Did the US start the Cold War?

[Jason]

In Oliver Stone's "Untold History of the United States", he claims that the US nuking of Japan, NATO, US intervention in Greece, and the Hydrogen Bomb (among other things) provoked the Soviet Union into establishing totaltarian control over eastern Europe.

[Paul Pott]

It's true. We in the west have been given the popular conception that the East Bloc was created in order to spread the revolution or something, while in fact the purpose was to put as much distance between the west and the USSR as possible in Europe.

One little known fact is that Stalin pushed for a united, disarmed, neutral Germany instead of the potential flashpoint for WWIII that resulted.

Stalin believed that the west intended to attack the USSR at some point in the near future. For all intents and purposes, the Cold War had been going on since the intervention in the Russian Civil War, the Red Scare, French interference in Spain, the appeasement of Germany as an anti-communist bulwark until it proved a threat to everyone, and so on.

[Yet_Another_Boring_Marxist]

Yea I think Stalin once wrote something along those lines in a letter to Churchill. Still, I don't think it matters who started it, what matters is who won it and who will win the next one

[RadioRaheem84]

Cold War started a long time before 1945. It began when the Western powers invaded Russia in 1918.

WWII was just a break from the relentless onslaught the USSR faced since it's inception, knowing not one day of peace until it dissolved.

[skitty]

The nuking of Japan may have been nothing more than a message to the Soviets, anticipating a long battle for the world's resources. Eastern Europe was a protective buffer. It would be difficult to imagine how the Soviets felt after all they lost in the war.

[Blake's Baby]

I would think that more than anyone, Churchill was the main driving force (at least politically) of 'anti-Bolshevism' in the West. Don't forget, early on he supported both Mussolini and Hitler due to the fact that they know 'how to deal with Bolsheviks'.

But even if all the western politicians had been lovely as baked biscuits and Stalin had been manufactured entirely of jasmine-scented care-bears, the Cold War would still have happened. Empires gotta emp, or whatever it is they do. Oppose each other implacibaly, or whatever. the Cold War required an American 'empire' and a Russian 'empire'. It's pointless to say that one or other 'started' it, that's like saying that the Moon only exerts a gravitational pull on the Earth because the Earth exerts a pull on the Moon.

[Avanti]

cain started it

when he killed

abel

[Jason]

I would think that more than anyone, Churchill was the main driving force (at least politically) of 'anti-Bolshevism' in the West. Don't forget, early on he supported both Mussolini and Hitler due to the fact that they know 'how to deal with Bolsheviks'.

But even if all the western politicians had been lovely as baked biscuits and Stalin had been manufactured entirely of jasmine-scented care-bears, the Cold War would still have happened. Empires gotta emp, or whatever it is they do. Oppose each other implacibaly, or whatever. the Cold War required an American 'empire' and a Russian 'empire'. It's pointless to say that one or other 'started' it, that's like saying that the Moon only exerts a gravitational pull on the Earth because the Earth exerts a pull on the Moon.

Right, I totally agree. However, Oliver Stone was suggesting that if Henry Wallace (not George :rolleyes:) became president, perhaps the Cold War would have been averted. That's nonsense.

[NGNM85]

I haven't really studied this, I just watched a trailer for the series online, and I flipped through the book in Barnes & Nobles, for like ten minutes, but it seemed to me like this project is just a shoddy, third-rate knock-off of Zinn's People's History, with conspiracy nonsense thrown in. Too bad SHOWTIME didn't make a series based on that.

[Jason]

I haven't really studied this, I just watched a trailer for the series online, and I flipped through the book in Barnes & Nobles, for like ten minutes, but it seemed to me like this project is just a shoddy, third-rate knock-off of Zinn's People's History, with conspiracy nonsense thrown in. Too bad SHOWTIME didn't make a series based on that.

There's definitely a lot of wishful thinking in it. Stone seems to think the certain individuals, whether they be Wallace or Kennedy, could have steered the US toward socialism. For instance, in JFK he claimed Kennedy was assassinated because he wanted to end Vietnam. Assuming, of course, a kinder and gentler America if he had lived.

[RadioRaheem84]

To Stone's credit, US/Western foreign policy was the primary reason why the Soviet Union and most ML States became paranoid bureaucracies.

I don't know why people attribute the outcomes of the ML States to the leaders being these evil master planners with the dark desire for more and more power.

Would the US be so free if from it's inception had WWI, a revolution, civil war, foreign invasion by Western powers, Nazi Onslaught, and then Cold War in the span of 20 years? From 1917-1945, what peace did the Soviet Union know? Not even afterward did they know it.

Economic isolation, terrorism, constant threat of war, political strangulation, economic sabotage.

These nations became inward paranoid bureaucratic places in a constant state of war.

[Geiseric]

First of all there wasn't a soviet empire, eastern bloc countries had higher standards of living than the Ussr and there was no capitalism whatsoever. Left communists are dillusional, the think that management stealing minute production, such as a guy taking a crate of wheat out from a collective farm to exchange with another bureaucrat who somehow got wine is capitalism basically. The cold war wasn't an imperialist conflict in the ww1 sense, it was the struggle of the capitalists to dominate ****ries with planned economies, to put it the best I can.

[Raúl Duke]

It was a bit of "push-pull."

Also, Soviet fears/paranoia regarding "capitalist encirclement" goes way back and mostly caused by Western intervention in the past.

From the UK point of view, I don't know anything. Although it's apparent that Churchill was most unfriendly to the USSR.

The US had a more nuanced views in its state department. You had idealists that desired, believed in a long-term US-USSR collab sometimes on faulty premises. You had people like George Kennan who didn't think it was possible since they could never get over "Soviet paranoia" or what not. In the White House, during the initial post-war years, there was the belief that things will still continue well.

But if you think of the beginning, a lot of Soviet actions played a role in the stiffening of relations and the acceptance of "containment" which heralded the Cold War.

For starters, the US perceived that in certain aspects the Soviets weren't meeting the spirit and certain provisions in Potsdam and Yalta Agreements in Eastern Europe, were somewhat cold in collaborating over German occupation, etc.

But what really got the ball rolling were certain events regarding Iran and Turkey during 1945-1946. The Soviets allegedly issued threats to Turkey and demanded being able to build naval bases there so to assure safe passage through the straits and in Iran the Soviet occupation force did not leave at their negotiated time and were perceived as fomenting 2 (Azerbaijan People's Government, Republic of Mahabad) rebellions in the northern Iranian provinces against their "wartime ally" of Iran.

Soviets actions also worsen American public opinion, not just the state department, which began to foment a stronger anti-communist sentiment in the US. This kinda feed-back into itself, leading to a hysterical anti-communist foreign policy from the US which started to rise with the "Truman Doctrine" speech and became enshrined with NSC-68. By hysterical, I mean the US began to engage in actions purportedly against "communism" in contexts where there were little to no communists and little to no connection with the USSR; such as Arbenz's Guatemala and the Coup (this act carried out against the prior "Good Neighbor" Policy and from the 1950s onwards US foreign policy could be described mostly in terms of "anti-communist, especially anti-Soviet" which superseded other foreign policy considerations).

The Soviets also reacted back (mostly in response to US actions in regards to Germany) and hit mostly in Europe, particularly in places like Berlin (Berlin Blockade), Czechoslovakia (1948 coup), etc. While for the US I guess the Cold War began in 1946-1947, for the USSR it starts in 1948 as it reacts to US actions in Europe and its more assertive and aggressive foreign policy.

Of course, one can read between the lines. Both super-powers wanted to expand their influence/imperialism and both were ideologically incompatible so it was likely that the Cold War was going to be the outcome.

[Jack]

The West started the Cold War 100%, I can't say that the Soviet Union didn't respond later, but the initial moves were made by the West.

It was the West that refused to peacefully unify West and East Germany, because West Germany was the larger and much more valuable part and they wanted it to become a part of what would later be NATO.

The West banned Communist and other Leftist parties in South Korean elections, and repressed a 2 year long leftist insurgency killing tens of thousands. South Korea began the war by taking a North Korean town during the 4 years of constant shelling and other conflicts by either side.

The West refused to abide by the Geneva Convention and peacefully and democratically unify Vietnam, choosing to back the illegitimate South Vietnamese dictatorship.

The West, not the Soviet Union, sent millions of dollars and countless weapons to Greece during the Civil War, while the USSR honored its agreements not to get involved in Greece. Meanwhile the West refused to honor their end of the agreement and sent saboteurs, spies, and rebels into Eastern Bloc countries like Albania and the Baltics.

The West formed NATO in 1949, while the Warsaw Pact wasn't founded until 1955 only after West Germany joined NATO.

The West pioneered nuclear weapons despite numerous appeals by the Soviet Union during the Stalin era for unilateral disarmament, signing petitions like the Stockholm Appeal to put forth the idea.

The West refused to recognize the Peoples Republic of China, preferring to support the corrupt government in exile on Taiwan (which just years previous had been part of Japan).

The capitalist powers are entirely to blame for the Cold War, they had no genuine interest in detente.

[Ismail]

A classic read on the origins of the Cold War is the aptly named The Cold War and Its Origins, 1917-1960 in two volumes by D.F. Fleming.


For starters, the US perceived that in certain aspects the Soviets weren't meeting the spirit and certain provisions in Potsdam and Yalta Agreements in Eastern Europe, were somewhat cold in collaborating over German occupation, etc.A good read on the latter subject is Drawing the Line: The American Decision to Divide Germany, 1944-1949. In any case, the Soviets were "somewhat cold" because the West was abusing the terms of that occupation. "For the Soviet Union, Potsdam meant the destruction of the forces which had twice in thirty years spread vast devastation in its territories. In the Soviet zone, therefore, the large landed estates were broken up among the landless and poor peasantry. All known large and small supporters of the Nazi regime and its war machine were removed from their posts in private enterprise as well as public office. Works committees and trade unions were freely formed by the workmen. They were encouraged to demand, and successfully to press upon the various provincial governments which were set up, nationalization without compensation of the most important branches of industry, and the banks... to destroy over a large part of Germany the power of aggressive Junkerdom and war-making monopoly capital." (A. Rothstein, A History of the U.S.S.R., p. 372.) Similar measures were not taken in the zones occupied by the Western powers, who among other things revived the same monopolies which had so closely collaborated with Nazi Germany (I.G. Farben for instance) or even had a role in the NSDAP's rise (such as Thyssen.)

The West used Potsdam and Yalta to promote "democracy" in Greece (by massacring the EAM) and in other Eastern European countries, to keep monarchs on their thrones, and to keep the prewar economic systems intact.

[l'Enfermé]

Stalin was one of the main proponents of "Peaceful Co-Existence".

http://marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/subject/peace/index.htm

The Cold War was an exclusively Western initiative. Soviet actions were predominantly defensive and preemptive.

[Raúl Duke]

and to keep the prewar economic systems intact. Of course, this was fundamental; they saw anything that "looked" like Soviet influence creeping in as "aggression" even though in some cases (i.e. the Greek case) it's arguable (after all, the communists in Greek were probably quite popular, especially relative to the shitty reactionary monarchy, while the West liked to label them as an "armed minority" under the control of Moscow). The West wanted to keep the status-quo which benefited them but for the Soviets surely it sucked, I don't blame them for wanting to try and spread a bit more beyond their WWII gains when they believed they can or for helping certain revolutionaries, etc.

The Soviets also did view the West as not following the agreements as well, particularly in the case of Germany.

[Ismail]

Stalin was one of the main proponents of "Peaceful Co-Existence".Lenin was the founder of it. Khrushchev "contributed" to it, his "contributions" being condemned by the Albanians and Chinese as distortions. See: http://www.marxists.org/subject/china/documents/polemic/peaceful.htm

But yeah this was a typical Bolshevik approach to the question:

"Karl Radek made the Soviets' designs very clear in an interview published by the Manchester Guardian on 8 January 1920....

The Russians desired peace. In that case, the interviewer asked, what did he have to say about the Soviet threat in India through continued propaganda? Radek answered:

'The Russian government conducts no such propaganda. On the contrary, it is prepared to give to any country that establishes peaceful relations all conceivable guarantees. Of course, the march of ideas cannot be arrested, but we are ready to give guarantees that we shall use neither money nor agents, direct or indirect, for the conduct of propaganda in India as elsewhere in the British empire. We have too great [a] need for peace with England to haggle.'

Radek expressed himself quite openly, going so far as to maintain that:

'British imperialism is not merely a capitalist intrigue, but is rooted in the psychology of the masses. The British domination of India and Ireland is popular. If we desire the British masses to become socialist, we cannot do anything from outside. Salvation must come to the English proletarians and oppressed people of the empire from their own exertions. It is their own affair, not that of the Soviet government. We can only offer our sympathy; anything further would be forbidden towards a country with which we are at peace.'

At this point it was logical for the interviewer to ask if Soviet Russia really did intend to 'settle down amid a non-socialist world as one state among others.' This was Radek's reply:

'Why not? It is the standpoint of the Russian government that normal and good relations are just as possible between socialist and capitalist states as they have been between capitalist and feudal states. For example, imperialist England lived on quite good terms with czarist feudal Russia in the days of serfdom. I, personally, am convinced that Communism can only be saved through good relations with the capitalist states. All the capitalist states are moving towards socialism along their own roads... in each of these countries the battle will be won from within in the growing struggle between the peoples and governments. Revolutions never originate in foreign affairs but are made at home.'

[....]

'Our historic task [said Radek] is to reconstruct Russia, and for that peace is essential... All the talk about our plans to disrupt and destroy the British empire is the sheerest nonsense and Northcliffe bluff.'"
(Piero Melograni. Lenin and the Myth of World Revolution: Ideology and Reasons of State, 1917-1920. Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press International. 1989. pp. 88-90.)

You can find similar remarks by Lenin and Trotsky.

[Geiseric]

First off thanks for explaining peaceful coexistance. However you won't find any similar statements by Lenin nor Trotsky.

[Ismail]

First off thanks for explaining peaceful coexistance. However you won't find any similar statements by Lenin nor Trotsky.First, Radek's statement was made on behalf of Soviet Russia (of which Lenin was obviously its leader.) Second, the link I provided gives various examples of Lenin's policy of peaceful coexistence from his own words. Third,

"We said to Poland: 'What do you demand? The independence of Poland? We recognize it. Do you fear that we will overthrow the bourgeois government of Warsaw? No, we will not meddle in your internal affairs. The Polish working class will overthrow you when it thinks it necessary.'"
(Leon Trotsky in 1920, quoted in Thomas T. Hammond (ed). The Anatomy of Communist Takeovers. New Haven: Yale University Press. 1975. p. 97.)

Compare with:

"You see, we Marxists believe that a revolution will also take place in other countries. But it will take place only when the revolutionaries in those countries think it possible, or necessary. The export of revolution is nonsense. Every country will make its own revolution if it wants to, and if it does not want to, there will be no revolution. For example, our country wanted to make a revolution and made it, and now we are building a new, classless society.

But to assert that we want to make a revolution in other countries, to interfere in their lives, means saying what is untrue, and what we have never advocated."
(J.V. Stalin. Works Vol. 14. London: Red Star Press Ltd. 1978. p. 137.)

[prolcon]

First off thanks for explaining peaceful coexistance. However you won't find any similar statements by Lenin nor Trotsky.

Which I think just goes to show two things:



Lenin would never get a chance to formulate theories locked in a Cold War with a capitalist superpower. You can see that the failure of uninterrupted global revolution affected his conclusions; he had no concept of being locked in a stalemate with a capitalist superpower.
Trotsky had, by this point, lost any revolutionary credibility. He spent his days more or less reacting against Stalin. I wonder if he, in the same position as Stalin, could have lucidly suggested actually warring against the United States and their allies.

[freehobo]

Yes, also the CIA developed HIV1 and HIV2, Lyndon B. Johnson killed Kennedy, and brought down the world trade towers. I sometimes wonder why even need a humanities education when we the Oliver Stone canon.

Seriously, no of course not. No single thing "caused" The Cold War. It was just two heavyweights shaping up against each other. Generally if you needed one causal agent you would have to say Germany caused it, by starting WWII. But then you might wanna go back and cast WWI as cause of WWII, and so ad infinitum.

[Anarchocommunaltoad]

The Soviets wanted a buffer and to expand into a few key areas as eventual spring boards for further conquest. The Americans wanted to halt expansion and to consolidate their new holdings. They both were bad and caused what was inevitable(see Prague insurrection and all middle east politics pre 1990)

[Ismail]

The Soviets wanted a buffer and to expand into a few key areas as eventual spring boards for further conquest. The Americans wanted to halt expansion and to consolidate their new holdings. They both were bad and caused what was inevitable(see Prague insurrection and all middle east politics pre 1990)The Americans didn't want to simply "halt expansion." They tried to overthrow the Albanian government as early as 1949 through guerrillas parachuted into the country. They reversed what would otherwise have been a pro-Soviet government in Greece through armed intervention. They obstructed Korean unity by dismantling the people's committees spontaneously set up all over the country and crushed popular rebellions against the US-backed government. They likewise intervened in Vietnam carrying forward the legacy of French colonialism, which had intervened there in 1945 to save their sphere of influence from the Vietminh which was otherwise naturally poised to take power.

[Anarchocommunaltoad]

The Americans didn't want to "halt expansion." They tried to overthrow the Albanian government as early as 1949 through guerrillas parachuted into the country. They reversed what would otherwise have been a pro-Soviet government in Greece through armed intervention. They obstructed Korean unity by dismantling the people's committees spontaneously set up all over the country and crushed popular rebellions against the US-backed government. They likewise intervened in Vietnam carrying forward the legacy of French colonialism, which had intervened there in 1945 to save their sphere of influence from the Vietminh.

The Soviets killed in eastern Europe and overthrew non puppet regimes when the people tried to create a better socialism for the future. The Soviets killed millions of their own due to the frantic hysteria of a madman. Potatoes potatas

[Ismail]

The Soviets killed in eastern Europe and overthrew non puppet regimes when the people tried to create a better socialism for the future. The Soviets killed millions of their own due to the frantic hysteria of a madman. Potatoes potatasI don't see what this has to do with what I said, or what you mean by "puppet regimes," or "better socialism for the future." The ascendancy of revisionism in the USSR produced situations such as Hungary in 1956 (when the Soviet revisionists got rid of the "Stalinist" Rákosi in favor of Nagy, and then found out Nagy was moving away from them) and Czechoslovakia in 1968 (where, once again, the Soviet revisionists backed Dubček before realizing he, too, was moving away from them.)

Nagy and Dubček were not socialists, they were and are recognized as "liberal communists." Dubček in the 80's praised Sweden as a great example of "socialism," while Nagy called for reconciliation with the Church, the revival of artisan production (i.e. small-scale production which, as Lenin says, engenders capitalism), the revival of bourgeois parties, etc. The Soviets sent troops in both cases to replace both men with obedient lackeys who furthered the process of capitalist restoration without severing their economic and military tutelage to the USSR. Neither case has to do with the situation in Eastern Europe in the earliest years of the Cold War.

Neither case has anything to do with the claim that the USA was merely "halting expansion" and "consolidating their new holdings," especially since, among other things, the CIA waged active propaganda campaigns (assisted through the Marshall Plan) to put a stop to Communist Party victories in Italy and France, which isn't the mark of a "new holding" being "consolidated" since both the French and Italian parties were at that point very popular due to their leading role in the resistance against fascism.

[Anarchocommunaltoad]

I don't see what this has to do with what I said, or what you mean by "puppet regimes," or "better socialism for the future." The ascendancy of revisionism in the USSR produced situations such as Hungary in 1956 (when the Soviet revisionists got rid of the "Stalinist" Rákosi in favor of Nagy, and then found out Nagy was moving away from them) and Czechoslovakia in 1968 (where, once again, the Soviet revisionists backed Dubček before realizing he, too, was moving away from them.)

Nagy and Dubček were not socialists, they were and are recognized as "liberal communists." Dubček in the 80's praised Sweden as a great example of "socialism," while Nagy called for reconciliation with the Church, the revival of artisan production (i.e. small-scale production which, as Lenin says, engenders capitalism), the revival of bourgeois parties, etc. The Soviets sent troops in both cases to replace both men with obedient lackeys who furthered the process of capitalist restoration without severing their economic and military tutelage to the USSR. Neither case has to do with the situation in Eastern Europe in the earliest years of the Cold War.

Neither case has anything to do with the claim that the USA was merely "halting expansion" and "consolidating their new holdings," especially since, among other things, the CIA waged active propaganda campaigns (assisted through the Marshall Plan) to put a stop to Communist Party victories in Italy and France, which isn't the mark of a "new holding" being "consolidated" since both the French and Italian parties were at that point very popular due to their leading role in the resistance against fascism.

So what was the KGB doing during the cold war, twiddling their thumbs?

[Ismail]

So what was the KGB doing during the cold war, twiddling their thumbs?After the 50's capitalism was restored in the Soviet Union and it became a social-imperialist superpower, competing with the USA. This has little to do with the question of the foundations of the Cold War.

To answer your question though, as the Cold War progressed the USA and USSR sought to expand at the expense of the other, neither one was "defensive." It was the Chinese who argued in the 70's and 80's that the USA, NATO, etc. were "defensive" while the Soviets were "offensive," a position that resulted in a number of pro-Chinese parties across Western Europe and North America calling for the strengthening of their respective countries' war industries to "meet the Soviet threat," to oppose "appeasing" the Soviets, etc.

Soviet social-imperialism expressed itself in its invasions of Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan, as well as its interventions through its neo-colony Cuba against Somalia and in Angola.

[Geiseric]

First, Radek's statement was made on behalf of Soviet Russia (of which Lenin was obviously its leader.) Second, the link I provided gives various examples of Lenin's policy of peaceful coexistence from his own words. Third,

"We said to Poland: 'What do you demand? The independence of Poland? We recognize it. Do you fear that we will overthrow the bourgeois government of Warsaw? No, we will not meddle in your internal affairs. The Polish working class will overthrow you when it thinks it necessary.'"
(Leon Trotsky in 1920, quoted in Thomas T. Hammond (ed). The Anatomy of Communist Takeovers. New Haven: Yale University Press. 1975. p. 97.)

Compare with:

"You see, we Marxists believe that a revolution will also take place in other countries. But it will take place only when the revolutionaries in those countries think it possible, or necessary. The export of revolution is nonsense. Every country will make its own revolution if it wants to, and if it does not want to, there will be no revolution. For example, our country wanted to make a revolution and made it, and now we are building a new, classless society.

But to assert that we want to make a revolution in other countries, to interfere in their lives, means saying what is untrue, and what we have never advocated."
(J.V. Stalin. Works Vol. 14. London: Red Star Press Ltd. 1978. p. 137.)
Trotsky never said they wouldn't support a polish revolution, he said the russians themseves would not be overthrowing the polish government. Stalin however was speaing in general, seeng as he, unlike trotsky and lenin, actually sought after and thought possible of an indefinate peace.

[Let's Get Free]

After the 50's capitalism was restored in the Soviet Union and it became a social-imperialist superpower, competing with the USA

How was capitalism "restored?" Did the workers hand their means of production back over to the capitalists?

[GoddessCleoLover]

The United States and the United Kingdom may have "started" the Cold War in Greece in 1944, but in the places where the Greek Communists took control they murdered innocent people and imposed single-party dictatorship. The Greek Communists would have been a cure as bad as the capitalist disease.

[Rafiq]

The United States and the United Kingdom may have "started" the Cold War in Greece in 1944, but in the places where the Greek Communists took control they murdered innocent people and imposed single-party dictatorship. The Greek Communists would have been a cure as bad as the capitalist disease.

Source?

[Ostrinski]

How was capitalism "restored?" Did the workers hand their means of production back over to the capitalists?This, and, you'd think if the entirety of the productive relations were transformed that perhaps, I don't know, someone would have noticed?

[GoddessCleoLover]

Source?

The ghost of Eleni Gatzoyiannis.

[Ismail]

How was capitalism "restored?" Did the workers hand their means of production back over to the capitalists?Feel free to read up:
* http://www.bannedthought.net/USA/RU/RP/RP7/RU-RP7.pdf
* http://marx2mao.com/Other/RCSU75.html
* http://www.oneparty.co.uk/html/book/ussrindex.html