Sino Soviet Relations

This caused American and Communist Chinese forces to fight each other during the Korean War, which began in 1949. Communist threats against Taiwan in the 1950's drove the U.S. and the Chinese Communists to the brink of nuclear war. The U.S. went to war in Vietnam in part to prevent the expansion of Chinese Communism. For the United States, China today is neither an outright enemy, nor a trusted friend. Today tensions exist because of the kind of government China has, and the actions it takes.

Conflicts of national interest caused the United States and the Soviet Union to continue tension from World War II onto the Cold War, that lasted from 1947 to 1991. Although there was no direct military conflicts, there were constant nuclear threats. Over the past thirty years historians have divided themselves into different categories including: traditionalists, revisionists, and post-revisionists, and share their perspective on who caused the Cold War, the USSR or the US. Based off of three historians: Michael H Hart believes the USSR is at fault for aggressively wanting Communism to be spreaded, William Appleman Williams stated that the US is to blame for being too focused on their “open door” policy with foreign trade , and John Lewis Gaddis believes that their are at fault due to miscommunication and efforts to remain peaceful at the end of the war.

Over the past several decades, there have been great tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union which continue into what is known today as Russia. Suspicions and tensions between these two countries increased greatly during and directly after World War II, particularly between 1941 and 1949.

Relations between the United States and the Soviet Union have always been complicated. Over the entire 20th century they have been close allies to bitter rivals. The stark differences in each of their political systems prevented the USA and the USSR from maintaining a close political friendship and understanding, and even to the very edge of war.

Between circa 1925 and circa 1950, the relations between the Chinese peasants and the Chinese Communist Party became out of hand due to the peasant rebellions/uprising groups present, the tension between Japan and the communist party, and most notable the mass reform during this time period.

In foreign relations, trade had a marginal value and foreign investment both inwards and outwards were essentially absent. One of the greatest failures of Mao’s notable project ‘Great Leap Forward’ in 1958 turned out to be one of the greatest failures as it was intended to collectivize all agricultural, industrial and service life under people's communes and militias’ control . The first consequence of this measure was an economic autarky that led to one of the worst famines of the twentieth century. Developments in international policy pushed China towards a gradual isolation and growing conflicts. Eventually China's international political and economic relations degenerated and led to a serious military confrontation with its main ally, the Soviet Union and fighting a border war with India in the 60s. Isolation, political and economic, reaches its highest levels with the outbreak of the Cultural Revolution in 1966 until 1976 .

A main factor that caused the base tensions in Cold War was the opposing political systems set in place. The United States had a capitalist political system versus the communist system The Soviet Union lived by. The United States thought that the Soviets were trying to spread communism and

Fear was a large part of this as a fear of world domination by communists or nuclear holocaust, especially because the Soviet Union exploded its first A-Bomb in 1949 and China became communist.

Between 1945 and 1950, the tensions increased between the U.S. and the Soviet Union

This demonstrates that nationalism had a role in the change because each nation wanted to be the strongest and the most

Perhaps the earliest spark of disagreement between the US and Russia was during the Potsdam conference during World War II. At the time, Harry Truman had just taken over the US presidency after the death of President

Josef Stalin and Mao Zedong were both very similar and still quite different. Each of these great leaders wished to transform his country into something new and powerful. Though their methods of rule were not the same, they each were extremely effective leaders and had enormous impacts on his own country. Russia, before Stalin, could absolutely be considered as being a weak and peasant country. China, before Mao Zedong, was attempting, but failing, to modernize efficiently under Nationalism. These two countries under Stalin and Mao Zedong advanced quickly and went from being smaller and mostly powerless countries to global powers. These advances, however, did not come without sacrifice. Both countries suffered an astronomical number

The Cold War was the name given to the time period from 1945 to 1991. After World War II, tensions began between the United States and the Soviet Union. Fighting between the United States and Soviet Union did not happen directly against each other. Instead they fought with arms races, space races, and spying. Both superpowers set aside their differences to defeat Adolf Hitler, even before the war the United States distrusted the Soviet Union. The United States disliked the way the Soviet Union ran government. They believed that the Soviet Union wanted to overthrow the non-communist governments.

Prior to Communism in China, it was known to be a chaotic country on the brink of self-destruction. With the emergence of the party leader Mao Zedong, came a new hope, which filled its inhabitants with the belief that China would return to its former historical greatness. American and Chinese relations before 1971 were in simple terms described as “uneasy”, due to the American, Soviet Cold War. It was not until President Richard Nixon visited China and realized the high value of having China as a ally that relations between the two powers began to become positive. Unknown at the time, it is assumed in the book Chinese Lessons written by John Pomfret, that the relationships he formed with the people he met in China would change his outlook on life and Communist China forever.

As I understand the historical connection between China and United States, they were and in some sense still are both rivals, which began with Mao Zedong driving American-supported Chang out of China soon after the unconditional surrender of the defeat of aggressive Imperial Japan in 1945. Mao took over China and forced Chang to beat a hasty retreat to Taiwan Island. Then in l950, the world witnessed the fierce armed confrontation between Mao led China versus the United Nations' forces with the full backing of United States during the three year Korean War which eventually became a stalemate to this day. Then there was another world-shattering war between U.S. and Communist Soviet-China over the devastating Vietnam. So China had been at