Ronald Reagan and the Cold War

[erpowers]

For many years it seemed that Ronald Reagan was given sole credit for winning the Cold War. It is possible that a number of people still give him sole credit for winning the Cold War. I believe some, at times, have tried to claim that Reagan did not win the war by himself. I know that Bill Maher once claimed that John F Kennedy had done more to end the Cold War by going to Germany and saying I am a Berliner in German than Ronald Reagan did. With the revelations of the actions of Charlie Wilson and the fact that it seems that Ronald Reagan did not really do that much to help the Afghans win against the Russians should Reagan really be given credit for winning the Cold War? In addition to it finally being pointed out that Charlie Wilson played a major role in the Afghan defeat of Russia, according to the History Channel documentary that I watched a few months ago Reagan did not seem very interested in increasing the amount of money given to the Afghans or in helping them get better weapons to fight the Russians. According to the documentary it was actually Charlie Wilson who used his committee and connections in the CIA to get more money and better weapons for the Afghans. I know that in the end giving Charlie Wilson credit for winning the Cold War could cause problems for the Democrats in that it seems the government messed up in dealing with Afghanistan after the Russians were defeated. Even Wilson admits that the American government dropped the ball, in that it did not help the afghans after they defeated the Russians. However, it seems that Charlie Wilson and maybe the Democrats should be given the credit they deserve in helping to defeate the Russians in Afghanistan. So, what do others think?

[MacBookPro]

1. Reagan deserves no credit for ending the Cold War.

The fall of the Soviet Union was because of the inherent failure of Communism as a usable political system.

[izquierdista]

2. Except they didn't practice communism

Cronyism is more like it. Krushchev was the last communist leader of the Soviet Union. The ones that followed him had a lot more in common with Bush than they did with Lenin. They used the Communist party as a social reward for their cronies, appointing Brownies to do a heck of a job, until the whole system collapsed due to incompetence.

I write this comment as I sit in a Soviet era apartment built (I would guess) in the 1950's. To give Reagan any credit for 'winning' the Cold War is nonsense. It is akin to deciding the winner of a headbanging contest. Yes, the one who gets a concussion first and passes out is the loser, but the one that is left could still be brain damaged. And as long as the US continues to bang its head, paying $600+ billion dollars a year to their war machine, only mental instability lies ahead.

[MacBookPro]

4. You raise a good point.

The Soviet Union moved from semi-protypical Communism in the early 20s to what can only be described as fascism during the time of Krushchev. An interesting observation may be that they were, at the time of collapse, the perfect military-industrial complex.

I will, however, disagree with your claim that the system collapsed due to incompetence. Despite Kruschev's loosening of the rules regarding private ownership of the means of production, the downward-spiraling of general quality of life combined with skyrocketing cost to maintain, let alone build, infrastructure and military prowess, lead to the eventual demise. No matter how competent a leader could have been at that time period, the system was too thoroughly rotten to support itself.

[izquierdista]

5. You have to give the Soviets credit

They did rebuild a country that was DEVASTATED after World War II. Many cities were rubble in 1945, to be replaced 15 years later by blocks and blocks of habitable apartment buildings (like the one I am in temporarily). They also launched sputnik in 1957, built public transportation, had a top-notch educational system, and made a good attempt at providing everyone free health care. But the incompetence that caused the collapse is readily apparent everywhere I go. All I see is low-quality concrete, buildings out of plumb, infrastructure crumbling years before its design life, and the only things of any quality reserved for the cronies, the nomenklatura. It is eye-opening to see it from this side.

[MacBookPro]

6. Question

Do you think the low-quality of the programs and construction leading up to the time of the collapse was due to necessity? Meaning: they couldn't afford anything better.

[izquierdista]

12. It's not what you can afford

It's doing a sloppy, crappy job with what you've got. If the ancient Greeks could build something plumb, the Soviets sure could have tied a rock to a string to get a plumb line and put up a straight wall. It's also the attention to detail in other areas of construction. I've seen bathtubs sticking out 3" into the doorway, because apparently, someone didn't bother to think to measure the distance from the wall to the door.

In any event, concrete is pretty well known technology. When you haphazardly mix it, get the proportions wrong, don't work it to get the voids out, don't float and finish it correctly, you end up with shit that spalls and cracks and falls apart after a few years. Well laid concrete will continue to harden and cure and reaches its ultimate strength about 30 to 50 years after a pour, but not if you slop it around like these people apparently did.

It might have been too much vodka on the job, it might have been the concrete plant manager cutting corners, but it all points to no concern for the quality of the finished product. It's like the quality of Japanese products right after World War II. But W. Edwards Deming went to Japan and taught them about quality and they turned their industry completely around. That never happened in the Soviet Union.

[JHB]

8. Overcentralization and lack of accountability...

...were the main fountainheads of the incomptence, and those stem from the rottenness of the system, so you're both both right to that extent.

[MacBookPro]

10. Well put, JHB.

//

[SergeyDovlatov]

11. that is right!

[mulsh]

3. "No one would buy Russian tractors or Bulgarian shoes"

I forget which historian wrote that but it always appeared to me that the Soviets defeated them selfs. Ronnie sold appliances and looked good in a suit.

[Blue Dog Dominion]

7. Bill Maher is an idiot

So anything he says needs to be verified. As for JFK, one of the enter-educational channels had a program on new JFK documents/tapes etc. of his administration. His "success with the Russians appears to be a really mixed bag. I wish I had time to watch more of it. It was some really cool shit. And not the old rehashed stuff we've heard about for years.

[Ghost_of_Smedley]

9. Nancy`s Ronnie went to "G.E.University"

Reagan was a foundering"B"movie actor back in 1954
when G.E. found him.They gave him an all-electric home,his own
TV show-"The G.E.Theater"and a copy of "the
speech"-a diatribe of USSR strength and USA weakness,ergo
the need for hefty increases in defense spending of which,of
coarse,G.E was a prime beneficiary-then flew him around the
country to scare the hell out of his audiences.So,I guess we
could say GE and the lesser defense contractors eventually put
their own "Bitch"in the White House,much the same as
Big Oil did with the Cheney/Dubya regime.Yes, the Evil Empire
collapsed and,yes, some of reasons were that the US went on a
defense spending spree that the USSR could not match,because
we could "print"our own money,quadruple our national
debt and achieve G.E,`s ultimate objective!But mostly,as
already pointed out,the USSR fell under it`s own weight and
incompetence.Ronnie was,as most thinking folks know,a myth
created by the M.I.C