Ending the Cold War, Research Paper Example

In the essay “The Man Who Broke the Evil Empire,” Peter Schweizer contends that the bulk of responsibility for the collapse of the Soviet Union was due to the presence and influence of President Ronald Reagan who “made the Soviets spend so much on defense that their ‘Evil Empire’ collapsed.” Schweizer also declares that as early as 1982, President Reagan and his military advisors created a “strategic offensive designed to attack the fundamental weaknesses of the Soviet system” (1994, p. 406). In sum, the Cold War came to a conclusion because of Reagan’s staunch opposition to communism and his dedication to bringing an end to what he called the “Evil Empire.” As support for his argument, Schweizer quotes a number of individuals that were present when the Soviet Union fell apart and utilizes one important primary document–the National Security Decision Directive 75, a “written order from the President directing his senior advisors on major foreign policy matters” with the major goal being to substantially decrease Soviet power from a military and economic standpoint (1994, p. 410).

Although Schweizer does not provide a list of his primary and secondary sources, he does quote a number of individuals that played major roles in bringing the Soviet Union to its knees in the late 1980’s. For example, Schweizer mentions William Casey, the director of Central Intelligence; Caspar Weinberger of the Department of Defense; and of course, Mikhail Gorbachev who “not only launched glasnost. . . but started perestroika or the restructuring of the Soviet Union” (1994, p. 406). In this way, all of the sources quoted or paraphrased by Schweizer are interrelated, especially considering that Schweizer’s essay was included in his 1994 book Victory which does contain hundreds of highly reliable primary and secondary sources. For the most part, all of these sources tend to support one another; otherwise, Schweizer’s main argument concerning President Reagan and his major role in ending the Cold War and the Soviet Union would fall apart academically.

Message-wise, all of the sources convey the same general ideas and concepts, due to their origins during the time of the fall of the Soviet Union and their relevancy to Schweizer’s main argument or thesis. The main strength of these sources is based on first-hand knowledge and experience by those who were present during Reagan’s Presidency and who witnessed the collapse of the “Evil Empire” in 1989. They also provide the proper perspective on the subject and help to support Schweizer’s final observation–that without the “aggressive policies of the Reagan Administration, a weakened Soviet Union might still be lumbering on the world stage” (1994. p. 414).

In the essay  “Some Lessons From the Cold War,” historian Arthur M. Schlesinger posits that it is “irrelevant to allocate blame for the Cold War” which in his opinion was a “fundamental debate between communism and liberalism” which “charged the Cold War with its religious intensity.” Schlesinger also declares that there are six basic fallacies about the Cold War related to the “perception of events by both sides” and the fact that “human error, exaggeration, misunderstanding, and over-interpretation all played a key role” in maintaining the tensions and differences between the U.S. and the Soviet Union (1992, p. 415).

Schlesinger also declares that since the end of the Cold War, historians have started to view this event as a “terrible human predicament” and as a situation that exuded much conflict and tension (1992, p. 416). Thus, the current historical perspective related to the Cold War ranges from a true human tragedy to a conflict filled with wickedness on the part of the Soviet Union and its leaders, especially Josef Stalin who initiated a number of purges in the 1930’s and after World War II that resulted in his absolute domination of the Soviet Union via an “iron hand” which later led to the labeling of the division between East and West Germany as the “Iron Curtain.”

Schlesinger’s arguments are fully supported by some outstanding historians, such as Sir Herbert Butterfield, a noted British historian; American historian John Lewis Gaddis who refers to the end of the Cold War from an historiographic perspective as an “emerging post-revisionist synthesis” via an analytical approach to define and understand the complexities of the fall of the Soviet Union; and Henry Kissinger who once remarked that the two “superpowers” (i.e., the U.S. and the Soviet Union) were like “two heavily armed blind men feeling their way around a room” while being terrified of the other (Schlesinger, 1992, pp. 416-418).

One cannot really say that Schlesinger’s essay contains some flaws and weaknesses, simply because Schlesinger was one of the most outstanding academic historians and thinkers of the late 20th century. Thus, when Schlesinger’s essay is laid side-by-side to that of Schweizer, they tend to support one another in many ways with the exception being that Schlesinger does not see the need to place blame on any one individual. In fact, Schlesinger admits that he is not an “unlimited admirer” of Ronald Reagan, but does give the President “his share of credit for taking Mikhail Gorbachev seriously” in relation to his objectives to bring the Soviet Union into the global fold of American allies (1992, p. 422).

Overall, I tend to agree with both Schweizer and Schlesinger’s viewpoints and arguments concerning the complexities of the collapse of the Soviet Union and what brought about the end of the Cold War which began shortly after World War II, circa 1946 and endured for almost forty-five long years filled with tension and conflict. In fact, the Cold War almost brought about a nuclear war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union via the Bay of Pigs fiasco in the early 1960’s during the Presidency of John F. Kennedy. The main reason for this agreement is because of the author’s fine reputations as objective historians and their use of sources that are reliable and accurate.

As to new insights, it would appear that Mikhail Gorbachev had more to do with the collapse of the Soviet Union than President Reagan, due to his position as the leader of the Soviet Union during the Reagan Administration and his unceasing efforts to bring his country into the modern era. Although neither Schweizer nor Schlesinger mention it in their essays, it is clear that Gorbachev realized that if his programs succeeded, it would mean the end of communism in his country and would perhaps bring about the total collapse of the Soviet government. In fact, this is exactly what happened.

As to the question “What does it mean to be an American?” in relation to the readings, both Schweizer and Schlesinger represent the best of what America has to offer in the way of knowledgeable and reliable historians. Part of the reason for this is their objectivity and the use of factual information as opposed to fallacy and myth. But what I find most intriguing is the notion that Americans like Reagan are a very determined group of individuals and that when they dedicate themselves to solving a problem or a dilemma like the Cold War, nothing stands in their way. In the end, good triumphed over evil, and democracy won over communism, all because of good old-fashioned American perseverance.

References

Schlesinger, A.M. (1992). Some lessons from the Cold War. In The End of the Cold War: Its Meaning and Implications. Ed. Michael J. Hogan. UK: Cambridge University Press.

Schweizer, P. (1994). The man who broke the evil empire. In Victory. New York: Grove/Atlantic, Inc.