Soviet-American Relations Research Articles

Nixon, Brezhnev, Ford and Watergate: The Effects of a Domestic Crisis on Soviet-American Relations

Nixon, Brezhnev, Ford and Watergate: The Effects of a Domestic Crisis on Soviet-American Relations

Michael Cassella-Blackburn, The Donkey, the Carrot, and the Club: William C. Bullitt and Soviet-American Relations, 1917–1948

Michael Cassella-Blackburn, <i>The Donkey, the Carrot, and the Club: William C. Bullitt and Soviet-American Relations, 1917–1948</i>

FDR and the Soviet Union: the President's battles over foreign policy

Throughout his presidency, Franklin Roosevelt was determined to pursue a peaceful accommodation with an increasingly powerful Soviet Union, an inclination reinforced by the onset of world war. Roosevelt knew that defeating the Axis powers would require major contributions by the Soviets and their Red Army, and so, despite his misgivings about Stalin's expansionist motives, he pushed for friendlier relations. Yet almost from the moment he was inaugurated, lower-level officials challenged FDR's ability to carry out this policy. Mary Glantz analyzes tensions shaping the policy stance of the United States toward the Soviet Union before, during, and immediately after World War II. Focusing on the conflicts between a president who sought close relations between the two nations and the diplomatic and military officers who opposed them, she shows how these career officers were able to resist and shape presidential policy-and how their critical views helped shape the parameters of the subsequent Cold War. Venturing into the largely uncharted waters of bureaucratic politics, Glantz examines overlooked aspects of wartime relations between Washington and Moscow to highlight the roles played by U.S. personnel in the U.S.S.R. in formulating and implementing policies governing the American-Soviet relationship. She takes readers into the American embassy in Moscow to show how individuals like Ambassadors Joseph Davies, Lawrence Steinhadt, and Averell Harriman and U.S. military attachs like Joseph Michela influenced policy, and reveals how private resistance sometimes turned into public dispute. She also presents new material on the controversial military attach/lend-lease director Phillip Faymonville, a largely neglected officer who understood the Soviet system and supported Roosevelt's policy. Deftly combining military with diplomatic history, Glantz traces these philosophical and policy battles to show how difficult it was for even a highly popular president like Roosevelt to overcome such entrenched and determined opposition. Although he reorganized federal offices and appointed ambassadors who shared his views, in the end he was unable to outlast his bureaucratic opponents or change their minds. With his death, anti-Soviet factions rushed into the policymaking vacuum to become the primary architects of Truman's Cold War containment policy. A case study in foreign relations, high-level policymaking, and civil-military relations, FDR and the Soviet Union enlarges our understanding of the ideologies and events that set the stage for the Cold War. It adds a new dimension to our understanding of Soviet-American relations as it sheds new light on the surprising power of those in low places.

The Donkey, the Carrot, and the Club: William C. Bullitt and Soviet-American Relations, 1917–1948

The Donkey, the Carrot, and the Club: William C. Bullitt and Soviet-American Relations, 1917–1948

La théorie et la pratique de l’Arms Control : Bilan et perspectives

Arms control, as developed by American civilian strategists in the late 1950s, sought to maintain the equilibrium upon which mutual deterrence was dependent, and strove to prevent direct conflict between the two nuclear protagonists. Has it exhausted its virtuality and will there be a return to the tradition of general and total disarmament? One comes to ask within the framework of this analysis, whether the Washington treaty of december 1987 introduces a new element to arms control, or whether it closely follows the methods used in former agreements. In an effort to better comprehend this question, the past experiences in arms control will be examined before making any conjectures on its anticipated evolution, all the while taking into consideration the new approaches used in the American-Soviet relations, the problems created by technological innovation, and the intentions of both the small and medium States.

The donkey, the carrot, and the club: William C. Bullitt and Soviet-American relations, 1917-1948

Introduction The Origins of the Cold War Mission to Moscow Living the Life of a Radical Recognition of the Soviet Union, 1933 The Donkey, the Carrot, and the Club Fear and Loathing in Moscow The Revenant in Paris At War Bullitt, History, and the Postwar Order Conclusion Bibliographical Essay Bibliography Index

Double Anniversary: Miracles and Peace

In celebration of Albert Einstein’s “miraculous year” of 1905, this year, 2005, is deservedly recognized as the World Year of Physics and also as the International Year of Physics. This year also deserves recognition as the 50th anniversary of the First Geneva Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy—a conference that marked the public debut of global concern about our energy future, the public unveiling of the fusion energy program, and a thaw in Soviet–American relations. Conferences like it, which concern themselves with global energy problems and serve as meeting grounds for political adversaries, are particularly valuable. May they continue to flourish.© 2005 American Institute of Physics.

Sexing up the Cold War: New Evidence on the Molotov–Truman Talks of April 1945

This article presents and examines new evidence from the Russian archives on the Truman–Molotov talks of April 1945. This new evidence undercuts the conventional story that this was a rough and tough meeting that led to a significant deterioration of Soviet–American relations. The turn to Cold War came much later, and it was only in that context that the Molotov–Truman encounter came to be looked upon as a particularly negative event. That retrospective view fed into postwar memoirs and then into the historiography, thereby creating one of the mythical, emblematic events of the early Cold War.

Senator Jacob K. Javits and Soviet Jewish Emigration

Senator Jacob K. Javits rendered a critical service in writing the compromise wording and leading the negotiations over the Jackson-Vanik Amendment of 1974, which linked most- favored-nation trade status and subsidized low-interest government credits between the United States and the Soviet Union with a higher and more sustained level of Soviet Jewish emigration. As a Jewish Republican, Javits had to reconcile his relationship with the Nixon Administration, which regarded the linkage of trade agreements with human rights abuses as destructive of detente, with his support for Soviet Jews. Javits brought his ability to balance competing interests to make more moderate and flexible the amendment language. The influence of a Jewish Senator was critical because the established Jewish organizations were initially opposed to tying Soviet trade to emigration. His connections within the United States government and with the American Jewish leadership proved indispensable in aiding Soviet Jewish emigration.

Culture, Power, and Mission to Moscow: Film and Soviet-American Relations during World War II

Following a sumptuous feast (and copious amounts of vodka), the guests, gathered around a banquet table deep within the Kremlin's walls in May 1943, toasted SovietAmerican friendship. Premier Joseph V. Stalin and Foreign Minister Vyacheslav M. Molotov praised the Grand Alliance. Anastas I. Mikoyan, the Soviet commissar for foreign trade, Lavrenty P. Beria, the head of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs (Narodnyi Kommissariat Vnutrennykh Del, NKVD), and Maxim Litvinov, the Soviet ambassador to the United States, offered toasts, and the Anglo-Americans present-including the British ambassador to Moscow, Adm. William H. Standley, the reigning United States representative, and Joseph E. Davies, Washington's former ambassador-reciprocated. The American emissary from 1936 to 1938, Davies was there because President Franklin D. Roosevelt had sent him to arrange an introductory summit with Stalin, a meeting at which Roosevelt was sure all outstanding Soviet-American differences could be ironed out. Although Davies' presence was unusual, thus far the evening had been little different from similar receptions held by Soviet leaders for their Allied comrades during World War II. On this occasion, however, the former ambassador had brought with him a movie that both he and Roosevelt hoped would convince the Soviet dictator to eschew separate peace negotiations with Adolf Hitler and to remain within the tenuous Big Three

From Gagarin to Armageddon: Soviet-American Relations in the Cold War Space Epic

From Gagarin to Armageddon: Soviet-American Relations in the Cold War Space Epic

Katherine A. S. Siegel. &lt;italic&gt;Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919–1933&lt;/italic&gt;. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. 1996. Pp. x, 211. $39.95

Journal Article Katherine A. S. Siegel. Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919–1933. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. 1996. Pp. x, 211. $39.95 Get access Siegel Katherine A. S.. Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919–1933. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky. 1996. Pp. x, 211. $39.95. Timothy E. O'Connor Timothy E. O'Connor University of Northern Iowa Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The American Historical Review, Volume 105, Issue 1, February 2000, Pages 243–244, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/105.1.243 Published: 01 February 2000

Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919-1933

A study of US-Soviet business during the period when the US refused to grant diplomatic recognition to the Soviet Union, drawing on public, private, and corporate documents as well as newly available Soviet archives to reveal that business ties between the two countries flourished between 1923 and 1

The U.S. and third World Revolutionary States: Understanding the Breakdown in Relations

Although scholars focused on Soviet–American relations during the Cold War, the greatest number of conflicts for the U.S. occurred in the Third World, and most of these were with revolutionary states. Could U.S. policies toward the new revolutionary states have prevented the almost universal collapse in relations? Two dominant explanations for this breakdown are (1) American hostility toward revolutionary change and (2) Stephen Walt's variant of the spiral model. Using the comparative case approach and selecting “hard cases,” this article disputes these explanations and offers a new theory based on the externalization of domestic conflict in the revolutionary states. Given their ideological goals, the radicals externalized their domestic conflicts with the moderates, who had transnational ties with the U.S., by fomenting tensions with Washington. To demonstrate that this theory can be generalized, this article varies the dependent variable and shows through a critical case that its lack of conflict can best be explained by the absence of the conditions that lead to externalization. The foreign policies of both the U.S. and revolutionary states are explained by classical realism as opposed to Walt's structural realism, which fails to account for the foreign policies of Third World states.

Soviet-American Library Relations in the 1920s and 1930s: A Study in Mutual Fascination and Distrust

During the first fifteen years of the USSR's existence, a number of American and Soviet librarians formalized exchange agreements and shared information and professional expertise. Representatives of several important American research libraries traveled to Russia to buy books, and an American advised the Soviet government on establishing its provincial library network. The USSR drew on and encouraged the American experience of its own citizens: reforms in classification, library education, and provincial library organization stemmed directly from the influence of Soviet women with American exposure, who applied American library techniques to the systems being developed in the USSR. Nevertheless, long-term Soviet-American library relations were doomed by increasingly ideological Soviet cultural politics after 1930 and by American suspicion of any activities associated with Bolshevism.

Containing Coexistence: America, Russia, and the "Finnish Solution."

Containing Coexistence is the first full-scale study of Finland's role in Soviet-American relations during the onset of the cold war. Hanhimaki draws on a wide range of multinational source material, including newly released archival materials, in a comparative approach that interrelates American, British, Finnish, Russian, and Swedish perspectives. Containing Coexistence will be of interest to historians and political scientists as well as to any scholar interested in American and Soviet foreign policies during the cold war, post-World War II international relations, or twentieth-century European history.

Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919-1953

Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919-1953

Eduard Shevardnadze: Leading the Soviet Union Out of the Cold War

What is the relative importance of leadership when set against broad social, economic, and political trends? This is a difficult equation, made more so when the actions of the relevant actors are not clearly perceived and understood. Western commentators have tended to underestimate the role played by the Soviet leadership in ending the Cold War because they have focussed on the societal problems that precipitated the collapse of the Soviet Union, engaged in protracted debate about the contribution made by Western policies, and miscalculated the importance of Soviet policy changes. The ultimate dissolution of the Soviet empire may have been inevitable and the policies of the West important, but the timing and nature of the collapse and its impact on the international community were determined by the actions of Soviet leaders. Peaceful change was possible only because those who came to power in Moscow in 1985 were committed to domestic reform, reconciliation with the West, and non-use of force. Just as the Russian Revolution of October 1917 as defined by Lenin influenced the course of modern history, so the Soviet revolution as defined by Mikhail Gorbachev, Eduard Shevardnadze, and Aleksandr Yakovlev is having a profound impact on contemporary history. The readiness of these men to halt the arms race, renounce political and military dominance over Eastern Europe, and retreat from the Third World ended the superpower competition that had defined the post-World War II era. Their policies precipitated peaceful anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe and redefined the international system. By stabilizing the USSR's external position, Soviet leaders prepared their nation for its non-violent collapse. Shevardnadze played a critical role in conceptualizing and implementing the Soviet Union's dramatic volte-face. Considered the moral force for 'new political thinking,' he was the point man in the struggle to undermine the forces of inertia at home and to end Moscow's isolation abroad. Two American secretaries of state, George Shultz and James Baker, have credited him with convincing them that Moscow was committed to serious negotiations.(f.1) Each became a proponent of reconciliation in administrations that were intensely anti-Soviet; each concluded that the history of Soviet-American relations and the end of the Cold War would have been far different had it not been for Shevardnadze. Commitment to the non-use of force became Shevardnadze's most important contribution to the end of communism and the Cold War, permitting the virtually non-violent demise of the Soviet empire and of the Soviet Union itself. Shevardnadze was more adamant on this issue than was Gorbachev; he opposed the use of force in Tbilisi, Georgia, in 1989 and in the Baltics in 1990. In his resignation speech in December 1990, he predicted that the use of force would undermine perestroika. The violence in Lithuania three weeks later, condoned by Gorbachev, proved him right. NEW POLITICAL THINKING Recognition that the Soviet Union was an exhausted empire was widespread in Moscow long before the new leaders came to power in 1985. The rate of annual growth had been declining since the 1960s, and all important indicators suggested that economic performance would become even worse in the future.(f.2) The Soviet Union was not even keeping pace in the field to which it had devoted the most resources -- military technology and production. Its international position was no more promising. Every important relationship was in disarray. Relations with the United States and Western Europe were tense; Eastern Europe was a significant economic burden; and in the Third World its position had been in decline since the 1970s and was draining political and economic resources. Throughout the 1970s, Soviet commentators debated international trends. They saw an increasingly interdependent international economy and argued that Moscow's vision of separate and opposing capitalist and socialist systems was misguided and counter-productive. …

Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919-1933. By Katherine A. S. Siegel. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1996. x, 212 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Photographs. $39.95, hard bound.

Loans and Legitimacy: The Evolution of Soviet-American Relations, 1919-1933. By Katherine A. S. Siegel. Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1996. x, 212 pp. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Photographs. $39.95, hard bound. - Volume 56 Issue 4

Keith L. Nelson. &lt;italic&gt;The Making of Détente: Soviet-American Relations in the Shadow of Vietnam&lt;/italic&gt;. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 1995. Pp. xviii, 217. $35.00

Journal Article Keith L. Nelson. The Making of Détente: Soviet-American Relations in the Shadow of Vietnam. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 1995. Pp. xviii, 217. $35.00 Get access Nelson Keith L.. The Making of Détente: Soviet-American Relations in the Shadow of Vietnam. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. 1995. Pp. xviii, 217. $35.00. Lloyd C. Gardner Lloyd C. Gardner Rutgers University Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar The American Historical Review, Volume 101, Issue 5, December 1996, Page 1650, https://doi.org/10.1086/ahr/101.5.1650 Published: 01 December 1996