The United States, the Soviet Union, and the Politics of Opposites

1988 ◽  
Vol 40 (4) ◽  
pp. 452-475 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miroslav Nincic
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Political Leadership ◽  
The United States ◽  
Moderating Effect ◽  
Soviet Policy ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Government ◽  
Conciliatory Behavior

The notion that the attitudes of the American public vis-a-vis the Soviet Union are driven essentially by emotion, and that they are more extreme and volatile than those of the government itself, is widely believed but may not be valid. While the public typically desires a combination of tough and conciliatory policies, it also tends to express, at any given moment, particular concern about whichever of the two it feels is most slighted in U.S. policy. Thus, the public will tend to seek conciliatory behavior from hawkish administrations while preferring a tough stance from administrations it deems dovish. By so doing, the public is likely to have a moderating effect on official behavior toward Moscow. The proposition is tested with reference to shifts in public approval of presidential Soviet policy, and certain implications are suggested for the manner in which political leadership perceives of its mandate.

India’s Proxy War in Sri Lanka

Proxy War ◽  
2019 ◽  
pp. 182-200
Author(s):  
Tyrone L. Groh
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Sri Lanka ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Proxy War ◽  
The Government ◽  
War Policy

This chapter presents a case study for how India initially supported the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) covertly to protect ethnic Tamils in Sri Lanka and then later had to overtly intervene to stop LTTE’s operations during efforts to broker peace. For the duration of the conflict, India’s support remained covert and plausibly deniable. Inside Sri Lanka, the character of the conflict was almost exclusively ethnic and involved the government in Colombo trying to prevent the emergence of an independent Tamil state. Internationally, the United States, the Soviet Union, and most other global powers, for the most part, remained sidelined. Domestically, India’s government had to balance its foreign policy with concerns about its sympathetic Tamil population and the threat of several different secessionist movements inside its own borders. The India-LTTE case reflects history’s most costly proxy war policy.

The Iranian Crisis of 1945–1946 and the Spiral Model of International Conflict

1989 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 307-326 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fred H. Lawson
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Northern Iran ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Red Army ◽  
The Government ◽  
Sphere Of Influence ◽  
Spiral Model ◽  
The Cold War

Diplomatic historians of all persuasions agree that the Iranian Crisis of 1945–1946 played a considerable part in initiating the Cold War. For revisionist writers, the confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union that took place during these months resulted from American efforts to carve out a sphere of influence in the oil-producing areas of the Middle East. By the autumn of 1945, according to this view, U.S. firms had gained controlling interests in the consortia holding exclusive rights to work the extensive petroleum deposits located in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain; more importantly, Iranian officials were making repeated overtures to American concerns in an effort to counterbalance established British interests with more dynamic ones based in the United States. When the Red Army prevented the government in Tehran from suppressing separatist movements in Azerbaijan and Kurdistan in December 1945, the Truman Administration manipulated the Security Council of the United Nations into mandating a Soviet withdrawal from northern Iran.

Chinese Film Images of Invasion and Resistance

1971 ◽  
Vol 47 ◽  
pp. 439-470 ◽  
Author(s):  
John H. Weakland
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Vietnam War ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
The United States ◽  
Cultural Imperialism ◽  
International Affairs ◽  
Chinese Film ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Government

It is clear that the Government of the Chinese People's Republic is very concerned about national defence and possible foreign attack – especially from the United States, but increasingly from the Soviet Union also. Obviously, such concerns are largely relatable to both historical and current political and military realities – such as 100-odd years of western and Japanese encroachments on China, the Vietnam war, American military bases around China, Chinese-Soviet border clashes, and both ideological and practical political conflicts between China and the United States, and China and the Soviet Union. At the same time, however, these practical realities alone cannot provide a full basis for understanding the nature and strength of Chinese concerns about potential invasion. In the first place, such attitudes are both too deep and too wide. Traditionally, from long before the West became powerful in Asia, China has been concerned to keep foreigners out or at least carefully restricted, and long before the bitter attacks by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) on “cultural imperialism” this concern extended to economic and cultural as well as direct military or political influence. Second – more generally, but more fundamentally – political behaviour and attitudes are never so neatly and completely rational and compartmentalized as to depend only on the “real” political circumstances. As with anyone else, both what the Chinese perceive as “real” and as “political,” and the significance attributed to these perceptions, depends also on the lenses they use to view the world. And the nature of the lenses used to view international affairs may be shaped by matters that at first seem remote from international relations, and by unconscious and emotional as well as conscious and rational calculations.

No War Without Dictatorship, No Peace Without Democracy: Foreign Policy as Domestic Politics

1985 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 176-191
Author(s):  
Aaron Wildavsky
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
American Foreign Policy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Structural Basis ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Foreign Policies ◽  
The Government

I wish to consider the possibility that a good part of the opposition to the main lines of American foreign policy is based on deep-seated objections to the political and economic systems of the United States. This is not to say that existing policy is necessarily wise or that there may not be good and sufficient reasons for wishing to change it. Indeed, at any time and place, the United States might well be overestimating the threat from the Soviet Union or using too much force. What I wish to suggest is that across-the-board criticism of American policy as inherently aggressive and repressive, regardless of circumstance – a litany of criticism so constant that it does not alert us to the need for explanation – has a structural basis in the rise of a political culture that is opposed to existing authority.To the extent that this criticism is structural, that is, inherent in domestic politics, the problem of fashioning foreign policies that can obtain widespread support is much more difficult than it is commonly perceived to be. For if the objection is to American ways of life and, therefore, “to the government for which it stands,” only a transformation of power relationships at home, together with a vast redistribution of economic resources, would satisfy these critics. If the objection is not only to what we do but, more fundamentally, to who we are, looking to changes in foreign policy to shore up domestic support is radically to confuse the causal connections and, therefore, the order of priorities.

International Court of Justice

1959 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 630-634 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Japanese Island ◽  
Fighter Aircraft ◽  
International Court Of Justice ◽  
Court Of Justice ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
International Court ◽  
The Government

Case concerning the Aerial Incident of November 7, 1954 (United States v. Soviet Union): On July 7, 1959, an application instituting proceedings against die Soviet Union was filed in the Registry of the Court by the government of the United States. In its application the government of the United States alleged that on November 7, 1954, one of its aircraft was attacked and destroyed over the Japanese island of Hokkaido by fighter aircraft of the Soviet Union. It requested the Court to find that the Soviet Union was liable for the damages caused and to award damages in the sum of $756,604. It also stated that it had submitted to the Court's jurisdiction for the purposes of this case and that it was open to the government of the Soviet Union to do likewise. In accordance with Article 40 of the Statute of the Court, the application was thereupon communicated by the Registry to the government of the Soviet Union.

The United States, Belgium, and the Congo Crisis of 1960

1967 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 239-256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence S. Kaplan
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
United Nations ◽  
The United States ◽  
American Imperialism ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Congo Crisis ◽  
The Government

Involvement in the Congo crisis of 1960 illustrates dramatically an American dilemma in foreign policy: the apparent incompatibility between the nation's emotional rejection of colonialism and the burdens of world leadership which include the consequences of anticolonialism. In 1960 the United States joined the Soviet Union in expediting the removal of the NATO partner, Belgium, from the Congo, helped to increase the power of the United Nations in the Congo at the expense of Belgian interests, and used its influence to destroy the Western-oriented regime of Moise Tshombe of secessionist Katanga. But in 1964 the United States was largely responsible for replacing the United Nations' forces in the Congo with Belgian troops; in 1965 the United States supported Tshombe's government in Leopoldville; and in 1966 and 1967 the United States joined Belgium in an uneasy vigil over the government of General Joseph Mobutu. It is not surprising that its efforts should have been interpreted by communists as American imperialism, by Africans as neocolonialism, and by many allies either as incorrigible naiveté or as hypocrisy.

Stresses and Strains

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas K. Robb
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
International Power ◽  
The Government

By 1978, Carter’s foreign policy was in a state of flux. Unsure of how to promote arms limitations agreements with the Soviet Union, balance the energy and economics difficulties that the United States, as well as tackle his increasingly difficult NATO allies, the president looked towards London and the government of James Callaghan for assistance. Carter found a willing partner in Callaghan but as this chapter demonstrates, there were considerable limits to just how useful London could prove in a time of economic malaise and decreased international power.

Signaling with Secrets

2019 ◽  
pp. 205-233
Author(s):  
Brendan Rittenhouse Green ◽  
Austin G. Long
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
Nuclear Forces ◽  
Soviet Leadership ◽  
Soviet Policy ◽  
Cross Domain ◽  
Intelligence Collection ◽  
The Soviet Union

How do you credibly communicate a threat that you cannot reveal? This problem is endemic for modern space and cyberspace capabilities, but the challenge of secrecy constraints in cross-domain deterrence is not a new phenomenon. During the late Cold War, nuclear forces deterred conventional attack, theater nuclear forces deterred strategic nuclear escalation, and conventional threats to nuclear capabilities deterred conventional attack. Some of these capabilities, particularly intelligence collection and electronic datalinks, depended on sensitive tactics and technologies that could not be revealed lest the enemy develop effective countermeasures. Secrecy created uncertainty about the true balance of power, which should have made conflict more likely, according to rationalist theory. This chapter shows, however, that the United States was able to use several mechanisms to communicate its capabilities to the Soviet Union without thoroughly compromising the ability to use them. Leveraging historical evidence from senior Soviet leadership, the chapter argues that U.S. nuclear counterforce strategy, which leveraged clandestine capabilities in many domains, nevertheless was effective in shaping Soviet perceptions and influencing Soviet policy.

“Exclusive Preserves” and the New Soviet Policy Toward the Un Secretariat

1991 ◽  
Vol 85 (2) ◽  
pp. 322-329 ◽  
Author(s):  
Theodor Meron
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
United Nations ◽  
The United States ◽  
Soviet Government ◽  
Soviet Policy ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
The Government ◽  
The Impact

An “exclusive preserve” of a state in the UN Secretariat is a post that is continuously filled by nationals of the same state. Virtually from the founding of the United Nations, the Secretariat has observed an “unofficial” practice of exclusive preserves for many senior posts held by nationals of several influential states, including the United States; but its most persistent advocate, and with regard to a particularly wide range of posts, has been the Soviet Union. In view of the past underrepresentation of Soviet nationals in the Secretariat, largely because the Soviet Government insisted that its nationals be recruited only on fixed-term contracts based on secondment from the Government and Soviet institutions, a considerable number of posts were set aside to be filled on a replacement basis. The occupants of those posts were selected by the Secretary-General from a very short list of candidates submitted by the Soviet Government. The object of this Editorial is to assess the impact of the new Soviet policy toward the UN Secretariat, recent General Assembly resolutions and the jurisprudence of the United Nations Administrative Tribunal on the practice of exclusive preserves.

scholarly journals A Horse Derby, A Missed Connection, and Hiking through the Alps: John Dewey's 1928 visit to the Soviet Union

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vladislav Ryabyy
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
New York ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
New York Times ◽  
The United States ◽  
United States Department ◽  
Department Of State ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Government ◽  
Soviet Russia

After December 6, 1917, the government of the United States led by President Woodrow Wilson decided not to recognize the new government of Russia, which was led by the Bolshevik Party. Some of the reasons for this lack of recognition came from the Bolshevik government’srefusal to honor prior debits owed by the Tsarist government and the seizure of American property. The next three presidents would continue this policy.1 For the next sixteen years, many Americans visited and wrote about the Soviet Union. Amongst those visitors was a delegation of twenty-five who visited the Soviet Union in the summer of 1928. Their stated purpose was to,“study methods of public instruction in Soviet Russia this summer.” 2 The most influential amongst the twenty-five was John Dewey, a professor of philosophy at Colombia University and one of the leading educational reformers in the United States. In the time during and after this trip Dewey wrote a series of articles for the “New Republic” and later collected these articles andplaced them in his book, Impressions of the Revolutionary World.3 This book also dealt with his travels to China in 1920, Turkey in 1924, and Mexico in 1926. This book does not tell the full story of the trip. By analyzing his letters that he sent during this time, one can recreate a partial itinerary of his daily activities and those that he met with. Those letters also reveal that this trip influenced not only the twenty-five educators from the United States but also had an impact on Soviet educators because they had the ability to finally meet the man that they had studied for so long. The United States Department of State was also interested in this trip and used it to learn more about the Soviet Union. The Department of State was also dealing with anticommunism at this time and this caused Dewey’s trip to be closely monitored. The New York Times and other newspapers reported on this trip and the aftermath of this trip can be seen through these reports. This trip impacted not only those within the Soviet Union but also the State Departments and the American public’s view of the Soviet Union.

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