The Long Peace: Inquiries Into the History of the Cold War - Hardcover

Gaddis, John Lewis

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0195043367 ISBN 13: 9780195043365

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1987

Synopsis

How has it happened that the United States and the Soviet Union have managed to get through more than four decades of Cold War confrontation without going to war with one another? Historian John Lewis Gaddis suggests answers to this and other vital questions about postwar diplomacy in his new book, The Long Peace: Inquiries into the History of the Cold War.
Gaddis uses recently-declassified American and British documents to explore several key issues in Cold War history that remain unresolved: Precisely what was it about the Soviet Union's behavior after World War II that American leaders found so threatening? Did the United States really want a sphere of influence in postwar Europe? What led the Truman administration first to endorse, but then immediately to back away from, a strategy designed to avoid American military involvement on the mainland of Asia? Why did the United States not use nuclear weapons during the decade in which it had an effective monopoly over them? Did American leaders really believe in the existence of an international communist "monolith"? How did Russians and Americans fall into the habit of not shooting down each other's reconnaisance satellites?
Relating these questions to the current status of Soviet-American relations, Gaddis makes a strong case for the relative stability of the postwar international system, a stability whose components include--and go well beyond --nuclear deterrence. The result is a provocative exercise in contemporary history, certain to generate interest, discussion, and, in the end, important new insights on both past and present aspects of the age in which we live.

About this title

About the Author

About the Author
John Lewis Gaddis, Distinguished Professor of History at Ohio University, is recognized as one of the leading authorities on United States foreign relations since World War II. The author of The United States and Origins of the Cold War and Strategies of Containment: A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Security Policy, he is currently writing the diplomatic history volume in the forthcoming Oxford History of the United States and is working as well on a biography of George F. Kennan.

Reviews

In this collection of essays, Gaddis raises some interesting and timely questions. How is it that we have known four decades without a world war, when relations between the superpowers have been so tense? Gaddis believes that historians of the next century may look back upon our era as one of general peace and stability, despite the numerous conflicts . His explanations include nuclear deterrence and the fact that the United States and Russia studiously avoid direct confrontation, by constructing walls, using the troops of client states, or recognizing spheres of influence. This provocative and well-argued work is recommended. Jeff Northrup, Birmingham P.L. Ala.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1987
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0195043367
• ISBN 13: 9780195043365
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 352