Was the West justified in ignoring the 1956 events in Hungary and Poland as being the internal concerns of the USSR?

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Word count 2,762                Maya Lal

Was the West justified in ignoring the 1956 events in Hungary and Poland as being the internal concerns of the USSR?

In order to analyse this question, a number of components need to be discussed. The scene must be set as to what was occurring in the years preceding 1950’s to 1956 in the USSR. Why was Hungary and Poland of such importance to the Soviet Union, and why did the West not intervene in these affairs? Hence to answer this question, the USA’s foreign policy towards Eastern Europe and the USSR must be assessed. The evidence, which will be presented in this essay, will seek to argue that intervention by the USA in Hungary and Poland was impossible. Conversely the other side to the argument, which will be mentioned, is in reference to the Truman Doctrine and mentioning the relevance of Korea and Vietnam. Walter Lafaber argues that Truman viewed the conflict in Korea in terms of a domino effect, that if the Soviet's were not stopped in Korea then all of Asia would fall to Communism.

The reasons behind the change in the USA’s foreign policy from isolationist, which it was before the Second World War, to interventionist, which it became, were varied. They were led by a number of different fears. These included the size of the Soviet army the Red Army, which was the largest army on the planet, the fact that Europe was weak and therefore vulnerable to a communist take over and the development of technology particularly of Russian nuclear weapons. The Truman Doctrine led to an increase in intensity between the USA and the USSR, as they believed that the USA was attempting to spread capitalism across Europe particularly to the new Eastern Block countries. The Soviet Union believed that governments within Europe should be communist and therefore allied with her against capitalism. By the mid fifties the superpowers had nuclear weapons. The concept of MAD – mutually assured destruction emerged. Hence this was a time where both the USA and the USSR had developed nuclear weapons; therefore intervention would have set the stage for World War III. After World War II, we see the Cold War emerging, where the Soviet leaders see international affairs in terms of a struggle for world domination between to rival ideologies. Nikita Khrushchev eventually succeeded Stalin as ruler of the USSR. He introduced his de-Stalinization programme. It was thought that this would begin a period of better understanding with the West. However events in Eastern Europe and the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 showed that this was not to be.

The USSR, narrowly escaped defeat during World War II and its enormous human and material losses meant that by 1945 it was near economic ruin. Under Stalin, the Soviet Union had concentrated primarily on building up its economy. It was confronted by a prosperous US whose gross national product had more than doubled during the war, and which furthermore enjoyed a monopoly of atomic weapons. This is the setting (and of many interpretations) of the Cold War between the USA and USSR. A policy leading to the division of Germany and of Europe was consciously conducted from early 1946 onwards. The Truman Doctrine in 1947 was the political corollary of the Marshall Plan, the establishment of NATO was decided during Berlin blockade; and during the Korean War, the constellation of political forces in the US and Allied countries was pushed to the right. American pressure and the Western decision to form blocs resulted in the Soviet Union seeking greater political conformity in Eastern and South Eastern Europe. This widened the gulf between East and West. The rationale for Soviet-American collaboration during the Second World War was their common interest in the defeat of the Third Reich. Once this was achieved, the basis for further concurrence diminished. However the combination of power-political rivalries and ideological incompatibilities, compounded by a considerable degree of misperception and national anxiety, resulted in the United States and the Soviet Union confronting each other as adversaries. By 1949, the Western zones became the Federal Republic of Germany; and the Soviet zone the German Democratic Republic in 1955, these states became members of the rival alliances, respectively the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the Warsaw Pact.

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As the Cold War matured and as the Soviets tried to maintain their position in Eastern Europe, the USSR had to commit all its efforts to the maintenance of its systematic powers.

The Soviet Union was committed to weakening and ultimately destroying the ‘capitalist world’, which they look upon as their opponent to this struggle for power. This assessment has been confirmed by the events, which have taken place in Hungary and the Middle East. The 1950’s were marked in the sphere of nuclear weapons and strategy, where the development of Soviet capabilities and the availability of new generations ...

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