This book is the first to take an analytical approach to the history of the era. It doesn't start out with who caused what. What it does is to look at the comparative strengths of the players and what caused the US to behave as it did.
At the end of WW2 the US had the strongest economy in the world. It had the world's largest air force with strategic bombers. It also had a large stock of nuclear weapons. The US also had a number of bases which potentially allowed it to attack the Soviet Union with nuclear weapons if war broke out. The US also had the power to win a war of attrition. They could not only out produce the Soviets but they had the ability to destroy vital sectors of their economy such as oil production.
The major threat faced by the US was not a military threat but rather the potential of major European States going communist by either internal revolution or by the election of fellow traveler governments.(As happened in Czechoslovakia) Immediately after the war the European Economy was in chaos. There were food shortages and the effect of the war was to destroy infrastructure and industry. The first move the Americans was to intervene in Europe to rebuild the economy. With a buoyant growing economy the risk of Europe going communist was reduced. The US also intervened to support anti-communist parties in places such as Italy. The US also moved re-arm West Germany and Japan as potential allies.
The response of the Soviets appears to be one of caution. It appears that the Soviet leadership did not want war and their assessment was that they would lose any hot war. On the other hand they did react to the US strategy of containment. They armed the East European satellites to bolster their conventional military forces. The book is at pains to point out that the Soviets were not unthinkingly aggressive. They allowed Finland and Austria to be independent. They withdrew their forces from Norway and Iran. They also did not push the Berlin blockade after the Americans responded with the air-lift.
The book is also somewhat critical of US policy to the third world. These criticisms have been made before. They are that the US tended to confuse nationalist and anti imperial movements with communist infiltration. The reality was that after the war the Soviets and the Chinese were two weak to be able to project their power through Asia effectively. The US ended up supporting a large number of corrupt and dictatorial regimes in the name of anti-communism.
Previous histories of the cold war have been largely chronological with large amounts of value judgments incorporated into the narrative. Early histories of the cold war saw the US as defending the world against the potential expansion of a communist system based on totalitarianism. Some revisionist histories saw US actions as precipitating the conflict as the provoked the Soviets.
This book is good as it is not laden with the moral message. The book of course agrees that the US actions in re-starting the European economy were hugely beneficial. It is also clear that containing the communist system was a reasonable goal. However it has no central moral message it is simply the account of the power balance and how that balance led to the US policy of the time and the Soviet response.
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Top reviews from other countries
James 'error' Campbell
Overflowing with research
Reviewed in Canada on June 10, 2014
