14 The Cold War, I
Politics and ideology
Introduction: from war to peace – the consequences of World War II
The Cold War has passed into history, but the nuclear bomb and the nuclear revolution
are here to stay, prospectively for ever. Between them, the bomb and the political context
of the Cold War nearly brought strategic history to an abrupt full stop. The human
experience in its entirety might well have been concluded violently. How did this happen?
And, more to the point, why? This chapter offers a fresh look at the Soviet–American
Cold War of 1947– 89, while the chapter that follows pays particular attention to its
historically novel nuclear dimension.
The events and non-events, but possible events, of the Cold War years comprise a
contested history among scholars today (Westad, 2000; Herrman and Lebow, 2004).
Almost everything about the Cold War is uncertain; at least, it is uncertain if one focuses
on issues of motivation and causation. There is no solid consensus on why the Cold War
began, who was most responsible for it, or why it concluded with barely a whimper with
the loss of the will to power of the Soviet ruling elite in the late 1980s. Fortunately, the
historical record provides some compensation for the deeper uncertainties. Even if one
cannot be sure exactly why particular decisions were taken, one can secure an adequate
grasp of who did what and when. Furthermore, one can proceed to ask and answer the
strategist’s question: so what? Deeds and their consequences are less mysterious than are
motives.
One of the themes of this text is the intimate connection between war and peace,
and indeed between peace and war. Peace, at least some semblance thereof, follows
war. Moreover, peace of a particular character is what a war is all about. It is easy to
forget this fundamental fact amid the stress, excitement and difficulties of waging war.
The Cold War was a consequence of the changes in context produced by World War II.
It is vital to recognize the complex authority of context. It is not quite everything, because
individuals matter. But the Stalins, Kennedys and Gorbachevs must exercise their judge-
ment, their somewhat free will, in political, socio-cultural, economic, technological,