase immediately
after the Korean War had seen an increased closeness between
China and the Soviet Union. Mao Zedong had passed the test of
commitment that Stalin had set for him. The period after the Korean
War saw increased Soviet support for the post-war rebuilding effort
in China, both economic and military.
This was not to last long and by 1969 relations between the two
countries had deteriorated to the point of border skirmishes and
hostilities. China’s internal problems, compounded by Mao’s Great
Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution, considerably affected its
diplomatic relations with other Asian and African nations, to the
point where it could have become a serious liability for the USSR. The
breakdown of Sino-Soviet relations presented the Americans with an
opportunity to improve relations with the PRC, and so it was that
President Nixon and Henry Kissinger began to engineer a
rapprochement.
Another major change was noticed in a deliberate attempt by the
two superpowers to lessen tensions between them. Both sides
recognised the dangers of an uncontrolled arms race and the spread
of nuclear weapons across the world. There were formal efforts
towards this objective, and in 1968 these efforts bore fruit in the
form of the Non-Proliferation Treaty or NPT.
The Cold War and Arms Race
The trajectory of the Cold War is intricately linked with the
simultaneous and inevitable onset of an arms race and in particular
the spread of nuclear weapons. With the dropping of the atom
bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, the Nuclear Age had
begun. To ensure their security, states had to either build a capacity
for nuclear weapons or have credible military alliances with states
that had this capacity. The insecurity generated by the Cold War
rivalry provided the perfect setting for states to spur each other
towards a deadly arms race. Each side wanted to create better and
deadlier weapons than the other. Weapons stockpiles, especially
with the two superpowers, increased massively. This massive
increase in nuclear weapons at one level created panic at the
possibility of immense destruction that these weapons could have
caused. At another level, many policymakers felt that fear of such
destruction also leads to the tempering of rash behaviour of states.
This might have led to cautious behaviour from states to avoid
nuclear destruction and has created what some analysts call the
“long peace”.
Nuclear weapons were a tool to provide credible deterrence, as well
as help in providing a counterweight to conventional military might.
This was especially true in the initial phase of the war, where the US
depended on nuclear weapons to counter the Soviet Union’s
superior conventional military might in Europe. It was a necessity,
from the American point of view, to ensure the security of its NATO
allies in Europe. Contrary to American expectations, the nuclear
monopoly that it enjoyed in Europe soon ended with the Soviet
Union conducting its nuclear tests in August 1949. This now paved
the way for a nuclear arms race that would threaten the security of
the whole world .
The intensity with which the Cold War was waged was directly
reflected in the increase or decrease in the arms build-up. A decrease
in tensions was often accompanied by a mutual pledge of non-
proliferation of nuclear weapons or a self-imposed restraint on arms
production.

COLLPASE OF DETENTE AND RE- EMERGENCE OF COLD WAR

As discussed, from the late 1960s till around the mid-1970s, the
world was witnessing a relatively calmer period of the Cold War,
known as the detente. Optimists believed that this would slowly lead
to the building of confidence between the two sides and eventually
might even end the Cold War. The sceptics largely believed that the
Cold War was here to stay, but had been transformed into a firmly
entrenched bi-polar system, where the two superpowers would
continue to influence their part of the world, albeit in a less
confrontational manner.
Not everyone was happy with the detente status-quo, especially in
America, and internal pressure built on the American government to
do something decisive about the reported Human Rights violations in
the Eastern bloc. Many Americans also started feeling that the US
had become content with taking second place in the world, and they
felt this did not align well with the country’s security interests.
International events further perpetuated this belief. With the
promise of support from Moscow, the North Vietnam government in
Hanoi attacked South Vietnam in December 1974 (Logevall, 2010).
America had already cut aid to South Vietnam by half and was not
looking forward to re-joining the war, either. The remaining
American forces were hurriedly evacuated from Saigon, and Vietnam
was united under the North Vietnam leadership. A Communist
government was set up .
The spread of Communism in Indo-China, and its barbarity, was
further highlighted by the situation in Cambodia. Here a fanatical
group of Communists under Pol Pot took control of Cambodia after
the collapse of the US-backed government there. To rid the country
of external influence, Pol Pot went on to purge nearly two and a half
million people in Cambodia, including minorities from China and
Vietnam. The Carter presidency had to deal with many such crises, in
countries ranging from Angola to Iran. However, the final blow to
Détente came in the form of the Afghanistan situation. The Soviets
militarily intervened in Afghanistan to defend the communist regime
in Kabul from factions that wanted a more Islamist government.
This was viewed by the USA as a direct challenge to its power in Asia,
and more specifically their oil interests. Carter government then
imposed all sorts of bans on cultural, economic and trade relations
with USSR, and the West even boycotted the Moscow Olympics. The
military budget was again increased to the highest levels that
peacetime USA had seen.
With this, Detente was officially buried in the sands of time, and the
sense of hostility and mistrust between the two sides increased.
Carter also lost the next US presidential election to Ronald Regan,
who now promised to restore America’s ‘lost’ prestige in the world.
Whether Reagan had any concrete solutions to the problem or not is
a different story; however, his rhetoric of restoring American
greatness was received with some panic and paranoia in Moscow,
which took it as a sign that America might be signalling the start of
another world war.
THE END OF THE COLD WAR
A return to the Cold War tensions, however, could not be sustained
for a long time as the USSR had its troubles, many of them economic.
With a fall in oil prices, their revenue was decreasing. The war in
Afghanistan, which they had assumed would quickly be tackled, now
dragged on, with the Americans assisting the Mujahidin in their fight
with the Soviets. In Europe, the gap in economic progress between
the Western and Eastern blocs was increasing rapidly. USSR and
Eastern Europe often faced shortages of even the most basic
consumer goods and this, combined with the knowledge that people
in western Europe were living in much better conditions, contributed
to widespread discontent. Ironically, it was during the Detente
period that communication between Eastern and Western blocs in
Europe had increased, and consequently, the disparities were all the
starker and more noticeable.
Another important change was: the generations born and raised
after the Second World War had no lingering memories of Hitler’s
Germany, and did not perceive it as a threat. Having witnessed the
horrors unleashed by Hitler’s Germany, many had put up with Soviet-
backed regimes in the hope of being protected against any future
German aggression. With this threat greatly reduced, the rationale of
remaining under the Soviet umbrella sans economic security seemed
an increasingly daunting prospect.
Another related problem came to the fore in Poland. To find a way
out of the financial crisis it was in, the Government of Poland tried to
borrow money. Western banks were initially eager to lend them
money, thinking that Poland still had a few strong export sectors that
it could rely on to pay back that debt. However, with time they
realised that Polish goods were uncompetitive, due to low-quality
production processes, and their sales suffered. The debt crisis
intensified, and the government was forced to increase prices again.
A similar trend could also be seen in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.
They were also increasingly disillusioned by the system in Eastern
Europe when compared to Western Europe, and they increasingly
began to refer to themselves as being central Europeans who were
under the occupation of Soviet culture (Westad 2017). East Germany
also had a similar tale of economic stagnation and discontent to tell.
To face these myriad challenges, the Soviet Union chose the 54-year-
old Mikhail Gorbachev, the youngest member of its Politburo, as the
General Secretary of the Party. Gorbachev set about reforming the
Soviet Union as he saw best, but there were no easy solutions. He
had to find a way of reducing defence spending without
compromising on the USSR’s superpower status. Hence, improving
the economy was crucial, which Gorbachev now understood could
not be achieved without some cooperation with the West. He did not
have much hope or trust in dealing with the Americans, but he did
place some hope in dealing with Western European countries.
Meanwhile, Reagan was increasingly getting worried about starting a
nuclear war by pushing the paranoid Russians too far. It was in this
backdrop that he suggested a joint summit to address the issue of
nuclear weapons. Gorbachev did not completely believe him, but
went anyway to ease tensions between USSR and USA, and buy time
to set the Soviet economy in place. Besides the issue of nuclear
weapons, Gorbachev also indicated to Reagan his willingness to work
together to address regional conflicts, and of his plans to open up
and reform the Soviet economy. It was a daunting task, with rampant
sluggishness in the systems of the Soviet Union, and also its
commitments in Afghanistan, which were showing no signs of
abating.
By 1986, Gorbachev was working on his new initiatives called
perestroika (restructuring) and glasnost (openness). He wanted to
fundamentally restructure the Soviet economy and hoped to
increase efficiency and accountability with these approaches. He
started giving more autonomy to factories to set their own goals and
even sell surplus directly to consumers. Private ownership of
business in some sectors was also allowed. However, it was difficult
to introduce radical reforms in a society too set in its ways. As a
result, what little reform was introduced did more harm than good
and the Soviet economy weakened further.
His policy of glasnost, which allowed criticism of the system and the
government to improve its functioning, opened the floodgates for an
outpouring of frustrations that people had experienced for a long
time, without the liberty to express them. Under this influence, the
Soviet press started digging into the past excesses of the Soviet
regime right from the Stalin era. Gorbachev felt that this outpouring
of criticisms of past deeds would help him in consolidating his
position for the current reforms that he was proposing. But by 1988-
89, food shortages were rampant and political unrest was growing.
In March 1989, for the first time, the USSR held elections to a new
parliament. Gorbachev felt that the Cold War had reached its end
and wanted to focus on restructuring the Soviet Union. However, by
1991 even this objective was being called into question, and most
constituents gradually decided to break away from the Soviet Union .
LET US SUM UP
Cold War has been one of the most defining features of the 20th
century. It was the result of an intense ideological rivalry between
the USA and USSR. The Cold War began right after the Second World
War in 1945 and continued till 1991 when the Soviet Union
collapsed. The two superpowers aimed to spread their influence
while checking the spread of their opponent’s influence. The Cold
War saw a huge build-up of nuclear and conventional weapons by
both the superpowers. There was a real threat of a nuclear war
specially during the Cuban Missile crisis. In a bid to ensure that
governments sympathetic to their ideology was in place in different
countries of the world, USA and USSR often got involved in different
conflicts, many of them stretched for years, like the Korean War,
Vietnam War and the war in Afghanistan. In the latter part of the
1960s, there was a period of relative easing of tensions between the
two adversaries known as détente. It lasted for a few years and then
the rivalry peaked again. However, by the end of the 1980s, USSR
and European countries under the Eastern bloc were increasingly
getting disillusioned with the Soviet agenda owing to large scale
economic issues. Although Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet
Union did try to introduce much needed economic reforms, it was
too little and too late. Eventually, in 1991 the Soviet Union collapsed
and the Cold War ended with the USA remaining as the sole
superpower. The effects of the Cold War still linger in world politics
even today.