Foreign policy of the USSR. "Cold War. Foreign and domestic policy of the USSR in the post-war period. USSR and the world community
The foreign policy of the Soviet Union in the post-war years, marked by a transition to politics and the formation of a socialist bloc of states.
The beginning of the Cold War and the arms race
The victory and defeat of Nazi Germany made the USSR one of the most influential states in the world political arena. This caused great concern to the Western powers. Similar sentiments were reflected in the speech of former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who spoke in the American city of Fulton in March 1946. Recognizing that the Soviet people had become one of the “leading nations of the world,” Churchill declared that the USSR was striving for “the limitless spread of its power and its doctrines,” so the United States and Great Britain should create “an association of peoples speaking English language", who will talk to the USSR from a position of strength. At the same time, the use of new atomic weapons as a means of intimidation was allowed.
In February 1947, American President Harry Truman expanded on Churchill's position in his message to Congress (called the Truman Doctrine). It defined two strategic tasks in relation to the USSR: the minimum task is to prevent further expansion of the sphere of influence of the Soviets and its communist ideology (the doctrine of containing socialism), the maximum task is to force socialism to withdraw into its former borders (the doctrine of discarding socialism). What were the specific steps to achieve these goals? The need was determined to provide large-scale economic assistance to European countries, thereby making them dependent on the United States (“Marshall Plan”); create a military-political union of these countries led by the USA (NATO appeared in 1949, it included the USA, Great Britain, France, Canada, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Portugal); place a network of US military bases near the borders of the USSR; support anti-socialist forces within the Soviet bloc countries; as a last resort, use its armed forces to interfere in the internal affairs of the countries of the socialist camp.
At the same time, an arms race began. In July 1945, the United States conducted the first tests of atomic weapons, and on August 6 and 9, it dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The USSR viewed everything that was happening as a military threat. In August 1945, a Special Committee was established to coordinate work on atomic energy research, headed by. In 1949 Soviet Union announced the possession of atomic weapons.
Creation of a socialist system of states
The actions of the USSR to create a socialist bloc of states were adequate to the measures taken by the United States. At the end of the war, the Soviet Union contributed to the establishment of socialist orders in Poland, Bulgaria, Yugoslavia (although it left the control of the USSR in 1948 thanks to its leader Joseph Broz Tito), Albania, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, East Germany, North Vietnam, North Korea, China. He launched large-scale assistance to the countries of “people's democracy”, for which the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA) was created in 1949. After Stalin's death, in 1955, the USSR united some of these countries into a military-political union - the Warsaw Treaty Organization (WTO). The Soviets actively helped communist parties in capitalist countries, contributed to the growth of the national liberation movement and the creation of countries with a “socialist orientation.”
Confrontation between two systems
The confrontation between the two systems of capitalism and socialism manifested itself in the fate of defeated Germany: in 1949, the country was finally split into the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany), which included the occupation zones of the USA, Great Britain and France, and the GDR (East Germany), which included the Soviet occupation zone.
Another formidable example of such a confrontation was. In 1949, after a long struggle between Chiang Kai-shek and Mao Zedong and the victory of the latter (which was also facilitated by the assistance of the USSR), the People's Republic of China was formed. After this, the leadership of North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) launched an armed attempt to overthrow the pro-American regime of South Korea and reunite the entire country. Soon, US troops under the UN flag and the opposing Chinese armed forces (“Chinese volunteers”) intervened in the matter. The Soviets deployed several fighter aviation divisions to China, which for two and a half years participated in repelling American raids on China. The USSR also transferred to China a large number of aircraft and other equipment, contributed to the creation of tank, artillery, anti-aircraft and engineering troops. He supplied the Korean People's Army and “Chinese volunteers” with weapons, transport, food, and medicine. The war ended in 1953, and Korea remained divided into two warring states, becoming a symbol of the split into two systems in Asia. The same thing will then happen with Vietnam.
Thus began the Cold War era, which lasted until the collapse of the USSR in 1991.
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Introduction
3. "Iron Curtain".
4. Relations with third world countries.
5. Between the Cold War and the Cold Peace
6. Foreign policy of the USSR in 1965 - 1984.
7. New political thinking.
Conclusion.
Bibliography.
Introduction
The post-war decade was full of important political events. Many rightly believed that the broad anti-Hitler coalition of states and social forces that emerged during the years of the struggle against fascism would guarantee the peaceful progress of mankind in the long term. However, the second half of the 40s. did not become a period of development of the cooperation potential of the allied states, but, on the contrary, was a time of first cooling of relations between the victorious powers, and then drawing them into the so-called “Cold War”. The main change in the international situation after the end of the Second World War was the further deepening of the split of the world into two socio-political blocs, which began in 1917.
After the Second World War, profound changes took place in the international arena. The influence and authority of the USSR, which made the greatest contribution to the defeat of fascism, grew significantly. If in 1941 the USSR had diplomatic relations with only 26 countries, then in 1945 it was already with 52 countries and, in my opinion, this is what excited the US government.
The influence of the USSR extended to a number of countries in Europe (Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia) and Asia (China, North Korea, North Vietnam). These countries, together with the USSR and Mongolia, formed the socialist camp or the world system of socialism. In these countries, representatives of the communist and workers' parties came to power. They carried out nationalization of industry, agrarian reforms, and established democratic freedoms. A regime of people's democracy was established in these countries. Treaties of friendship and mutual assistance were concluded between the USSR and these states.
1. Balance of power in the international arena
The USSR became a world power: not a single important issue in international life was resolved without its participation. The USSR, like the USA, began to strive to expand its sphere of influence. A new geopolitical situation has emerged in the world.
After World War II, the Soviet Union had diplomatic relations with 52 states and concluded peace treaties with many of Germany's former allies. At the same time, during this period there was a cooling in relations with their own allies in the anti-Hitler coalition. The USSR itself built its foreign policy, based on the thesis about the division of the world into two opposing camps. This thesis was first formulated in September 1947 in Poland in a report by A.A. Zhdanov “On the international situation”.
The post of Minister of Foreign Affairs of the USSR from 1939 to 1949 was held by V.M. Molotov, and from 1949 to 1953. AND I. Vyshinsky.
In terms of issues, foreign policy of this period can be considered as follows:
1) Relations with former allies: the struggle for spheres of influence in Europe; problems of post-war Germany; the work of the USSR against propaganda and the outbreak of a new war.
2) Relations with countries of the socialist camp: economic assistance, political pressure, conflicts.
The growing influence of the USSR worried the leaders of the world's major powers. Their attitude towards the USSR, yesterday's ally in the anti-Hitler coalition, changed dramatically. They decided to limit the influence of the USSR using the nuclear factor. Even during the Second World War, the United States became the owner of nuclear weapons, and the power of the United States also grew even more. Their gross national product rose by 70%, and economic and human losses were minimal. Having become an international creditor during the war years, the United States gained the opportunity to expand its influence on other countries and peoples. President Truman said in 1945 that victory in World War II “challenged the American people to rule the world.” In relations between the USSR and leading Western European countries, the Cold War policy began to be pursued.
2. Relations of the USSR with former allies. Beginning of the Cold War
The Cold War is the confrontation between the United States and its allies and the USSR and its allies. It began in 1946 and continued (with short interruptions) until 1985, when M. S. Gorbachev sharply changed the course of the USSR’s foreign policy. (Although many believe that " cold war"has not ended to this day...) According to one of the leaders of Soviet foreign intelligence L.V. Shebarshina, “Russia was created by the needs of defense, which forced it to push its outposts and fortresses to new frontiers, to spend its resources on defense... And the psychology of a besieged fortress... was a natural product of our history. Hitler's invasion confirmed the reality of historical fears... What did we face immediately after the war? With the declaration of the Cold War and the beginning of feverish preparations for a new round of the real war. We did not start this preparation. It was not the Soviet Union that created and tested the first atomic bomb on people. At that time, the USSR was surrounded by a dense ring of military bases, fleets, and military blocs. Real, deadly preparations were underway for the destruction of the Soviet Union... The country was forced to respond to the threat in the only possible way - to prepare to repel it.”
Why, from 1946 to 1985, was the USSR forced to exist in the position of a “besieged fortress”? The defeat of Germany and its allies led to the emergence of two superpowers in the world - the USA and the USSR.
A superpower is a state whose influence extends far beyond its borders.
The USSR had a large territory, people, and minerals, but the economy, especially for the first time in the post-war years, was ruins. In my opinion, the US government decided to take advantage of this situation and become the power of the whole world. In 1945--1946. the balance of forces, as the American historian J.R. Adelman notes, “was perhaps the worst for the USSR during its entire existence.” However, fearing dependence on the “allies,” Stalin spoke out against the USSR’s participation in the so-called Marshall Plan.
George Marshall - American general, chief of staff of the US Army, according to which the United States provided economic assistance to European countries affected by the war.
A loud manifesto of the Cold War between former allies in the anti-Hitler coalition was the speech of former British Prime Minister W. Churchill in Fulton (USA), delivered on March 5, 1946 in the presence of the new American President G. Truman. The political meaning of this speech and the subsequent propaganda campaign was, first of all, to psychologically prepare the Western public for the subsequent severance of relations between the victorious countries, to erase from the consciousness of people those feelings of respect and gratitude for the Soviet people that had developed during the years joint struggle against fascism.
In the fall of 1946, liberal-minded figures towards the USSR from the previous administration of F.D. Roosevelt was forced out of key positions in the American government. In March 1947, in the wake of the ever-increasing political confrontation between the USSR and the USA, Truman announced in Congress his decision to stop the spread of “Soviet rule” in Europe at any cost (the “Truman Doctrine”). For the first time, the term “cold war” was released into propaganda circulation.
I would like and consider it necessary to note that the strategic turn of the US foreign policy towards open confrontation with the USSR was largely provoked by the ideology and policies of the Stalinist leadership. Having launched massive ideological and political repressions in its own country and in the Eastern European countries that fell into its sphere of influence, Stalinism turned in the eyes of millions of people into a kind of political bogeyman. This greatly facilitated the work of right-wing conservative forces in the West, who advocated refusal of cooperation with the USSR.
The sad diplomatic experience of the thirties for the USSR and, above all, the experience of Soviet-German relations had a certain influence on the nature of Stalin's foreign policy in the post-war period. Therefore, Stalin was very suspicious of Western diplomacy, believing that it was impossible to maintain stable long-term relations with it. This resulted in inflexibility, ultimatum notes in relations with the United States and other countries, and often an inadequate reaction to the actions of the West.
The specific subject of contradictions in the relations between the former allies were, first of all, differences in approaches to the post-war structure of the countries of Central and South-Eastern Europe. After the war, there was a growth in the influence of leftist communist forces, which was seen in the West as a potential threat to the existing system. The United States tried to counter this in every possible way. In turn, the leadership of the USSR considered the West’s desire to influence the nature of political processes in the countries of Central and South-Eastern Europe as an attempt to bring regimes unfriendly to the USSR to power here, to restore a “cordon sanitaire” at the western borders of the country, to deprive it of the fruits of victory, to oust The USSR from the sphere of interests of its security. Not without reason, Stalin perceived with increasing distrust any actions of the former allies in this region, suspecting that they were preparing strategic springboards for themselves for a future war with the USSR. Based simultaneously on the previous idea of a world communist revolution and the global geopolitical tasks of the USSR, Stalin actively contributed to the establishment of socio-political regimes similar to the USSR in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia and Albania. In 1949, largely thanks to the assistance of the USSR, the communists finally won power in China.
3. "Iron Curtain"
With the creation of the Soviet atomic bomb, Stalin received the much-desired first guarantee of safety. But he could not foresee that the arms race was just beginning, and in a few decades the desire, at all costs, to maintain military-strategic parity - the balance of power between the USSR and the USA - would lead the country's economy to a deep crisis.
Since 1946, Stalin has come to grips with creating a second security guarantee: the USSR should be surrounded by a kind of “cordon sanitaire” that would protect Soviet society from both a possible military attack from the West and from influence from “bourgeois propaganda.”
Since 1947, power in the countries of Eastern Europe - Poland, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Yugoslavia - is finally assigned to the communist parties, and coalition governments are dispersed, and often by force. Stalin harshly suppressed any attempts by European communists to show independence in political decisions. In 1947, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito, and the leader of the Bulgarian communists, Georgi Dimitrov, announced the beginning of the creation of the Balkan Federation. Stalin decided to seize the initiative from Tito and take control of the creation of this federation. And when the Yugoslavs showed “obstinacy,” on December 25, 1949, diplomatic relations between the USSR and the SFRY were severed. Tito was declared a "fascist" and a "Hitler-Trotskyist agent."
Having failed to find a compromise with his former allies on the issue of the future of Germany, Stalin gave orders to Marshal V.D. Sokolovsky to organize a blockade of West Berlin, which was a zone of Allied occupation. Willy Brandt, Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1969-1974, recalled: “On that day, June 24, 1948... we had a presentiment that decisions of enormous importance were coming... The night before, there was a Western mark introduced (single currency unit for the western occupation zones), and the next morning the East responded to this with a hunger blockade... The crossing points from the western sectors are blocked. Electrical cables coming from the eastern zone have been cut. All supplies coming from the East to the “rebellious” Western sectors of Berlin have been suspended.”
This political crisis led to the creation of two Germanys: on September 23, 1949, the occupation zones of the USA, England and France were united into the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG), and on October 7, 1949, the German Democratic Republic (GDR) appeared in the east, led by a protege Stalin - Walter Ulbricht, first secretary of the SED (Socialist Unity Party of Germany).
Relations between the former allies also worsened in the East: in China and Korea.
In 1946, a civil war broke out in China between the Kuomintang party, led by Chiang Kai-shek, who was supported by the United States, and the Communists. The prospect of victory for the Chinese communists, led by the ambitious and resourceful Mao Zedong, did not please Stalin at all - a huge, densely populated country could become an independent center of the world communist movement. In 1945-1948. The Kremlin repeatedly called on the leadership of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to begin negotiations with Chiang Kai-shek, and only on November 23, 1949, diplomatic relations were established between the USSR and Maoist China. As a sign of protest against the fact that Chiang Kai-shek's representatives continued to sit at the UN, the USSR withdrew from all its bodies.
This demarche was cleverly taken advantage of by the Truman administration, which managed, in the absence of Soviet diplomats, to pass through the UN Security Council a resolution on the deployment of American troops to Korea. At this time, a fierce war began between North Korea, which was adjacent to the socialist camp, and South Korea, which chose the Western path of development. The successful offensive of North Korean troops led to the capture of the capital of South Korea - Seoul. After the UN decision, troops were landed in the rear of the North Korean army under the command of American General Douglas MacArthur. In response to this, Mao sent his divisions to Korea, which were covered from the air by Soviet aviation. As a result of the bloody war, the split of Korea into two states was consolidated.
The confrontation between the former allies became so serious that in the spring of 1949, on the initiative of the United States, the military bloc NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) was created, uniting the armed forces of most European states. In 1955, the leadership of the USSR announced the formation of its military alliance - the Warsaw Pact, although in reality the majority of socialist countries since 1947 have been a single military camp, armed and trained according to Soviet models.
The splits of Germany and Korea symbolized the split of the whole world into two parts, fiercely opposed to each other. “From Stettin on the Baltic to Trieste on the Adriatic, an iron curtain has fallen over the European continent,” Churchill declared.
4. Relations with third world countries
In addition to the “Western” and “Eastern” military-political blocs, the mysterious “Third World” arose. The countries of the “third world” include states that have relatively recently freed themselves from colonial dependence, have a low level of economic development and an unstable political system.
After World War II, the colonial system began to rapidly disintegrate. Great Britain and France - the main colonial powers - were losing their possessions in Africa, Asia, Indochina, and the Middle East. Which bloc will the governments of the liberated countries join? Often they did not know it themselves, preoccupied with how to maintain power amid the military-revolutionary chaos. And then Stalin set about the legacy of the decrepit “British lion.” Those of the “third world” states that enjoyed active military and economic support from the USSR were called “countries of socialist orientation.”
Stalin's successors will chase the mirage for decades. Billions of rubles will leave the Soviet economy to support “progressive regimes” in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The leaders of these regimes will gladly take rubles from the USSR, and then... with even greater pleasure - dollars from the United States.
5. Between the Cold War and the Cold Peace
At the height of the Cold War, on March 5, 1953, Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin died. He passed away when the world, thanks in part to his policies, was teetering on the brink of a third world war. When the name of the new Soviet leader (Khrushchev) became known on the other side of the Iron Curtain, diplomats and intelligence officers only shrugged their shoulders - no one really knew who he was or what he was like.
After the death of I.V. Stalin's foreign policy course of the Soviet Union underwent some changes. During 1953-1956. Soviet leadership led by N.S. Khrushchev made attempts to find new approaches in foreign policy, which at the 20th Congress developed into a new foreign policy concept (a concept is a system of views, one or another understanding of phenomena, processes, a single defining plan). According to this concept, the right of socialist countries to choose their own paths to build socialism, and not strictly follow the Soviet model, was recognized, and the fatal inevitability of nuclear war as a result of the confrontation between socialism and communism was denied. The principle of peaceful coexistence now came to the fore in relations with capitalist countries. At the same time, the USSR by no means abandoned the spread of its influence to other regions of the planet. The most active policy was pursued in relation to countries that had freed themselves from colonial dependence - Egypt, Algeria, etc. Forcing them to choose the socialist path of development, the Soviet Union provided them with economic, military and cultural assistance practically free of charge.
Special efforts were made to strengthen the socialist camp, since the process of de-Stalinization that began in the USSR caused serious problems in the relations of the Soviet Union with a number of countries included in this camp. Thus, in 1956, anti-communist and anti-Soviet sentiments intensified in Poland and Hungary. In the case of Poland, the Soviet leadership, agreeing with the reform program proposed by the new Polish leader W. Gomulka, was able to relieve tension. In Hungary the situation is out of control. An uprising broke out there, which was suppressed by Soviet troops. Such actions of the Soviet Union caused condemnation in many countries. They could not help but slow down the process of overcoming Stalinism not only in the countries of Eastern Europe, but also in the USSR itself.
For another reason, relations with Albania and China deteriorated. The leaders of the communist parties of these countries did not share Khrushchev’s policy of exposing Stalin’s personality cult. These states began to distance themselves from the Soviet Union, which led to the curtailment of all ties and a split in the world communist movement.
Meanwhile, during the time of N.S. Khrushchev, Soviet-American relations were also not stable. In the 1950s - early 1960s. last century, the American side often took steps to destabilize these relations. For example, US leaders were fully aware that illegal incursions into USSR airspace by American aircraft constituted a serious violation of international law. In this regard, the incident that occurred on November 7, 1954 is indicative (the Americans generally liked to violate the airspace of the USSR in holidays: the most famous episode was May 1, 1960, when an American U-2 spy plane with pilot F. Powers surviving was shot down over the Urals). In 1954, when the USSR celebrated the 37th anniversary of the October Revolution, Soviet fighters shot down an American RB-29 reconnaissance aircraft making a reconnaissance flight along the coastline of the Soviet Far East in the Sea of Japan. Ten pilots from the crew of the reconnaissance plane jumped out by parachute and were rescued by American emergency services. One crew member died.
In the United States, a press campaign began accusing Soviet air defense forces of destroying an innocent aircraft. The Republican leader in the Senate, William Knowland, came to President Eisenhower with a demand to sever diplomatic relations with the Soviet Union, citing public demands. Eisenhower carefully made it clear to the senator that the plane was not performing a mission of an “innocent” nature. “In international relations,” said the US President, a military general who commanded the combined forces of the Allies in Europe during World War II, “things happen that cannot be explained in words to the general public... We sometimes behave aggressively, but you don’t care.” you don’t know about this... I know things that I can’t even afford to tell my wife... Our intelligence service is very active and often risky. So anything can happen." Eisenhower said that he knew the arguments of those who wanted to break off diplomatic relations with the USSR. But this will be a step towards war. “And if this is done,” the president concluded, “then the next question arises: are we ready for an attack?” As for me, I personally am not ready for an attack. We must understand that the day may come when we will have to go to war."
In an effort to improve relations with the West, the USSR took a number of initiatives: declared a moratorium on nuclear testing and unilaterally implemented a series of cuts armed forces. At the same time, however, they were rearmed with modern nuclear missile weapons. The declarative nature of many Soviet disarmament proposals was obvious, but their effectiveness was insignificant. At the same time, Khrushchev’s dynamic foreign policy activities and his numerous personal contacts with Western leaders opened the way for a search for mutual understanding. Khrushchev’s visit to the United States in 1959 gave rise to special hopes.
Soon, however, a new round of confrontation began. The events of 1961 led to the construction of the “Berlin Wall” and the aggravation of the situation around West Berlin, now isolated from the GDR. The Cold War reached its climax in the fall of 1962, when the Cuban Missile Crisis broke out due to the deployment of Soviet missiles in Cuba. For several days the world was on the brink of nuclear war. Only the compromise found (the withdrawal of Soviet missiles in exchange for an American commitment not to use force against Cuba) made it possible to prevent a worldwide catastrophe.
To be fair, it must be said that Soviet leaders (Stalin, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, Andropov) preferred forceful solutions to many international problems. In the aspect of the USSR foreign policy we are considering in the post-war period, the organization of the 12th Special Department under the 2nd Main Intelligence Directorate of the USSR Ministry of State Security in the fall of 1953 is of exceptional interest. This issue was previously considered by a special commission of the CPSU Central Committee on intelligence work. Soon, signed by N.S. Khrushchev, who was elected in those days as the First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, and the Central Committee adopted a resolution on the creation of “a department for carrying out sabotage at important military-strategic facilities and communications of the main aggressive states - the USA, England, as well as on the territory of other capitalist countries used by the main aggressors against the USSR." Further, the directive stated: “Recognize it as expedient to carry out active actions against the most active and vicious enemies of the Soviet Union from among the leaders of capitalist countries, especially dangerous foreign intelligence officers, leaders of anti-Soviet emigrant organizations and traitors to the Motherland.” In the original, instead of the words “active actions,” it was written “acts of terror.” In the “Regulations” about this department, four pages of typewritten text revealed the tasks and goals of the department’s upcoming activities; it spoke in detail and a lot about terror, and about sabotage work, and about the “secret seizure and delivery to our territory of persons whose removal to the USSR is called for special need." After the peak of tension in 1962, some positive changes were achieved in international relations. The Moscow Treaty of 1963 was concluded banning nuclear weapons tests in three areas: in space, under water and in the atmosphere.
6. Foreign policy of the USSR in 1965-1984.
After the resignation of N.S. Khrushchev and the rise to political leadership in the Soviet Union by L.I. Brezhnev saw relative stability in domestic politics. However, there were swings and fluctuations in foreign policy activities, which led either to a weakening of international tension or to a sharp aggravation of the situation in the world.
At the end of the 1960s. In Czechoslovakia, the process of democratization and reform of society began. The Soviet leadership initially calmly observed what was happening in Czechoslovakia, but gradually, due to fears that the success of reformers in Czechoslovakia would affect political processes in other countries, the position of the Politburo of the CPSU Central Committee began to change. Czechoslovak leaders, led by A. Dubcek, began to be put under pressure to suspend the reform process, during which the ideas of transition to a market economy and the construction of “socialism with a human face” were put forward. Convinced of the futility of such attempts, Soviet leaders took extreme measures. On August 21, 1968, troops from a number of countries participating in the Warsaw Pact - the USSR, East Germany, Poland, Hungary and Bulgaria were introduced into the territory of Czechoslovakia in order to prevent the loss of “socialist gains” there and prevent the country from leaving the Warsaw Pact. The world community condemned this action, a number of people spoke out against it communist parties foreign countries. The people of Czechoslovakia, who in 1945 enthusiastically greeted the Red Army as a liberator, were now hostile and saw the soldiers who entered its territory as occupiers. The defeat of democratic reforms in the Czechoslovak Republic delayed reforms not only in this country for two decades: it caused the strengthening of conservative tendencies in the USSR and other socialist states.
In the second half of the 1960s. There was a further deterioration in Soviet-Chinese relations, border conflicts began, which resulted in armed clashes in 1969 on Damansky Island.
In the early 1970s. There were positive changes in Europe and in Soviet-American relations. In Germany, a government led by the leader of the Social Democrats, W. Brandt, came to power and began to pursue the “new Eastern policy.” It consisted of recognizing the independent existence of the GDR, the inviolability of European post-war borders, and the need to improve relations with the USSR and the countries of Eastern Europe. As a result of a series of negotiations, relevant agreements were signed, and the rapid development of economic relations between the USSR and Germany began. The latter became the USSR's largest trading partner among Western countries. In 1971, agreements were reached between the USSR, the USA, Great Britain and France, which determined the status of West Berlin, which also softened the confrontation in the very center of Europe. All this contributed to the successful preparation and holding in Helsinki in July - August 1975 of the Meeting of Leaders of 33 European countries, the USA and Canada. At this meeting, the Final Act on Security and Cooperation in Europe was adopted. The Soviet Union was one of the initiators of this forum and considered its results as a major success of Soviet foreign policy.
Achieved in the late 1960s. The approximate equality (parity) of the nuclear missile potentials of the USA and the USSR prompted both countries to negotiate on the containment of strategic weapons. Throughout the 1970s. a number of agreements were concluded imposing certain restrictions on both sides on the number of nuclear warheads and their delivery vehicles.
The Helsinki Conference and the Soviet-American agreements became the most significant manifestations of the policy of détente. However, it did not last long. At the end of the 1970s. The leadership of the Soviet Union authorized the replacement of medium-range missiles deployed in the European part of the country with more powerful ones. This caused a response from NATO countries: the United States began to deploy new types of nuclear missile weapons on the territory of a number of its European allies, which led to an aggravation of the situation in Europe and the freezing of many years of negotiations on the reduction of nuclear and conventional weapons.
In December 1979, Soviet leaders decided to send a “limited contingent” of Soviet troops into neighboring Afghanistan. There, at that time, the civil war was gaining momentum, and Soviet intervention in the conflict on the side of the pro-communist government caused an explosion of national-patriotic feelings. The action of the Soviet Union met with general rejection in the world. Only certain countries refrained from condemning it. USA, China, Islamic states began to provide powerful support to the Afghan Mujahideen (Mujahideen - fighters for the Islamic faith) who fought against the Soviet troops. The USSR found itself drawn into an inglorious war against the people of a neighboring state, with which it had maintained friendly relations for decades.
After his death in November 1982, L.I. Brezhnev, Yu.V. became the General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee. Andropov, who was the chairman of the KGB of the USSR for many years. In foreign policy, he managed to declare himself as a supporter of a hard line, which made the Soviet-American confrontation even more acute. However, Andropov's stay in power lasted only 15 months. Suffering from serious kidney disease, he died in February 1984.
Successor Yu.V. Andropov on duty Secretary General The Central Committee of the CPSU became even more elderly and decrepit K.U. Chernenko. During his 13 months in power, foreign policy did not undergo significant changes.
7. New political thinking
A radical turn in Soviet foreign policy in the second half of the 1980s. associated with the names of the new General Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee, and then the President of the USSR M.S. Gorbachev and USSR Foreign Minister E.A. Shevardnadze. He replaced A.A. in this post. Gromyko, who continuously led the Soviet Union for three decades foreign policy and nicknamed foreign diplomats“Mr. No” for intransigence during any negotiations. In international relations, Gorbachev's leadership proposed a program of fundamental changes that became known as “new political thinking.” Its essence was the recognition of the priority in international affairs of universal human values over class values, which in the previous period determined the foreign policy of the USSR. The new thinking involved a transition from confrontation to cooperation, from the arms race to gradual disarmament, from supporting regional conflicts to finding ways to resolve them. Showing unprecedented dynamism, Gorbachev and Shevardnadze visited many countries of the world, established personal contacts with prominent statesmen, managed to convince them of the seriousness of their intentions to change the foreign policy course of the USSR. The atmosphere in the world began to change for the better.
As a result of numerous meetings M.S. Gorbachev and US Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush managed to agree on a real reduction in nuclear weapons: entire classes of medium- and short-range missiles began to be destroyed, and then some of their strategic types. For the first time in many decades, the specter of atomic war that threatened life on earth began to disappear.
A major step in recovery international relations was the decision of the Soviet leadership to withdraw troops from Afghanistan. This immediately defused the situation in the Middle East and made it possible to begin the process of improving relations with China and Muslim countries.
New principles of cooperation were laid down by M.S. Gorbachev and in relations with socialist countries, in particular, declared the non-interference of the Soviet Union in their internal affairs. In the context of growing anti-communist sentiment in Eastern European countries, this position of Gorbachev’s leadership did not give rise to a possible worsening of relations between the USSR and the West. In the parliamentary elections held in the summer of 1989 in Hungary and Poland, the communists were defeated, new political forces came to power, proclaiming a course for transforming society on the basis of market economy and political pluralism (pluralism is one of the principles of social order, in which there are political, ideological and organizational opportunities for expressing the interests of various social groups). In the autumn of the same year, there was a massive collapse of the communist regimes in the GDR, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Albania, Romania, and the disintegration of Yugoslavia into independent republics began. Political changes in Eastern European countries led to the demise of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the Warsaw Pact Organization.
The German question also received a quick resolution. In connection with the changes in the GDR, the Berlin Wall was destroyed, and non-communist forces that advocated the immediate merger of the two German states won the elections. M.S. Gorbachev, after negotiations with German Chancellor G. Kohl, the leaders of the USA, Great Britain and France, agreed to the withdrawal of Soviet troops from the territory of the GDR over a number of years and to the latter’s entry into the Federal Republic of Germany. In 1990, the unification of the two Germanys took place. The end of the confrontation between two military-political blocs in Europe and the overcoming of the split in Germany meant the end of the Cold War.
The joint efforts of the USSR and the USA in the international arena made it possible to move the decision of many conflict situations in the Middle East, Nicaragua, Kampuchea, southern Africa. In general, the change in the foreign policy course of the USSR in line with the new political thinking helped to significantly improve the international climate and put an end to the exhausting and wasteful confrontation between the two superpowers.
cold war foreign policy
Conclusion
I think that it is unlikely that any serious - be it Western or domestic - political scientists will say that the Cold War is just one of the episodes of the 20th century. Having greatly influenced the state of international relations for at least 40 years, this phenomenon left an indelible imprint not only on their external side, but also deeply affected the very essence of world and national development of these years, affecting political, socio-economic and even psychological aspects of life of many (maybe all) peoples and continents of the world.
The most important attribute of the Cold War, which caused the most serious and intractable trauma to the people of the 20th century, was the threat of mutual nuclear destruction, that is, the self-destruction of humanity in a nuclear war. She questioned many values that were previously considered unshakable, even axiomatic.
Is the Cold War over? In a broad political sense, probably yes. The beginning of the end of the Cold War can probably be dated to 1985, when the new leaders of the USSR, led by M.S. Gorbachev, came to power. By this time, the need to end the confrontation was firmly recognized by the entire society. Significant milestones on the way to this were: the Soviet-American meeting in Reykjavik, the negotiations on nuclear and space weapons (NSAW), the signing of the INF Treaty in 1987, the CFE negotiations in Vienna, unilateral reductions in tactical nuclear weapons in Europe. However, after the Second World War, the most important boundary between the confrontational and post-confrontational periods in the history of international relations should be considered the withdrawal of Soviet troops from the countries of Eastern Europe. The subsequent fall of the Berlin Wall only consolidated this unprecedented unilateral step in a symbolic sense, carried out, by the way, completely voluntarily and without any external pressure.
At the same time, it can be easily proven that the Cold War is not completely over. And one of the strongest arguments in favor of such a conclusion is the preservation of the doctrine of nuclear deterrence, which is an organic element of the international security system that emerged after the Second World War. The most important American documents indicate that the doctrine of nuclear deterrence of Russia is still organic and inalienable integral part military-political thinking of the United States, which, therefore, did not undergo significant changes even after the declared end of the Cold War.
Another argument that the Cold War is not completely over is the unprecedented geopolitical offensive the United States launched after the Cold War was declared a thing of the past. It should be recognized that this offensive was provoked by the gross miscalculations of the Soviet leadership, which failed to ensure the continuity of the geopolitical interests of historical Russia in the late 80s and early 90s. There is no doubt that by this time the withdrawal of Soviet troops from the countries of Central and Eastern Europe was one way or another inevitable and met the national interests of the country. The collapse of the Warsaw Department and the unification of Germany were just as inevitable. Another thing is that at that time all the prerequisites and opportunities remained to resolve these issues with due regard for the national interests of the USSR, in particular by legally formalizing the West’s obligations not to violate the geopolitical status quo in Europe, including through the expansion of NATO to the East. And the West, it should be admitted with complete certainty, was then ready for this. After all, at the end of the 80s, no one even dreamed of the possibility of the Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary joining the alliance, not to mention the Baltic countries.
Bibliography
1. L.V. Zhukov “History of Russia from ancient times to the present time”, M.: Nauka, 1995.
2. V.Ya. Khutorsky “History of Russia. Soviet era (1917-1993)",
M.: Exam, 2005.
3. “History of Russia. XX century" ed. V.P. Dmitrenko, M.: Nauka, 2001.
4. “History of international relations and foreign policy of the USSR”, ed. V.G. Trukhanovsky, M.: International relations, 1967.
5. Encyclopedia for children. T.5, part 3. Moscow “Avanta+”. 1995.
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The decisive contribution of the Soviet Union to the victory of the anti-Hitler coalition over fascism led to serious changes in the international arena.
The world authority of the USSR increased as one of the victorious countries in the fight against fascism, and it again began to be perceived as a great power. The influence of our state was predominant in Eastern Europe and China. In the second half of the 1940s. Communist regimes formed in these countries. This was largely due to the presence of Soviet troops on their territories and a large financial assistance from the USSR.
But gradually the contradictions between the former allies in World War II began to worsen.
The manifesto of the confrontation was W. Churchill’s speech “The Muscles of the World” in Fulton (USA) on March 5, 1946, where he called on Western countries to fight the “expansion of totalitarian communism.”
In Moscow, this speech was perceived as a political challenge. I.V. Stalin sharply responded to W. Churchill in the Pravda newspaper, noting: “... that in essence, Mr. Churchill now stands in the position of warmongers.” The confrontation intensified further and the Cold War flared up on both sides.
Then the initiative to develop confrontational actions in line with the Cold War passed to the United States. In February 1947, President G. Truman, in his annual message to the US Congress, proposed specific measures aimed against the spread of Soviet influence, which included economic assistance to Europe, the formation of a military-political alliance under US leadership, the placement of American military bases along Soviet borders, as well as providing support to opposition movements in Eastern European countries.
An important milestone in American expansion was the program of economic assistance to countries affected by Nazi aggression, proclaimed on June 5, 1947 by US Secretary of State J. Marshall.
Moscow pointedly refused to participate in the Marshall Plan and put pressure on the countries of Central and Eastern Europe to do the same.
The Kremlin's response to the Marshall Plan was the creation in September 1947 of the Information Bureau of Communist Parties (Cominform) with the aim of strengthening control over the communist movement in the world and the countries of Central and Eastern Europe. Cominform focused only on Soviet model the formation of socialism, condemning the previously existing concepts of “national paths to socialism.” In 1947–1948 At the instigation of the Soviet leadership in the countries of Eastern Europe, a series of revelations occurred regarding a number of party and government figures accused of sabotage and deviations from the agreed line of socialist construction.
In 1948, relations between the USSR and Yugoslavia sharply deteriorated. The head of this state I.B. Tito sought leadership in the Balkans and put forward the idea of creating a Balkan federation under the leadership of Yugoslavia; due to his own ambitions and authority, he refused to act under the dictates of I.V. Stalin. The Cominform in June 1948 issued a resolution on the situation in the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, accusing its leaders of departing from Marxist-Leninist ideology. Further, the conflict deepened, which led to the severance of all relations between the two countries.
Having refused to participate in the implementation of the Marshall Plan, the countries of Eastern Europe, on the initiative of the USSR, created their own international economic organization in January 1949 - the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA). Its main objectives were material support for the countries of the pro-Soviet bloc, as well as their economic integration. All activities of CMEA were built on planning and directive principles and were imbued with recognition political leadership USSR in the socialist camp.
In the late 1940s - early 1960s. The confrontation between the USSR and the USA intensified in Europe and Asia.
As part of the implementation of the “Marshall Plan”, on April 4, 1949, at the initiative of the United States, a military-political alliance was created - the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which included the USA, Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Canada, Italy, Portugal, Norway, Denmark, Iceland. Later, Turkey and Greece (1952), as well as the Federal Republic of Germany (1955), joined NATO.
An acute problem remained the confrontation in Germany occupied by the Allied forces, in which the process of dividing the country into two parts was taking place: western and eastern. In September 1949, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) was formed from the western zones of occupation, and in October of the same year, the German Democratic Republic (GDR) was formed in the Soviet zone.
In the Far East in 1950–1953. broke out Korean War between North and South, which became an almost open military clash between opposing blocs. The Soviet Union and China provided political, material and human assistance to North Korea, and the United States to South Korea. The war went on with varying degrees of success. As a result, neither side managed to achieve a decisive military advantage. In July 1953, peace was established in Korea, but the country remained split into two states, which have survived to this day.
19.2. The creation of atomic weapons and the beginning of nuclear confrontation
In the 1940s atomic weapons were created, which became a determining factor in international relations.
On US territory, in Los Alamos, an American nuclear center was created in 1942. At its base, work began to create an atomic bomb. The overall management of the project was entrusted to the talented nuclear physicist R. Oppenheimer. By the summer of 1945, the Americans managed to assemble two atomic bombs. The first explosion was carried out at the Alamogordo test site on July 16, 1945 and was timed to coincide with a meeting of the leaders of the USSR, USA, Great Britain and France in Potsdam.
As already noted, on August 6 and 9, 1945, two atomic bombs were dropped on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The use of nuclear weapons was not caused by military necessity. US ruling circles pursued political goals. They wanted to demonstrate their strength to intimidate the USSR and other countries.
The beginning of the Soviet atomic project also dates back to 1942. When I.V. Stalin received information about the desire of the United States and Germany to master this superweapon, he uttered one phrase: “We need to do it.”
In the spring of 1943, I.V. was appointed scientific director of work on the use of atomic energy. Kurchatov.
On August 29, 1949, the first Soviet atomic bomb was successfully tested at the test site near Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan. The US nuclear monopoly was eliminated, and the confrontation between the two great powers became thermonuclear.
The creators of domestic atomic weapons were academicians I.V. Kurchatov, Yu.B. Khariton, Ya.B. Zeldovich.
Yu.B. Khariton, at the end of his life in 1995, uttered warning words: “Conscious of my involvement in remarkable scientific and engineering achievements... today, at a more mature age, I am aware of our involvement in the terrible loss of life, in the monstrous damage caused to the nature of our home - the Earth ...
God grant that those who come after us find the way, find the strength of spirit and determination, striving for the best, and not do the worst.”
19.3. Post-war economic development of the country
The war destroyed about one third of the country's total national wealth. A huge number of factories and factories, mines, railways and other industrial facilities.
Restoration work began during the Great Patriotic War, immediately after the liberation of part of the occupied territories. In August 1943 it was adopted special resolution The Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks and the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR “On urgent measures to restore the economy in areas liberated from German occupation.” By the end of the war, as a result of the titanic efforts of our workers, it was possible to recreate part of industrial production.
However, the main restoration processes took place after the victorious end of the war, during the Fourth Five-Year Plan period (1946–1950). As in the years of the first five-year plans, the emphasis in industrial development was placed on heavy industry. The level of pre-war industrial production was achieved by 1948. A total of 6,200 large enterprises were restored and rebuilt.
Agriculture in the Fourth Five-Year Plan did not have time to reach pre-war levels. This was only achieved in the next five-year period.
At the same time, the country faced enormous difficulties and problems. In 1946, famine broke out in a number of regions, the result of both drought and traditional government policies regarding agriculture. From the village, as during the period of collectivization, resources and funds were taken to develop industry and, accordingly, to meet foreign policy objectives (in particular, in 1946–1947, the USSR exported 2.5 million tons of grain to Europe at preferential prices).
The war and its consequence - the rationing system of supplying the population - upset financial system countries. The critical situation in the consumer market, the expansion of natural exchange, and inflationary processes threatened to disrupt the program for restoring the national economy, so the question of monetary reform arose. On December 16, 1947, the implementation of monetary reform began in the USSR, cards for food and industrial goods were abolished. Money was released into circulation and exchanged within a week (until December 22, 1947) for existing old cash in a ratio of 1:10 (i.e., 10 old rubles were equal to one new ruble).
Prices for bread, flour, pasta, cereals, and beer decreased everywhere. But at the same time, prices for meat, fish, sugar, salt, vodka, milk, eggs, vegetables, fabrics, shoes, and knitwear were not changed.
It is quite obvious that the reform pursued confiscation goals and “ate up” part of the savings of the Soviet people.
Since 1949, a constant decline in prices began, but the purchasing power of the population was extremely low, which created the illusion of abundance and improvement of life. The financial situation of the population was aggravated by forced loans from the state from the people through subscription and purchase of various bonds.
19.4. Social and political life
After the abolition of the highest body of state power in the country during the Great Patriotic War - State Committee Defense - all power continued to remain in the hands of the party-state apparatus, which was headed individually by I.V. Stalin, who was both the head of government (since 1941) and the leader of the Communist Party. Other leaders also held senior government and party posts (G.M. Malenkov, N.A. Voznesensky, L.P. Beria, L.M. Kaganovich, K.E. Voroshilov, etc.).
In fact, all power in the country was still in the hands of I.V. Stalin. The highest party body, the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, met irregularly and extremely rarely. For daily work I.V. Stalin created a system of “troikas”, “sixes”, “sevens” with changing composition. Having outlined any decision, he approved it together with specific persons summoned for discussion who were members of the Politburo, the Organizing Bureau, the Secretariat of the Party Central Committee or the Council of Ministers. Thus, until the death of I.V. Stalin's system of supreme party-Soviet power functioned.
Immediately after the war, a new revolution began in the country political repression. This was explained primarily by Stalin’s desire to recreate the atmosphere of fear as the main component of the authoritarian regime, to eliminate the elements of freedom that appeared as a result of the people’s victory in the war. Such policies were also used as a means of struggle for power in the political leadership.
The treatment of prisoners of war returning to the USSR already from the summer of 1945 indicated a tightening of the regime. Only 20% of the 2 million repatriated prisoners of war were allowed to return home. Most of those captured were sent to camps or sentenced to exile for at least five years.
I.V. Stalin did not trust the military, constantly kept them under the control of state security agencies and systematically subjected them to repression. One of the first was the “aviators’ case” in 1946. Commander-in-Chief of the Air Force A.A. was arrested and convicted of sabotage in the aviation industry. Novikov, People's Commissar aviation industry A.I. Shakhurin, Air Marshal S.A. Khudyakov, chief engineer of the Air Force A.K. Repin and others.
He was subjected to disgrace in 1946–1948. and Marshal G.K. Zhukov, who was removed from leading military posts and sent to command the Odessa and then the Ural Military District. Military leaders close to him were repressed: generals V.N. Gordov, F.T. Rybalchenko, V.V. Kryukov, V.K. Telegin, former Marshal G.I. Sandpiper.
The so-called “Leningrad case” (1949–1950) was fabricated, as a result of which prominent government and party workers were repressed (N.A. Voznesensky, A.A. Kuznetsov, P.S. Popkov, M.I. Rodionov, Ya L. F. Kapustin, P. G. Lazutin, etc.).
All of them were charged with treason, which allegedly consisted of organizing subversive work in the party and government bodies, seeking to turn the Leningrad party organization into their support for the fight against the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, violating state plans, etc.
The court sentenced six of the accused (mentioned above) to capital punishment, the rest to various terms. imprisonment.
However, at this stage the “Leningrad affair” did not end. In 1950–1952 Over 200 responsible party and Soviet workers in Leningrad were convicted and sentenced to death and long prison terms.
April 30, 1954, after the death of I.V. Stalin, the Supreme Court of the USSR exonerated all those accused in this case, many of them posthumously.
After Stalin's terror of the 1930s. a wave of mass repressions rose again. An anti-Semitic campaign began to unfold under the guise of fighting “rootless cosmopolitanism.” There were arrests and executions of representatives of the Jewish intelligentsia.
The Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, which during the war years was involved in collecting among Jewish communities, was dissolved different countries(mainly in the USA) financial resources to support the Soviet Union. Its leaders - S. Lozovsky, B. Shimelianovich, P. Markish, L. Kvitko and others were arrested and convicted in the summer of 1952 by the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the USSR, and were subsequently shot. The famous actor and director S. Mikhoels died under mysterious circumstances, and P. Zhemchuzhina (wife of V.M. Molotov) was also imprisoned.
On January 13, 1953, TASS reported the arrest of a group of doctors - M. Vovsi, B. Kogan, B. Feldman, Y. Etinger and others. It was announced that a terrorist group of doctors wanted to shorten the lives of active figures in the Soviet state through sabotage treatment. They were also accused of involvement in foreign intelligence services.
On March 5, 1953, I.V. died. Stalin. A month later, the arrested doctors were released and found innocent.
Foreign policy of the USSR. "Cold War"
Signs of the Cold War:
The existence of a relatively stable bipolar world is the presence in the world of two superpowers that balance each other’s influence, to which other states gravitate to one degree or another.
“Block politics” is the creation of opposing military-political blocs by superpowers. 1949 - creation of NATO, 1955 - Warsaw Pact Organization.
“Arms race” - the increase in the number of weapons by the USSR and the USA in order to achieve qualitative superiority. The “arms race” ended by the beginning of the 1970s. in connection with the achievement of parity (balance, equality) in the number of weapons. From this moment on, the “policy of detente” begins - a policy aimed at eliminating the threat of nuclear war and reducing the level of international tension. “Détente” ended after the entry of Soviet troops into Afghanistan (1979)
Formation of an “enemy image” among one’s own population in relation to the ideological enemy. In the USSR, this policy was manifested in the creation of the “Iron Curtain” - a system of international self-isolation. In the USA, “McCarthyism” is being carried out - the persecution of supporters of “left” ideas. Soviet economy post-war
Periodically emerging armed conflicts that threaten to escalate the Cold War into a full-scale war.
Causes of the Cold War:
Victory in World War II led to a sharp strengthening of the USSR and the USA.
The imperial ambitions of Stalin sought to expand the zone of influence of the USSR into the territories of Turkey, Tripolitania (Libya) and Iran.
The US nuclear monopoly, attempts at dictatorship in relations with other countries.
Ineradicable ideological contradictions between the two superpowers.
Formation of a socialist camp controlled by the USSR in Eastern Europe.
The date of the beginning of the Cold War is considered to be March 1946, when W. Churchill made a speech in Fulton (USA) in the presence of President G. Truman, in which he accused the USSR of “the limitless spread of its power and its doctrines” in the world. Soon, President Truman announced a program of measures to “save” Europe from Soviet expansion (the “Truman Doctrine”). He proposed providing large-scale economic assistance to European countries (“Marshall Plan”); create a military-political alliance of Western countries under the auspices of the United States (NATO); place a network of US military bases along the borders of the USSR; support internal opposition in Eastern European countries. All this was supposed not only to prevent further expansion of the sphere of influence of the USSR (the doctrine of containing socialism), but also to force the Soviet Union to return to its previous borders (the doctrine of rolling back socialism).
By this time, communist governments existed only in Yugoslavia, Albania and Bulgaria. However, from 1947 to 1949. socialist systems are also developing in Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia, North Korea, and China. The USSR provides them with enormous financial assistance.
In 1949, the economic foundations of the Soviet bloc were formalized. For this purpose, the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance was created. For military-political cooperation, the Warsaw Treaty Organization was formed in 1955. Within the framework of the commonwealth, no “independence” was allowed. Relations between the USSR and Yugoslavia (Joseph Broz Tito), which was seeking its path to socialism, were severed. At the end of the 1940s. Relations with China (Mao Zedong) deteriorated sharply.
The first serious clash between the USSR and the USA was the Korean War (1950-53). The Soviet state supports the communist regime of North Korea (DPRK, Kim Il Sung), the USA supports the bourgeois government of the South. The Soviet Union supplied to the DPRK modern views military equipment (including MiG-15 jet aircraft), military specialists. As a result of the conflict, the Korean Peninsula was officially divided into two parts.
Thus, the international position of the USSR in the first post-war years was determined by the status of one of the two world superpowers won during the war. The confrontation between the USSR and the USA and the outbreak of the Cold War marked the beginning of the division of the world into two warring military-political camps.
Transition to Cold War politics. The growing influence of the USSR in the post-war world caused extreme concern among the leadership of Western powers. It was most strongly reflected in the speech of former British Prime Minister W. Churchill, which he delivered in Fulton (USA, March 1946). Recognizing that military victories had propelled the USSR into the ranks of “the leading nations of the world,” the former British prime minister said that the Soviet Union was striving for “the limitless spread of its power and its doctrines.” Since “Russians most admire strength,” the United States and Great Britain, having created “an association of English-speaking peoples,” should talk to them from a position of strength. At the same time, the use of American atomic weapons was allowed as “ effective means intimidation."
In February 1947, US President G. Truman, in his message to Congress, specified the position of W. Churchill (“Truman Doctrine”). As a result, two strategic tasks were defined in relation to the USSR: at a minimum, to prevent further expansion of the sphere of influence of the USSR and its communist ideology (the doctrine of containing socialism), and, at maximum, to force socialism to withdraw into its former borders (the doctrine of discarding socialism). Specific steps to achieve these goals were also identified: first, to provide large-scale economic assistance to European countries, making their economies dependent on the United States (“Marshall Plan”); secondly, to create a military-political alliance of these countries led by the United States (NATO, 1949); thirdly, to place a network of US military bases (Greece, Turkey) near the borders of the USSR; fourth, support anti-socialist forces within the Soviet bloc countries; finally, use - as a last resort - its armed forces for direct intervention in the internal affairs of the countries of the Soviet sphere of influence.
The leadership of the USSR regarded the new foreign policy course of the former military allies as a call to war, which immediately affected both the foreign and domestic policies of the Soviet state. Hopes for comprehensive cooperation after the war among the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition collapsed, the world entered the era of the Cold War.
Creation socialist System. The measures taken by the USSR after the war in foreign policy were adequate to those of the United States, although less effective. The forces were unequal, first of all, because the USSR emerged from the war economically weakened, while the United States emerged stronger.
The Soviet Union, led by the CPSU (until 1952 - the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks)), contributed to the establishment of socialist governments in Bulgaria, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Yugoslavia, Albania, East Germany, North Vietnam, North Korea, and China. He, in turn, deployed large-scale assistance to the countries of “people's democracy”, creating for this purpose a special organization - the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA, 1949), and a few years later united some of them into a military-political union - the Warsaw Pact Organization (OVD, 1955). The USSR actively promoted communist parties and movements in capitalist countries, contributed to the growth of the national liberation movement, the collapse of the colonial system and the creation of countries with a “socialist orientation.”
A symbol of the split of the world into two opposing systems - the “system of capitalism” and the “system of socialism” - was the split of Germany into two states - the Federal Republic of Germany (1948) and the GDR (1949).
The most formidable event of the Soviet-American confrontation at the end of Stalin's rule was the Korean War (1950-1953). The USSR supported the DPRK's attempt to overthrow the pro-American regime of South Korea. The Korean War was ended in 1953. Korea remained, divided into two opposing states as a symbol of the split into two systems on the Asian continent. Vietnam shared this fate.
Cultural life of the USSR 1945-1953.
Despite the extremely tense economic situation, the Soviet government is seeking funds for the development of science, public education, and cultural institutions. Universal primary education was restored, and since 1952 education up to 7 grades has become compulsory; Evening schools are opened for working youth. Television begins regular broadcasting. At the same time, control over the intelligentsia, weakened during the war, is being restored. In the summer of 1946, a campaign against “petty-bourgeois individualism” and cosmopolitanism began. It was led by A.A. Zhdanov. On August 14, 1946, resolutions of the Party Central Committee were adopted on the magazines “Leningrad” and “Zvezda”, which were persecuted for publishing the works of A. Akhmatova and M. Zoshchenko. A.A. was appointed first secretary of the board of the Writers' Union. Fadeev, who was tasked with bringing order to this organization.
The foreign policy of the USSR in the post-war years was carried out in conditions of deep political confrontation. The victory of the Soviet state in the fight against fascism significantly increased the country's authority in the international arena. At the same time, the United States was not going to give up its leadership position.
The main vector of USSR foreign policy in the post-war years
The struggle for leadership of the two superpowers was significantly complicated by the fact that in some European countries left-wing leaders came to power, supporting communist ideology, were in no hurry to break capitalist ties with the United States. The foreign policy of the USSR during this period was aimed at eradicating imperialism, in particular American, and strengthening the power of communist governments in European countries.
Already in 1946, the USSR had established the so-called sanitary zone – geopolitical isolation, which was caused by the fear of penetration of an alien ideology into the state.
Creation of the Cominform Bureau
In 1947, the Soviet government initiated a meeting of the leaders of nine European communist parties with the goal of creating a body that would regulate the construction of socialism in European states and prevent US attempts to interfere in the internal politics of socialist states.
Establishment Agreement Cominformburo was signed by all foreign delegates and the Soviet side. The main functions of the Cominform Bureau were mutual support of socialist states in the political arena. The creation of the Komiinformburo was an event that divided the world into socialist and capitalist camps.
Later, the Soviet government signed similar agreements with other friendly states - the Korean People's Democratic Republic, the German Democratic Republic and the People's Republic of China. Such agreements provided for the obligation on the part of the USSR to participate in all confrontations that these states might have with the United States.
Soon, the USSR had the opportunity to fulfill its promise, and thereby worsen relations with the capitalist West: US troops intervened in civil war In Korea.
USSR and third world countries
After the start of the Cold War, in addition to the “capitalist” and “socialist” blocs, a mysterious at that time "third World", which consisted of the poorest states that, until the end of World War II, did not attract political interest from either the USA or the USSR.
The low level of political and economic development of such states became the main instrument in the struggle of two opposite-polar empires. Taking advantage of the collapse of colonialism, the Soviet state began to invest millions of rubles in the economies of former colonies - African countries, Latin America and Asia.
In return, the governments of the “third world” states were only required to join the socialist bloc. However, despite the regular financial assistance of the USSR, these states also willingly accepted assistance from the United States, and for a long time occupied neutral positions in the global confrontation.
