HIST 236 Lecture Notes - Lecture 24: Peaceful Coexistence, Nikita Khrushchev, Proxy War
19 Jun 2018
School
Department
Course
Professor
Peaceful coexistence
Relations with the West were relaxed in the late 1950s under Khrushchev
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New avenues for cooperation, exchange and building mutual understanding
were opened up
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Communism would eventually beat capitalism, but for now, Khrushchev
argued the two systems could "peacefully coexist"
In reality, they continued to compete
○
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Soviet government signs agreements with the West
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Instead of there being isolation, they are going to try and understand each
other
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Meetings with Soviet leaders and other leaders
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Khrushchev meets JFK in 1959, doesn't really like him and thinks that he is
too young
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Khrushchev and Nixon have the "kitchen debate"
Argue about how Nixon says that Russians do not have new
technology and about consumerism
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The Space Race
The Soviet Union put sputnik ("fellow traveller") into orbit in 1957
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This prompted fears in the US of a missile gap and kicked off the arms race
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The Soviet Union put the first dog into space, followed by the first man in
space, followed by the first women in space
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Decolonizing and Developing Countries
The Soviet government also competed for influence in the decolonizing
Third World
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They provided money, resources, advisors, and weapons to these new
states, presenting themselves as allies who wanted to see them modernize
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The Soviet government became involved in proxy wars in countries that had
communist revolutions, including Vietnam and Cuba, etc.
Proxy war, Korean war with the US and Vietnam
○
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Soviet government is the only ally that Cuba has
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Providing aid to countries that are on the fence of communism, or are
working both sides
Governments use cold war conflict to their advantage, Soviet Union
does not give them money because Rubles are useless, but they are
able to give countries resources
○
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1956 Uprising in Poland and Hungary
Poland and Hungary has become hotbeds of discontent by 1956
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After trying to launch liberalizing reforms, Poland's leadership was warned
by the Soviet Union that going their own way would have consequences
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A student protest in Hungary in 1956 turned into an anti-Communist
uprising
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Happened after Khrushchev's secret speech, where they think that they can
liberalize
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Soviet tanks were eventually sent in to put it down and the leaders were
arrested and later executed
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Hungary was treated like an occupied country after the war (WWII)
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The Sino-Soviet Split
China which had had a communist revolution in 1949, increasingly clashed
with the Soviet Union
Stalin and Mao distrusted one another; Khrushchev and Mao
eventually fell out over ideological disagreements
○
Mao was worried about Khrushchev's rapprochement with the West,
especially after the Cuban missile crisis
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In 1962, the countries broke diplomatic relations
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The Cuban Missile Crisis
Khrushchev agreed to move missiles to Cuba after the Bay of Pigs incident
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US officials were worried because these could hit American targets
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After tense negotiations that brought the US and the Soviet Union to the
brink of nuclear war, the Soviet government agreed to remove the missiles
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The Americans also removed their missiles from Turkey
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The US and Soviet Union established a hotline for emergencies thereafter
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Détente
Following the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Soviet Union and the US entered into
a period of détente (relaxed tensions)
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They continued to engage in proxy wars abroad
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The Soviet Union signed onto many international agreements during this
time
In 1975, they signed the Helsinki accords in which, among other
things, they acknowledged the right of state sovereignty, human
rights, etc. (though the USSR was arguably violating these at home and
in Eastern Europe)
○
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Agreements on nuclear non-proliferation, human rights legislation, etc.
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Invasion of Czechoslovakia
In 1968, Alexander Bubcek was elected in Czechoslovakia and launched
liberalizing reforms (Prague Spring)
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Brezhnev gathered the Warsaw Pact (the East bloc equivalent to NATO) and
after negotiations failed, they collectively (minus Romania) invaded
Czechoslovakia
Any attempt to go off with a different direction to socialism is an
attack on the USSR
○
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Liberalization was replaced with a policy of repressive normalization and a
communist hardliner Gustav Husak replaced Dubcek
The invasion was retroactively justified by the Brezhnev doctrine or
the argument that when forces that are hostile to socialism try to turn
the development of some socialist country towards capitalism, it
becomes not only a problem of the country concerned but a common
problem and concern of all socialist countries
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Prompts a massive emigration, violation of sovereignty
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Prague was a destination for many Soviet tourists, but they turned their
backs to the Soviets and refused to speak Russian, as well there were many
protests
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The Invasion of Afghanistan
In 1979, the Soviet government invaded Afghanistan to prop up its
struggling communist regime
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The invasion was condemned internationally as illegitimate and brought an
end to détente
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The Soviet government thought the war in Afghanistan was going ot be
short and painless, but it ended up dragging on for almost a decade until
they withdrew, having accomplished little there
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This is another proxy war, creates a lot of discontent
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They can only keep a high living standard due to oil money, when that goes
away because of funneling resources to proxy wars living standards drop
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Lecture 24 - Moscow's Foreign Relations from Peaceful Coexistence to Détente
Wednesday, March 28, 2018
11:00 AM
