Cold War
Cold War | U.S. Development of a Defensive Weapons System Would Increase Nuclear Proliferation
Ronald Reagan, U.S. president from 1981 to 1989, was one of America’s most popular presidents, yet his hard-line policy toward the Soviet Union encountered sharp criticism. Reagan’s multibillion-dollar Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), the technological pursuit of defensive weapons in space that critics dubbed “Star Wars” (after the popular science fiction movie), received particularly virulent criticism. Some argued that the system was wasteful and ineffective; others claimed that it would violate the 1972 U.S.-Soviet Antiballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which limited defensive...
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- Introduction
-
From Allies to Enemies: The Origins of the Cold War
- Chapter 1 Preface
- The United States Should Seek Peace with the Soviet Union
- The United States Should Not Seek Peace with the Soviet Union
- The United States Should Contain Soviet Expansion
- The Soviet Union Should Contain U.S. Imperialism
- Soviet Expansion Policies Initiated the Cold War
- U.S. Containment Policies Initiated the Cold War
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Coexistence and Conflict
- Chapter 2 Preface
- The War in Korea Should Be Expanded
- The War in Korea Should Be Limited
- The Soviet Union Seeks Peaceful Coexistence with the United States
- The Soviet Union Does Not Seek Peaceful Coexistence with the United States
- The United States Could Have Won the War in Vietnam
- The United States Could Not Have Won the War in Vietnam
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From Détente to the Cold War’s End
- Chapter 3 Preface
- Détente Is a Constructive
- Détente Is a Flawed U.S. Policy
- The United States Must Develop a Defensive Weapons System to Prevent Nuclear War
- U.S. Development of a Defensive Weapons System Would Increase Nuclear Proliferation
- Ronald Reagan’s Policies Ended the Cold War
- Mikhail Gorbachev’s Policies Ended the Cold War
- Reflections: The Impact of the Cold War
- For Further Discussion
- Copyright
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