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I have been reading a number of books about Eisenhower recently, in preparation for writing a long form post about his decision making process. One of the recur

I have been reading a number of books about Eisenhower recently, in preparation for writing a long form post about his decision making process. One of the recurring themes throughout his presidency was the conflict between the former Supreme Commander, who quite literally ordered thousands of men into battle and their deaths, that wanted to work toward some kind of peace and de-escalation with the Soviets with regards to nuclear weapons – and the military-industrial-political complex that pushed and pushed him to fund more weapons without any restrictions on the budget or geopolitical implications. Eisenhower of course was no fool and didn’t disregard the need for weapons, but he generally tried to navigate the narrow path between defending oneself and escalating an arms race. One of the takeaways I had from this was essentially how powerless even the president was in pushing back against the arms race, even against his own people. This of course culminated in his famous farewell speech where he coined the term MIC. In any case, if the dynamics of these kinds of companies interest you, I cannot recommend reading about Eisenhower’s presidency enough. There was actually a situation with Taiwan that is still quite relevant to today. And I truly hope, but unfortunately doubt, that equivalent amounts of money are being put into startups or organizations that help solve, diffuse, and de-escalate conflicts.

adrianN 2y ago
It was my understanding that the Soviet Union collapsed in part because they couldn’t afford the arms race anymore.
- keiferski 2y ago
  I’m not an expert in any way on this, but my impression from reading maybe half a dozen books involving the Soviets + living in a former Soviet-occupied country is that the USSR simply wasn’t ever going to work sociopolitically by nature of its multi-nation imperial structure. The client states were never really assimilated and didn’t want to be - and the relationship with them was hostile from the start - see the lack of help during the Warsaw Uprising, Hungarian Revolution in 1957, Prague in 1968, etc. So my impression is that the USSR would inevitably collapse and it was mostly just a matter of time. The arms race definitely had an effect on the Soviet economy, but I don’t think it’s correct to say that was the main reason for the collapse.
  - arisAlexis 2y ago
    Or in one sentence because communism can't work for long periods
    - dr-detroit 2y ago
      [dead]
    - arisAlexis 2y ago
      I am rarely surprised at my age but HN community thinking that communism can indeed work over long periods is awesome
  - AYBABTME 2y ago
    It seems like a lot of reasons, many of which derived from hubris and a delusion that one can plan an entire society, and everything that follows from this mistake. Bad economy, over reliance on limited set of heavy industries, corruption, lack of agency; overall reduced economic performance and thus unable to outcompete the US economy, which was forcing the Soviets into an arms race death march.
- dr-detroit 2y ago
  [dead]
- samat 2y ago
  In part, yes, but the main reason was severely mismanaged economy, specifically — super unproductive agro. They had to buy food (grain), selling oil. And then oil prices went down.
  - uoaei 2y ago
    There's some theories that the US poisoned some of the crop fields in the 60s and 70s especially in the Ukraine resulting in inadequate yields, exacerbating the budgetary issues already present from space race / arms race spending.
    - Log_out_ 2y ago
      I'm sure they have such conspirancid paranoia in north korea right now. They are expressions of unvented frustration in unreformable systems. It can not be the ruler or the ideology, and it can not be that the combination is unable to deal with a world that regularly throws you a stick for the legs if you think you have a good run. Pests evolve and the soil becomes less fertile .Industrial Agriculture is not the same every year. it just looks loke that for a layman.
    - nradov 2y ago
      That's the type of ridiculous conspiracy theory that Communists frequently invented to excuse their own failures. The US had no capability for spreading enough poison in the USSR to significantly reduce crop yields. Like seriously, was the CIA supposed to be flying stealth crop duster airplanes over Ukraine and dropping Agent Orange everywhere? Makes no sense at all.
andrepd 2y ago
If his goal was peace and prosperity why did he send death squads to murder peasants and overthrow the (democratic and very successful) government of Guatemala, in order to increase profits for American companies? Honest question
- keiferski 2y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A... The short answer is that the new government in Guatemala was perceived as being communist and therefore potentially hostile to the US, as well as being a “foothold” that could then spread communism to other Latin American countries. Purely on a geopolitical basis I think it was a bad decision, as it had major blowback on Cuba for example (Che was actually in Guatemala at the time.) Similarly to Iran the year before - it made sense to them at the time but had major negative effects, and so ended up being a really stupid decision. This policy of intervention was actually a deliberate strategy of Eisenhower’s though, as from his perspective these clandestine regime changes were preferable to outright war and using nuclear weapons, which is what pretty much everyone around him wanted him to do in Korea, Vietnam, and China. Retrospectively it seems to me that the avoidance of outright war was a noble aim, but the strategy put into practice wasn’t very well thought through.
  - andrepd 2y ago
    Again, that's a lot of words for "we murdered a few peasants and set the rest back into debt bondage to increase the profits for a handful of Americans". I don't see the relevance of talking about nuclear weapons either, when discussing what to do when a small Central American country sets a tax on large properties; seems like a non sequitur. Considerations about "preventing the spread of communism" don't really have much strength when you call "communism" something which (1) is the lightest possible land reform (expropriating land which is *both* unused and above a large threshold, and paying fair compensation for it), and (2) had tremendous effects on poverty levels, child mortality, economic productivity, etc, in just a few short years.
    - 2y ago

adrianN 2y ago

It was my understanding that the Soviet Union collapsed in part because they couldn’t afford the arms race anymore.

keiferski 2y ago
I’m not an expert in any way on this, but my impression from reading maybe half a dozen books involving the Soviets + living in a former Soviet-occupied country is that the USSR simply wasn’t ever going to work sociopolitically by nature of its multi-nation imperial structure. The client states were never really assimilated and didn’t want to be - and the relationship with them was hostile from the start - see the lack of help during the Warsaw Uprising, Hungarian Revolution in 1957, Prague in 1968, etc. So my impression is that the USSR would inevitably collapse and it was mostly just a matter of time. The arms race definitely had an effect on the Soviet economy, but I don’t think it’s correct to say that was the main reason for the collapse.
- arisAlexis 2y ago
  Or in one sentence because communism can't work for long periods
  - dr-detroit 2y ago
    [dead]
  - arisAlexis 2y ago
    I am rarely surprised at my age but HN community thinking that communism can indeed work over long periods is awesome
- AYBABTME 2y ago
  It seems like a lot of reasons, many of which derived from hubris and a delusion that one can plan an entire society, and everything that follows from this mistake. Bad economy, over reliance on limited set of heavy industries, corruption, lack of agency; overall reduced economic performance and thus unable to outcompete the US economy, which was forcing the Soviets into an arms race death march.
dr-detroit 2y ago
[dead]
samat 2y ago
In part, yes, but the main reason was severely mismanaged economy, specifically — super unproductive agro. They had to buy food (grain), selling oil. And then oil prices went down.
- uoaei 2y ago
  There's some theories that the US poisoned some of the crop fields in the 60s and 70s especially in the Ukraine resulting in inadequate yields, exacerbating the budgetary issues already present from space race / arms race spending.
  - Log_out_ 2y ago
    I'm sure they have such conspirancid paranoia in north korea right now. They are expressions of unvented frustration in unreformable systems. It can not be the ruler or the ideology, and it can not be that the combination is unable to deal with a world that regularly throws you a stick for the legs if you think you have a good run. Pests evolve and the soil becomes less fertile .Industrial Agriculture is not the same every year. it just looks loke that for a layman.
  - nradov 2y ago
    That's the type of ridiculous conspiracy theory that Communists frequently invented to excuse their own failures. The US had no capability for spreading enough poison in the USSR to significantly reduce crop yields. Like seriously, was the CIA supposed to be flying stealth crop duster airplanes over Ukraine and dropping Agent Orange everywhere? Makes no sense at all.

andrepd 2y ago

If his goal was peace and prosperity why did he send death squads to murder peasants and overthrow the (democratic and very successful) government of Guatemala, in order to increase profits for American companies? Honest question

keiferski 2y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A... The short answer is that the new government in Guatemala was perceived as being communist and therefore potentially hostile to the US, as well as being a “foothold” that could then spread communism to other Latin American countries. Purely on a geopolitical basis I think it was a bad decision, as it had major blowback on Cuba for example (Che was actually in Guatemala at the time.) Similarly to Iran the year before - it made sense to them at the time but had major negative effects, and so ended up being a really stupid decision. This policy of intervention was actually a deliberate strategy of Eisenhower’s though, as from his perspective these clandestine regime changes were preferable to outright war and using nuclear weapons, which is what pretty much everyone around him wanted him to do in Korea, Vietnam, and China. Retrospectively it seems to me that the avoidance of outright war was a noble aim, but the strategy put into practice wasn’t very well thought through.
- andrepd 2y ago
  Again, that's a lot of words for "we murdered a few peasants and set the rest back into debt bondage to increase the profits for a handful of Americans". I don't see the relevance of talking about nuclear weapons either, when discussing what to do when a small Central American country sets a tax on large properties; seems like a non sequitur. Considerations about "preventing the spread of communism" don't really have much strength when you call "communism" something which (1) is the lightest possible land reform (expropriating land which is *both* unused and above a large threshold, and paying fair compensation for it), and (2) had tremendous effects on poverty levels, child mortality, economic productivity, etc, in just a few short years.
  - 2y ago