How far was the Cuban Missile Crisis the most important event during the period 1945 to 1965?

by tjl1444 (student)

Name: Valerie Makumire Centre Id: 17703 Candidate Number: 8157

Introduction

The Cuban missile crisis was an important even during the period 1945 to 1965, which was the period of the Cold war. A cold war is a war without fighting. However, I do not think it was the most important event during this period. There are many other events that are also quite important during this period. Such events are the Yalta, Korean War, Truman doctrine, Berlin wall, the Berlin blockade, NATO and the sputnik project. However, in this essay I have chosen to evaluate three events, which I consider to be significant to the Cold war. With each event I will come to a conclusion on whether it is more or less important than the Cuban missile crisis. The events I will evaluate are Yalta, Korean War and the Truman doctrine.

Main body

Cuban Missile crisis

The Cuban missile crisis is an event that began in 1962 .To begin with, Cuba became communist. America stopped trading with them. This led them to begin trading with the USSR. Then the USSR places missile in Cuba. The American spy plane spotted in 1962. This made the Americans feels anxious because they were in danger. President Kennedy of the USA had quite a few choices. To avoid a cold war, Kennedy attempted invading Cuba in the Bay of Pigs but failed. So, instead he chose to naval blockade them. This prevented the Russian ships transporting missiles into Cuba. However, the Russians saw this as an act of war. Both sides prepared their nuclear weapons for a nuclear war. The tension was high between the two superpowers. To stop a nuclear war from happening, America made a secret trade off. The trade-off required America to remove their missiles in Turkey and for Russia to remove their missiles in Cuba. That is the Cuban missile crisis in short. As a result of the Cuban missile crisis a telephone hotlines was setup, a nuclear test ban treaty was signed and a nuclear non-proliferation treaty was signed.

The Cuban Missile crisis can be thoroughly compared to the Korean War. There are many similarities and differences. The similarities are that nuclear weapons were close to being used. In fact, in the Korean War, if the armistice was not signed, the nuclear bomb could have been used. Another similarity is that in both events, the conflict was between the communists and the democrats. The significance of this is that. One major difference is that Korean War was actually a war and people died. On the other hand, the Cuban missile crisis got close to a nuclear war.

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Source G shows how close it was to a nuclear war. The message off this cartoon is that the world is close to a nuclear war and it is an intense time. This is shown by the fact that Kennedy and Khrushchev are in an intense arm wrestle and they are both sitting on nuclear bombs. The fact the nuclear bombs are so close to them, shows that they are ready to use them. This source does exemplify the fact that this was an important event. As I have stressed in my introduction the Cuban Missile crisis is an important event out of many other important events. However, this source does not show how the other events were just as important. In addition, this source was published in the daily mail which tells me that this it is exaggerated to interest the audience. Therefore, this source cannot be academically referenced or used to confirm a series of events.

Yalta

At the Yalta conference three leaders agreed on three major decisions. The first decision was splitting Germany into four zones of occupation which would be controlled by America, France, Britain and the USSR. They did this to stop the Nazi’s rebuilding their military. The second decision was free elections for new governments were to be held in the countries in Eastern Europe where Germany had previously occupied. The last decision was that the United Nation would replace the League of Nations. They did this because the League of Nations was a failure and they thought the United Nations would be more successful. Prior to this conference, the Soviet Union was expecting quite a lot of land because of their losses in WW2 but the Europeans, with Britain in mind, were not comfortable with the idea of giving Eastern European's nations away to the Soviets. This caused the Soviets to be quite furious.

This event links in with the Potsdam conference which was later in the same year. There were many agreements at Yalta but at Potsdam there were many disagreements. When you compare Yalta to Potsdam, you quickly see that at Potsdam the tensions were highly increased between the superpowers. This was because of the many disagreements. The disagreements were about the splitting of Germany and the amount of reparations that the soviets could take. At Potsdam, the leaders had changed. Instead, at Potsdam there was Atlee, Truman and Stalin. In addition, Stalin was angry at Truman for not telling him about the atomic bomb. Furthermore, Atlee and Truman were anxious of Stalin because of the growth of communism.

As you can see, there was a little bit of tension and few disagreements at Yalta. But in Potsdam the tensions increased rapidly mostly because of the many disagreements. However, I think these events are less important than the Cuban missile crisis because these events did not even get close to a nuclear war. The only thing that happened in these events is that the tensions were increased because of a few disagreements. However, from another perspective you could say that the agreements they made were very important because without them the Nazi’s could have rebuilt their military. But in my opinion, yes that is valid point but the Germans were too poor after the war to rebuild their army and they would have been behind on the nuclear arms race.

Truman doctrine

The Truman doctrine was the name of a policy which was created to fight off communism. America was becoming more and more aware of the growth of communism. This was worrying to them so, when the British told them they could not keep their soldiers in Greece; America took over with no hesitation. The congress of America said it was "America's job to stop communism growing any stronger." Historians say that this was a direct warning to the UUSR without directly addressing them.

Source (E) shows Stalin choking on the Truman doctrine. The message of the cartoon is that the Truman doctrine negatively impacted Stalin. The size of the pipe represents Stalin's growing empire. The purpose of the Truman doctrine was to stop the spread of communism. This directly conflicted with Stalin's plans of spreading communism. This would have impacted him greatly. The cartoon is quite accurate because it shows how Stalin was impacted. But it is exaggerated a little. This is probably because it is biased. This cartoon was drawn for an American audience to show them that the Truman doctrine was in effective. Therefore, I cannot really place 100% trust in this source.

The Truman doctrine was quite similar to the Marshall plan except that the Marshall plan involved the US assisting countries which were in need of financial assistance. But both policies served the same purpose, which was, to stop the growth of communism. The Marshall plan used money to do it while the Truman doctrine used soldiers. These events are quite important when put together because they both show the US willing to fight off communism. The significance of this is that the communist powers see that the US is doing something about communism, which the communist powers were not.

The creation of the Truman doctrine can be seen as quite important because it shows that America were wanting to fight off communism. From another perspective, it can be seen as not so important because it was just a warning to the UUSR. When comparing this event to the Cuban missile crisis, the Cuban missile crisis is more important. This is because it was the closest the world got to a nuclear war. However, another person might argue that the Truman doctrine was more important because it the Truman doctrine showed the world that the US were not going to sit back and let communism spread.

Korean War

The Korean War was the first armed conflict of the Cold war. The war was fought around the 38th parallel. The Korean War started in 1950 and ended in 1953 when Eisenhower, the president of the USA threatened to use an atomic bomb if they did not sign the armistice. The first thing that happened was that Russia and China invaded South Korea. South Korea fought back with the help of the Americans. From then on it was back and forth until 1953.The Korean War showed the world that America did have atomic bombs and were willing to use them if necessary. Ehow.com says that the significance of the Korean War is that it "demonstrated both side's hesitance to use nuclear forms of attack and how the cold war could develop as 'proxy war' between the domino countries setup around Europe and Asia.” A proxy war is a war where opposing powers using other powers to fight the war for them. This type of war was continued all throughout the cold war.

The Korean War links well to the Berlin wall. The common link is that there is a physical division that symbolises the division between democracy and communism. I think that this shows how communism was being fought against. However, the two events have many differences. Such as the why the divisions were there. The Berlin wall was set up to stop people migrating to West Germany. And the division between South Korea and North Korea is there to separate the communist government from the democratic government.

The Korean War was very important because it was the first war where an atomic bomb was close to being used. However, some historians do not see at it is very important because they are blinded by the Cuban missile crisis. On the other hand, some historians say that the Korean war almost led to a third world war. Overall, I think that the Korean War was more important than cold war but it depends on individual's perception. The United Nations and its members would say it is the most important because it was the first time the UN were faced with a “cold war” problem and dealt with the problem as a group. This showed that the UN as entity was prepared to work as a team to deal with problems.

Conclusion

The Cuban missile crisis was the closest the world got to a nuclear war. From this I can infer that the Cuban missile crisis was very important when compared to other events but it is not the most important event. In my opinion, the importance of an event is dependent on where that person is from or the aspect of life that it affected. For example the Cuban missile crisis is quite important to Cuban’s because it was their first major involvement in the cold war. To answer the question directly, I do not think that Cuban missile crisis was the most important event during the period 1945 to 1965 because it did not actually become a war. It was just a crisis. I think that the Korean War was the most important event because there were lots of deaths and if the armistice had not been signed by North Korea then America would have used the atomic bomb which could have lead to world war 3.