President Reagan, the ‘Second Cold War’ and the Strategic Defence Initiative (Star Wars). Flashcards
President Reagan’s main policies
Communism is ‘Evil’.
In 1983, he described the Soviet Union as an ‘ Evil Empire ’ and said that the USA represented the forces of ‘good’. The Soviet leader, Yuri Andropov responded by calling Reagan a ‘liar’ and ‘insane’. Increased spending:
Reagan increased spending on arms/weapons and the military. In 1982 , 13% extra was spent on new weapons such as Trident Nuclear Submarines and Stealth Bombers.
Helping Anti-Communist groups abroad:
He announced his ‘ Reagan Doctrine’. This would show America’s support for any group wanting to fight against Communism around the world.
Examples of the Reagan doctrine
- The US Army supported an island called Grenada in the Caribbean to defeat the Communist government there.
- The USA also helped support a Trade Union called ‘Solidarity’ in Poland which wanted fairer working rights and more democracy in Poland.
Reagan’s defense policies
Reagan announced that the USA would spend more than 1 trillion dollars improving its weapons to ‘defend’ the country against Communism. Reagan was willing to do this as he knew that the Soviet Union were running out of money and they would not be able to keep up with this ‘arms race’ by the 1980s.
New defense technology (Reagan’s policies)
A ‘Stealth Bomber ’ which would be able to remain undetected by
radar systems.
• B-1 Supersonic bombers
• The development of a ‘neutron
bomb’ which would kill people but leave little damage to buildings’.
• The placement of ‘cruise missiles’ which were invisible to radar in countries in Western Europe.
• NUTS: Nuclear Utilization Target Selection . US missiles would openly target the Soviet Union’s military bases rather than popular cities. This would mean the USA could easily destroy any Soviet nuclear weapons quickly before they became a threat to the USA.
Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative STAR WARS (1983)
President Reagan announced an even bigger plan to defeat communism. It was so high tech and expensive that there would be no way the Soviet Union could afford to challenge it. This plan or policy was known as the Strategic Defence Initiative. The American and Western media nicknamed it the ‘ Star Wars’ Programme after the popular movie of the time.
What was the SDI?
The USA would place a number of satellites into orbit. These satellites would carry
powerful lasers which would be able to detect and then shoot down and destroy any missiles launched by the Soviet Union. It was against the terms of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty.
Was the Strategic Defense Initiative real?
President Reagan spoke about the Strategic Defence Initiative as if it already
existed. However, he did not admit to the rest of the world that the technology for it was years from actually being ready.
What were the consequences of the SDI project on the development of the Cold War?
The Soviet Union were in shock. They had spent huge sums of money developing their own missiles. However, they now believed that the Strategic Defence Initiative would mean their missiles would simply be destroyed if they were ever launched.
The Soviet Union accused the USA of preparing for an attack on the Soviet Union first, even though the USA claimed that the Strategic Defence Initiative was to ‘protect’ and ‘defend’ America. It led to even more tension in the Cold War.
The Soviet Union realised that they would either have to spend more money developing their own weapons or fail in the arms race against America for good.
It proved to the Soviet Union that they had not been able to keep up with the technological advances of the USA and the Capitalist West. Its economy was poor and the Soviet people would no longer accept living in even more poverty for the sake of developing even better weapons.
Reagan hoped that the Soviet Union would want to spend even more money on the arms race and in which case it would destroy the Soviet economy completely and show the failure of Communism.
The USA had already won the space race with the first man on the moon in 1969 and the development of space shuttles in the 1980s. This would mean the Soviet Union loosing the Space Race and the Arms race against the USA.
Computer technology was far more advanced in the West. It was this technology that was now needed to develop weapons, space technology, communication, the media and transport even more. The Soviet Union felt they could no longer compete against the US.
