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With regards to domestic policy, the US was miles better than the USSR. With regards to foreign policy, the distinction isnt anywhere near that clear. The US ha
by wz1000 10y ago
With regards to domestic policy, the US was miles better than the USSR. With regards to foreign policy, the distinction isnt anywhere near that clear. The US has supported mass murders in Guatemala, Iran, Nicaragua, Pakistan/Bangladesh, Indonesia, Laos, Cambodia, Iraq since WW2 and I'm sure I'm missing a few.
The nuclear arms race was also hardly one sided, and Kennedy in particular has a terrible record when it came to the imminent nuclear destruction of the world. The Cuban missile crisis was sparked of by NATO and US troop movements in Turkey and Eastern Europe.
The United Nations in particular was deliberately crippled by the US. There are quotes from officials under Nixon and Ford who said they were deliberately instructed to sabotage UN proceedings relating to the Pakistani genocide in Bangladesh. There are also numerous such instances where the US has dramatically opposed international consensus and blocked the functioning of international agencies relating to Israel/Palestine, Rwanda, Cuba, Indonesia/East Timor and Nicaragua.
- arethuza 10y ago"Kennedy in particular has a terrible record when it came to the imminent nuclear destruction of the world" To be fair to Kennedy - I think he pretty much prevented a war during the Cuban Missile Crisis. A weaker president might have gone with the recommendations to invade Cuba and that would probably have turned out rather badly for all concerned (particularly the Cubans and Soviets).
- mirimir 10y agoHe and Khrushchev did that together. As I recall, it was Khrushchev who suggested trading US missiles in Turkey and Italy for Soviet missiles in Cuba. And it was arguably a far greater political risk for Khrushchev.