Chapter 10. The End of the Cold War

Learning Checklist

Focus 1: The Decline of the USSR and the end of the Cold War

The rise and fall of detente
Soviet Economy before the 1970s
Opposition to Communism in Eastern Europe
The Brezhnev Doctrine
Ageing leadership

Focus 2: The Escalation of US-USSR tensions in the 1980s

US economic and military superiority
Gorbachev's reforms
- Glasnost
- Perestroika
- Foreign Policy Reforms
- The Reagan - Gorbachev summits
- De-ideologisation of Soviet Foreign Policy

Focus 3: The Impact of Gorbachev's political and economic reforms on the USSR and its fall

Collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe, 1989
Collapse of the USSR

Detente - "Easing of tensions"

Detente: A period of the easing of Cold War tensions between the US and the Soviet Union from 1967 to 1979, seen through

Increased trade and cooperation
Signing of the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) treaties.

The "thawing out" of Cold War tensions by President Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford and Soviet General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev marked a decade of improved relations between the nations, an increase in trade, and the negotiation and signing of key nuclear arms treaties.

In the 1970s, the Cold War entered a period known as 'Detente'. Detente is a French word, which translates to relaxation. Both sides were keen to reduce tensions and build a more peaceful relationship, following various crises in the 1960s such as the Cuban Missile Crisis*.

Cuban Missile Crisis, also known as CMC, is not part of your syllabus. However, it would be good for you to understand how CMC contributed to detente during this period.

The Cuban Missile Crisis of Oct 1962 was a direct and dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War and was the moment when the two superpowers came closest to nuclear conflict.

Read the following article for more information on CMC.

A 'break' during Cold War: End of Detente

Relations between the two superpowers began to deteriorate once more when Brezhnev made the decision to invade Afghanistan to support the communist government against Islamic extremists. The US public reacted by voting for Ronald Reagan who followed a hardline stance against the USSR, calling it an ’evil empire’ and increasing US military spending. United States also refused to the SALT II treaty in America because of Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

With Ronald Reagan’s election in 1980, America started to pursue a more interventionist anti-communist foreign policy, which seemed to reverse the détente of the prior three presidents. Concerned about increasing Soviet military power, the ascendance to power of communists in the western hemisphere, and a loss of American confidence through what he called “the Vietnam syndrome,” Reagan pushed for a stronger anti- communist role for the United States in the world.

Who is Mikhael Gorbachev?

Soviet official: General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1985 to 1991.
President of the Soviet Union in 1990-1991.
Made the effort to democratise his country's political system and decentralise its economy, which led to the downfall of communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.
He ended the Soviet Union's postwar domination of Eastern Europe.
Awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1990 for his role in ending the Codl War and spent his later years collecting accolades and awards from all corners of the world. Yet, he was widely despised at home.
Opposition within his country was brewing. On Aug 19, 1991, a group of Communist hard liners took control of the country by sending tanks into Moscow, where they were met by angry protestors.
Gorbachev was under house arrest at his vacation villa on the Black Sea at the time.

In a 1992 interview with the media, Gorbachev said, "I see myself as a man who started the reforms that were necessary for the country and for Europe and the world."

Gorbachev, a Reformer

Soon after taking power, Gorbachev began a campaign to end his country's economic and political stagnation, using "glasnost" or openness, to help achieve his goal of "perestroika" or restructuring.
Gorbachev freed political prisoners, allowed open debate and multi-candidate elections, gave his countrymen freedom to travel, halted religious oppression, reduced nuclear arsenals, established closer ties with the West and did not resist the fall of Communist regimes in Eastern European satellite states.
Glasnost — meaning "openness", particularly openness of information, loosening of state censorship of media
Perestroika — meaning a "restructuring", specifically of the Communist economy and political system. Incorporation of some features of a market economy into the Soviet economy, by loosening price controls, encouraging more entrepreneurism and limited private businesses and by making imported consumer goods easier to purchase.
The terms above went hand-in-hand because, together, the reforms described would make the Soviet Union more democratic and incorporate some features of capitalism to revitalise the economy.
Also, Gorbachev's innovative foreign policy was to prevent a nuclear war with the West, which he believed was the greatest threat to the planet. His efforts, however, had an unintended side effect — the disintegration of the Eastern bloc and subsequent dissolution of the Soviet Union.
- Advocated for "a world without war, without an arms race, a nuclear-free and non-violent world" for the sake of all mankind.
- Met with President Ronald Reagan in Geneva and started the conversation on arms limitation — signed the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty in Washington
- Ended the disastrous war with Afghanistan by sanctioning the withdrawal of the Soviet troops on May 1988.
Most importantly, he saw his reforms as a work to return to the principles of Soviet founder, Vladimir Lenin, and an attempt to rebuild the failing command economy and humanise the rigorous communist doctrine.

Collapse of Soviet Union

Watch the video on the reasons for the fall of the Soviet Union

Structural Factors that gradually weakened the Soviet Union

The Soviet economy had faced stagnation.
The Soviets had always feared the superiority of US military technology and nuclear weapon systems. US Star Wars weapon systems meant Soviet revenues devoted to defense would have to increase, further depriving ordinary citizens of revenues for medical research, infrastructure, and consumer goods.
Nationalism in Eastern Europe and the USSR itself had become more pronounced as the dream of a classless communist society became illusory.
Soviet disbursements of funds into Eastern Europe resulted in higher and higher costs as Soviet military presence and subsidies to unproductive factories siphoned off funds that could be spent at home.
The creation of the 35-nation Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) and its achievement of Helsinki Accords in 1975 created new norms of international behaviour, including the right to self-determination, the right to travel and respect for human rights, and fundamental freedoms. They were not always respected, but the accords and the annual meetings created a more stable international environment and a basis of change within USSR and Eastern Europe.

Mikhael Gorbachev's Reforming Strategies

Glasnost
National movement: Gorbachev's early decision not to use force to repress freedom movements in Poland had influenced the Hungarians and East Germans each of whom achieved independence in 1989 without Soviet repression.
Perestroika
Abolished the Communist Party by Gorbachev: removed central organizing principle of the Soviet system. The government were then free to make policy and effect change, but without the traditional party structures, the government had no guiding principles by which to make decisions. With an ineffective government, the USSR's most powerful institution was destroyed.