Khrushchev 's Influence On America

The Cold War changed American society by introducing both foreign and domestic fear into the lives of Americans. It brought neighbor against neighbor, and a trembling thoughts to all Americans. It gave an upper-hand to the men in the branches of Federal Government, and especially to the HUAC; moreover it

After the ravages of World War II, the United States experienced a long period of economic boom, thanks to industrial weapons work and to the low price of oil. At the same time, under this nationwide economic prosperity, Americans felt increasing fear in the looming shadow of the communist Soviet Union. The US seemed to be in a spiral. Sputnik’s successful launch increased tensions that had been building since the aftermath of World War II; while President Eisenhower and his administration instituted numerous measures to calm down the hysteria that pervaded the US, these attempts had no real effect on de-escalating tensions felt between both sides.

The Cold War propelled the United States of America into a seat of previously unattained power in the world . American citizens spearheaded the push toward advancement in their search for the epitome of happiness: the “American Dream”. Post-war paranoia was driven by the supposed threat of the spread of communism, which Americans feared could interfere with the freedoms and liberties the founding fathers fought to achieve. This paranoia eventually controlled the thoughts and actions of citizens everywhere. The Second Red Scare spread across America like a virus, leaving a trail of dread and despair in its wake. The fear of the growing communist regime, a lack of trust between citizens and the government, and a zealous streak of American pride drove the U.S. toward internal conflict and potential devastation.

The United States and Communist Russia endured a complicated relationship in the first half of the 20th century. In the early 1940’s the U.S. had encouraged an alliance with the Soviets against their common enemy, Nazi Germany. This short-lived accord began to deteriorate as WW II ended. By 1947 U.S. policy toward the Soviet Union had shifted from one of cooperation to a policy of containment. In 1949, when the Soviets tested their first atomic bomb, it was a widely-held belief in the U.S. that the Russians were an untrustworthy enemy with plans to invade the United States. America’s mood turned on American Communists, labeling them traitors and Russian spies. Underlying a domestic sense of well-being in the United States in the 1950’s

. President Reagan had an agenda regarding the USSR and the Cold War; he developed a strategy that the Soviet Union could not keep up with. (Shultz, 2104). He used the media to spread his view of the Soviet Union; furthermore, he reinstated the production of the military’s arsenals and expanded missile productions. Financially, the Soviet Union did not the resources to keep pace with America’s developing defense. In conclusion, the Cold War ended with rather high costs for all parties involved. America’s economic struggles continued, the Soviet Union pulling out of Afghanistan allowed the immergence of the Taliban, and the discovery of American weapons being sold to our enemy became the main

After the ravages of World War II, the United States experienced a long period of economic boom, thanks to the increased production of weapons during the war and to the low price of oil. However, despite the nationwide economic prosperity, Americans felt increasing fear in the looming shadow of the communist Soviet Union. Sputnik’s successful launch increased tensions that had been building since the aftermath of World War II; as a result, President Eisenhower and his administration instituted numerous measures to calm down the hysteria that pervaded the US, but these attempts had no real effect on reducing tensions felt by both sides.

Amidst these, cold war fears re-emerged when in 1956 Soviet Union invaded Hungary after its withdrawal from Warsaw Pact and in the same year space race began when Soviet launched Sputnik I into space. Though the communist presence of J.Edgar Hoover loomed, and with the public demise of McCarthy in 1954, the paranoia and Red baiting of the early decade ebbed. Halliwell rightly quotes Ronald J. Oakley who in his book God’s Country: America in the 50’s calls it “a period of paradoxes”, and “fidgety mix of anxiety and relaxation, sloth and achievement, complacency and self-criticism” (49). After Soviet Union exploded atomic weapon in 1949 soon after World War II, it made Americans wondering about Soviet espionage and the nation was gripped by fear “Better dead than Red” the anti-communist slogan that was in rife during World

In his careful handling of “the Sputnik ‘crisis,’” Eisenhower was able to alleviate any pressure on the Soviet Union, but the same could not be said about the fears of Americans (421-422). When America had to play catch-up in space technology and when Eisenhower minced the details on American nuclear superiority, he barely “half-succeeded” in allaying American fears (422). Unfortunately, this was only one of many issues that Eisenhower faced before the end of his time

As World War II came to a close, there stood a decimated Europe. Acres of land were laid to waste and ruin and millions of people died or displaced. To rebuild the (ravished) continent, control was given to the victors of the war: the United States, United Kingdom, France, and the Soviet Union. With time, tensions grew between the Soviet Union and the western nations and a more concrete division between the two was reinforced, splitting Europe in half for half of a century. The lives of those who lived in these affected areas would differ drastic over the decades; while at first, reconstruction of the entire region meant that there were similar experiences on both sides, in the long-run, those who lived on the western end of the Iron Curtain

Robert Cottrell is reviewing Khrushchev: The Man and His Era by William Taubman, who is also the co-author of Khrushchev's Cold War, a work investigated in the summer assignment. Cottrell has worked for The Economist and Financial Times as Moscow bureau chief and has written a plethora of reviews on the topic of Russia; he also hosts the website The Browser where he reviews and recommends books to a general audience. Adeptly summarizing and analyzing the main points of Taubman's book, he makes a few points which are contrary to some of the other sources analyzed in the summer, such as saying that the public effect of the 20th congress speech was not noticeable and that Khrushchev's negotiations over the Cuban Missile crisis were "panicky" (FOOTNOTE).

Negotiations between US and USSR were tense with either side trying to gain the upper hand, Kennedy later confessed that Khrushchev ‘beat the hell out of me’)

The first source which will be evaluated in depth is an extract from Premier Khrushchev’s autobiography, Khrushchev Remembers published in 1970. The purpose of this source is for the justification of Khrushchev’s personal account for why missiles were placed in Cuba, expressing his specific reasons and role in placing missiles, as the Soviet Union’s Premier. The context of the source is that it was published in 1970, exactly eight years after the Cuban missile crisis and that Soviet Union’s Premier Khrushchev was involved in this. The value of this source is that it gives an account of Khrushchev’s reasons for placing the missiles. As Khrushchev was discharged from his Premiership following the crisis, he could candidly account for his interpretation

“The Cold War became a dominant influence on many aspects of American society for much of the second half of the twentieth century. It escalated due to antagonist values between the United States, representing capitalism and democracy, and the Soviet Union, representing communism and authoritarianism” (Tradshad, par. 1). This long lasting war had a lot of negative effects on the American people, but also helped many in a positive way of becoming free citizens. Although most people had feelings of hatred toward the Soviet Union, a sense of fear swept over the United States and many actions had to be taken to keep the enemy and their influences out. 4 done.

During the formative years of the Cold War, Germany had become both the potential balancer and ideological battleground between the East and the West. After Stalin's death in 1953 tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union seemed to be improving. However, by the late 1950s when Khruschev took over power, hostility was on the rise due to his efforts to bully the United States into "détente through intimidation." Khruschev wished for, among other things, a reunited Germany under Soviet terms and conditions. The Soviet Union's efforts to intimidate the United States led to several global crises. "Ironically, two of these crises, the construction of the Berlin Wall and the Cuban

Khrushchev fervently believed in communism and the prospects of the Soviet Union as a world power. He was much older and more experienced than Kennedy, but in global relations, the United States held the upper hand. Khrushchev was well aware of the Soviet Union as the weaker power and used intimidation to create a sense of apprehension within the United States. The threat of nuclear war for Khrushchev was not to reach a boiling point with Kennedy, but to give “the Americans a taste of their own medicine” (Dobbs 37). Therefore, the American and Soviet people felt unremitting trepidation because of possible nuclear war.