The Origins of the Cold War 1941-49

The Origins of the Cold War 1941-49

There are now two great nations in the world, which starting from different points, seem to be advancing toward the same goal: the Russians and the Anglo-Americans ... [E]ach seems called by some secret design of Providence one day to hold in its hands the destines of half the world.

Alexis de Toequeville, 1835

With the defeat of the Reich and pending the emergence of the Asiatic, the African, and perhaps the South American nationalism, there remain in the world only two Great Powers capable of confronting each other-the United States and Soviet Russia. The laws of both history and geography will compel these two Powers to a trial of strength, either military or in the fields of economics and ideology. The same laws make it inevitable that both Powers should become enemies of Europe. And it is equally certain that both these Powers will sooner or later find it desirable to seek the support of the sole surviving great nation in Europe, the German people.

Adolf Hitler, 1945

Six Big Ideas Regarding the

Origins of the Cold War:

Number #1

Domestic Issues drive Foreign Policy both in the United States and in the Soviet Union.

Number #2

The United States has three distinct approaches to the Soviet Union in the 1940s:

Roosevelt - Internationalism

Harriman & Deane - Carrot and Stick

Kennan - Containment

Number #3

Kennan's policy is "particularization." To win domestic support, the policy becomes one of "Universalism." This changes the nature of the struggle from geopolitical to ideological.

Number #4

Nuclear weapons changed how international relations were conducted. The nature of security changes from physical to psychological.

Number #5

In seeking the their legitimate security needs, both the United States and the Soviet Union made each other increasingly insecure.

Number #6

The United States and the Soviet Union both created empires in Europe, the USSR by force and the US by invitation.

IB Topics in 20^th Century History

World War II, The Atomic Bomb, and the Origins of the Cold War
The creation of the Grand Alliance, the Victory of the Grand Alliance, the Atomic Bomb and the Coming of the Cold War were not inevitable or clearly foreseeable. Too often in the study of history we assume that the players should have known or foreseen what was to come. The reality is that the decade of the 40’s brought events, forces, and technology that were unimaginable and unforeseeable. By the end of the decade, these forces had transformed the world as no others ever had, and the totality of this transformation was unimaginable to those who played roles in it.

1. 
   C
   Cold War Historiography
   
   
   1. 
      Orthodoxy – The Soviet Union is responsible: Soviet Insecurity drove them to confront the United States. There was nothing the US could have done. The Ideological perspective here is that Communism is a danger/aggressive.
      
   2. 
      Revisionism – The United States is responsible: United States needs to have markets and resources to feed its economy. The Soviet Union impeded these goals and therefore had to be confronted. Economic Issues drive US policy. The Ideological perspective here is that Capitalism is the danger/aggressor.
      
   3. 
      Post-Revisionism – There is truth in both arguments. The Soviet Union under Stalin was paranoid and difficult to deal with. The United States was driven in large part by the fear of another depression. Other issues played a serious role in the origins of the Cold War: Domestic Policy, Security, Allies, and perceptions. The Ideological perspective here is that all post-revisionist do not agree. Ideology still drives their views regarding the degree of responsibility each side has.
      
   old War Historiography
   
   1. 
      The Orthodox View: Soviet Expansion and Paranoia drove them. – Their Fault (The Soviet Union is to Blame)
      

Thus Soviet leaders are driven by necessities of their own past and present position to put forward dogma which pictures the outside world as evil, hostile, and menacing, but as bearing within itself germs of creeping disease and destined to be wracked with growing internal convulsions until it is given final coup de grace by rising power of socialism and yield to a better world. This thesis provides justification for that increase of military and police power in Russia state, for that fluid and constant pressure to extend limits of Russia police power which together the natural and instinctive urges of Russian rulers. (George F. Kennan, The Long Telegram of 22 February 1946.)¹

2. 
   The Revisionist View: The Preservation of the Capitalist System was a bigger issue than the spread of Communism. (The New-Left) – Our Fault (The United Sates is to Blame)
   

Seen in historical perspective, therefore, what we are accustomed to call the Cold War-meaning the confrontation between the United States, the Soviet Union, and the People’s Republic of China, between 1943 and 1971-is in reality only the most recent phase of a more general conflict between the established system of western capitalism and its internal and external opponents. The broader view not only makes it possible to understand more clearly why American foreign policy has been criticized by conservatives as well as radicals but also provides a fuller grasp of the long struggle by China (and other nations) against being reconstructed as a part of the western system. It should also deepen our determination to break free of the assumptions, beliefs, and habits that have carried us so close to the abyss of thermonuclear war.²

Nevertheless, and allowing for these differences, there would appear to have been four interlocking propositions upon which the New Left view rested:

1. 
   That post war American foreign policy approximated the classical Leninist model of Imperialism-…
   
2. 
   That this internally motivated drive for empire left little room for accommodating the legitimate security interests of the Soviet Union, thereby ensuring the breakdown of wartime cooperation
   
3. 
   That the United States imposed its empire on a mostly unwilling world, recruiting it into military alliances, forcing it into positions of economic dependency, maintaining its imperial authority against growing opposition by means that included bribery, intimidation, and covert intervention.
   
4. 
   That all of this took place against the will of the people of the United States, who were tricked by cynical but skillful leaders into supporting this policy of imperialism through the propagation of the myth that monolithic communism threatened the survival of the nation.³
   

3. 
   Post-Revisionism (General) - Everybody’s Fault (A Question of the amount of Responsibility)
   

O

John Lewis Gaddis

The answer is yes, but they were said more on the basis of political conviction or personal experience than systematic archival research. What the postrevisionists have done is to confirm, on the basis of documents, several of the key arguments of the old orthodox position, and that in itself is a significant development. But postrevisionism should not be thought of as simply orthodoxy plus archives. On several major points, revisionism has had a significant impact on postrevisionist historiography. This coincidence of viewpoints between revisionists and their successors needs to be emphasized, if only to make the point that postrevisionism is something new, not merely a return to old augments.

1. 
   Postrevisionist accounts pay full attention to the use by the United States of economic instruments to achieve political ends. …
   
2. 
   Postrevisionism tends to stress the absence of an ideological blueprint for world revolution in Stalin's mind: …
   
3. 
   Postrevisionist analyses differ from their orthodox predecessors in confirming revisionist assertions that the government, from time to time, did exaggerate external dangers for the purpose of achieving certain internal goals. …
   
4. 
   But the aspect of New Left historiography that postrevisionists are likely to find most useful-and the point upon which their work will depart most noticeably from orthodox accounts-is the argument that there was in fact an American "empire."⁴
   

4. 
   Post-Revisionism (Specific Issues/Historians)
   
   1. 
      Melvyn Leffler – The Security Dilemma
      

Neither the Americans not the Soviets sought to harm the other in 1945. But each side, in pursuit of its security interests, took steps to arouse the other’s apprehensions. Moreover, the protests that each country’s actions evoked from the other fueled the cycle of distrust as neither could comprehend the fears of the other, perceiving its own actions as defensive. Herein rests the classic security dilemma. Postulating a state of international anarchy – and, given world conditions in 1945, this was much more than a theoretical construct – the security dilemma assumes that each country’s quest for security raises the anxieties of a prospective adversary, provokes countermeasures, and results in less security for everyone.⁵

2. 
   Vladislav Zubok & Constantine Pleshakov – The Revolutionary-Imperial paradigm
   

… The result was a strange amalgam of ideological proselytism and geopolitical pragmatism that began to evolve in Soviet Russia in the early 1920s. Marxism was a utopian teaching, but since it proclaimed that the goal of the material transformation of the world was to be realized in a violent confrontation with its opponents, Communist proselytes developed a whole set of highly effective political institutions. Utopian ideals gave way to ruthless and cynical interpretation of the realpolitik tradition.

The combination of traditional Russian messianism and Marxist ideology produced something larger (though more fragile) than its parts taken separately. The two phenomena became completely blurred in the USSR by the 1920s and remained that way until the collapse of the Soviet regime in 1991. Together they provide a theoretical explanation of Soviet foreign policy behavior – the revolutionary-imperial paradigm.⁶

3. 
   Geir Lundestad – Empire by Invitation/Integration vs. Empire by Force
   
   1. 
      The United States established an Empire in Europe by Invitation/Integration (contrasted to its Asian/Latin American spheres of influence)
      

The Europeans in fact “invited” the Americans to play the overall role they did in Western Europe after the Second World War. The Americans in turn basically trusted the Europeans. Dulles thus believed it was almost certain that the United States and Western Europe would stay close together for the very good reason that the Western European nations and the United States “were part and parcel of Western civilization, with similar religions, culture, and other fundamental affinities.” Or, in McGeorge Bundy’s words, in the end America’s confidence in Europe rested “on deeper and more solid ground” since the European peoples are “our cousins by history and culture, by language and religion. We are cousins too in our current sense of human and social purpose.”

Again, in other parts of the American “empire” or sphere of influence, where the interests of the United States and local governments did not coincide to the extent they did in Western Europe, American rule could be more direct. When necessary, the United States was certainly able to act much more imperially than it did in Western Europe.⁷

1. 
   The Soviet Union established an Empire in Europe by Force (contrasted to its Asian/Latin American spheres of influence)
   
1. 
   John Lewis Gaddis (1972 version) – The Soviet Union had Greater Room to Maneuver
   

If one must assign responsibility for the Cold War, the most meaningful way to proceed is to ask which side had greater opportunity to accommodate itself, at least in part, to the other’s position, given the range of alternatives as they appeared at the time. Revisionists have argued that American policy-makers possessed greater freedom of action, but their view ignores the constraints imposed by domestic politics. Little is known even today about how Stalin defined his options, but it does seem safe to say that the very nature of the Soviet system affords him a larger selection of alternatives than were open to leaders of the United States. The Russian dictator was immune from pressure of Congress, public opinion, or the press. Even ideology did not restrict him: Stalin was the master of communist doctrine, not a prisoner of it, and could modify or suspend Marxism-Leninism whenever it suited him to do so. This is not to say that Stalin wanted a Cold War – he had every reason to avoid one. But his absolute powers did give him more chances to surmount the internal restraints on his policy than were available to his democratic counterparts in the West.⁸

5. 
   Walter LaFeber – The Contradiction
   

American policymakers soon discovered an even greater problem. Their own policy was contradictory. Neither Roosevelt nor his successor, Harry S. Truman, ever reconciled the contradictions. That failure was a major cause of the Cold War. The contradiction contained an economic and a political factor.⁹

5. 
   Other Historiographic Issues
   
   1. 
      The End of the War and Germany
      

Germany was going to be divided at the end of World War II whatever else happened: invasion on several fronts by several enemies ensured different treatment from that accorded the Japanese. In a sense, Hitler himself - who collected enemies as avidly as he collected bad art - was the architect of German disunity, as of so much else. Presumably, though, the occupying powers could have reunited Germany quickly had they agreed on what its character was to be. There were two reasons why they were unable to do this.

The first had to do with the lessons of the past. Would punishing the Germans more harshly than after the first world war provide the best protection against a third? … Disarray within as much as among the victors, therefore, could have delayed a German settlement, even if there had been no Cold War.

But of course there was a Cold War, and it became the second and more significant reason for Germany's division. What each superpower feared was that its wartime enemy might align itself with its Cold War adversary: if that were to happen, the resulting concentration of military, industrial, and economic power could be to great to overcome.¹⁰

2. 
   The End of the War and Japan / The Bomb
   

… Instead they have been preoccupied with the historiographical controversy between "orthodox historians," typified by Herbert Feis (1961), and "revisionists," lead by Gar Alperovitz and more recently Martin Sherwin. The former contend that the bomb was necessary as a military means to hasten the end of the war with Japan, while scholars of the latter - the "atomic diplomacy" school - claim the bomb was meant as a political-diplomatic threat aimed against the Soviet Union in the emerging Cold War. Bernstein advances a third interpretation, arguing that the bomb, although primarily aimed at the speedy surrender of Japan, had a "bonus" effect of intimidating the Soviet Union. In the heat generated by this debate, American historians have neglected the Japanese side of the picture. Concentrating on the motives behind the use of the bombs, they have slighted the effects of the bombs.

… The "orthodox" interpretation in Japan has reflected the American "revisionist" view.¹¹

3. 
   Psychology
   
   1. 
      Stalin
      

Stalin's behavior in power is indicative of the need of the paranoid to protect his fragile narcissistic ego from external threats.¹²

Franklin Roosevelt

2. 
   Truman
   

Cognitive dissonance theory postulates that U.S. policymakers adopted Cold War beliefs after being forced by situational pressures to act contrary to strongly held, consistent beliefs in favor of Soviet-American cooperation, without adequate justification and in spite of their fear of negative consequences. For attitude change to occur, however, U.S. policymakers must have felt their decision to initiate the Cold War was voluntary. Otherwise, they could have reduced dissonance merely by denting their personal responsibility, or by blaming others for their actions. This means that the situational or social pressures responsible for their conformity must have been subtle or illegitimate. Domestic political interests are not "supposed" to sway or bias foreign policy decisions - yet they do.¹⁴

2. 
   The Roots of the Cold War – World War II and the Diplomacy of the Grand Alliance
   
   1. 
      T
      Damage caused to the White House by Winston Churchill
      

      hree Visions of the World

      
      
      1. 
         Franklin Roosevelt – President of the United States
         
         1. 
            World View - Collective Security / Internationalism (Economic Integration) - The Four Policeman (United States, Great Britain, Soviet Union, China)
            

R

1. 
   Danger to the World Order – Economic Collapse, The Depression again & Separate Peace
   
1. 
   Winston Churchill
   
   1. 
      World View - Balance of Power
      

Churchill wanted to reconstruct the traditional balance of power in Europe. This meant rebuilding Great Britain, France, and even defeated Germany so that, along with the United States, these countries could counter balance the Soviet colossus to the east.¹⁶

1. 
   Danger to the World Order – American Return to Isolation, England Alone & Separate Peace
   
1. 
   Joseph Stalin
   
   1. 
      World View – Power Politics
      

Joseph Stalin

Stalin’s approach reflected both his communist ideology and traditional Russian foreign policy. He strove to cash in on his country’s victory by extending Russian influence into Central Europe. And he intended to turn the countries he conquered by soviet armies into buffer zones to protect Russia against future German aggression.¹⁷

2. 
   Danger to the World Order – Germany and Everything (he is paranoid)
   
   1. 
      Stalin's Paranoia
      
   2. 
      The Role of Intelligence
      

There were more "believers" among Western intellectuals and artistic elites than there were actual card-carrying Communists. Many wrote enthusiastic stories about the "new Soviet civilization." In that milieu Soviet Intelligence recruited its best spies. … In the United States an illegal Soviet network in Washington consisted of informants working in various government agencies of the Roosevelt administration. The Soviets acquired important agents even in the OSS, precursor of the CIA.

Without these "friends" Stalin never would have obtained the secrets of the Manhattan atomic project so quickly and efficiently. The lieutenant-general of military intelligence (GRU), Mikail Milstein, who in 1942-46 had supervised the North American intelligence network from Mexico to Canada, claimed that "in that period all our intelligence activities … relied essentially on so-called liberal cadres, that is, the ones who sympathized with the Soviet Union … Those people regarded the Soviet Union as their second homeland and worked not for cash, but for the idea [ne za strakh a za sovest]."¹⁸

3. 
   Soviet Rise to Power
   

Another factor was a new experience of the Allied relationship during the war: again, for the first time in their history the Soviets through the great performance and sacrifices in the war were accepted as full partners in the councils of the great powers, who seemed quite respectful of their interests, rights, and newly gained status. No wonder that even Stalin and Molotov, not to speak of their more impressionable diplomats, came to believe in Soviet parity with the West in terms of the legitimacy of their security requirements and their acceptance by the West, especially since there seemed to be few direct conflicts of interest aside from ideology. No wonder that they now felt entitled to their "fair share" of the war spoils in terms of new territories, trusteeships, an expanded sphere of influence and some strong points in the areas stretching beyond that sphere.¹⁹

1. 
   T
   The Big Three at Tehran
   
   
   he Conferences
   
   1. 
      1941 - Origins of the Grand Alliance
      
      1. 
         The Atlantic Charter - 14 August 1941
         
      2. 
         Arcadia - 22 December 1941 through 14 January 1942 (Washington) - The Combined Command Structure
         
   2. 
      1942 - Russia: The Grand Alliance Complete
      
      1. 
         Molotov - 20 May through 2 June 1942 (London and Washington) -
         
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