Ronald Reagan and the Cold War

The Evil Empire When Reagan ran for the presidency in 1980 he made the Soviet Union the enemy  he pointed out that they were the “Evil Empire” and that the US had treated them with kid gloves  he was determined to show that he would work to end the Soviet Union

Reagan and Soviet Leadership President Reagan decided not to negotiate with Soviet leaders when he came into office  when asked about this he joked that they kept dying (they went through several leaders in a short period of time)  Reagan was unwilling to negotiate with what he considered dictators who were unwilling to negotiate back in good faith Reagan continued to antagonize the Soviet Union

Reagan’s Plan Reagan’s plan to defeat the Soviet Union was to outspend them SU economy on brink of collapse and this plan would put them into bankruptcy  because of deterrence he knew that they would need to spend if the US spent Reagan worked to build up US military

Changing the Relationship Two things happened that changed Reagan’s approach towards the SU 1.A military exercise took place that almost went wrong and increased tensions to a near confrontation level  Reagan decided he should cool the rhetoric a bit 2.A new Soviet leader was chosen who was interested in change and improved relations

Gorbachev and Reagan In 1985 Mikhail Gorbachev became the leader of the Soviet Union Reagan and Gorbachev met several times to negotiate and work towards peace

SDI “Star Wars” Reagan ran into a problem with Gorbachev when he announced US would work to build SDI  this was a missile defense system  this would give US huge advantage in terms of deterrence Gorbachev refused to negotiate further with US as long as SDI was around

Crisis in Eastern Europe Throughout 1980s Eastern European “Soviet Satellites” experienced trouble with movements that wanted freedom  in the past SU would send in the military to crush such uprisings but in 1980s SU could not offer help due to financial problems Late 80s one by one Eastern European nations governments fell and democratically elected governments were created  these new governments were not loyal to SU and wanted to be friendly with US

Trouble in the SU SU was made up of 16 Republics (like states) and some were forced into this relationship within SU  with fall of Eastern Europe some republics looked for freedom as well 1990 some Soviet Republics began pushing for independence  SU would not allow this to happen and sent in tanks to quiet the crowd  this was covered by international news and made SU look very bad SU eventually allows republics to set up own governments that would work with SU government

Fall of SU Aug 1991 a group of hard liner communists attempted to overthrow Gorbachev  they put him under house arrest  they were unhappy with his policies that relaxed control of SU government and gave more power to the people  this coup is eventually put down with the help of the leader of Russia (Boris Yeltsin) Gorbachev was a weakened leader after this and SU was failing fast Dec 25, 1991 SU officially dissolves COLD WAR IS OVER