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It becomes again wild when you remember that the Cold War was only "necessary" because of US antagonism post-war. This isn't passing judgment on Soviet policies

It becomes again wild when you remember that the Cold War was only "necessary" because of US antagonism post-war. This isn't passing judgment on Soviet policies, only a recognition that conflict might not have been so heated if we'd learned our lesson from how the disintegration of US-Japanese relations had drawn us into the previous war. Essentially, the US seems to have a habit of being "forced" to ally with undesirable elements after some lapse in geopolitical awareness or effort leads to hostilities (sound familiar?).

FredPret 2y ago
Are you saying the Soviets took the “kumbaya” approach to communism and if only the US chilled out, there would’ve been no conflict? Surely you cannot believe that?
- underlipton 2y ago
  No, because that's a straw man. The idea is that the Soviets were not looking to be in a half-century-long dick-measuring contest with the US, with the fate of the biosphere in the balance, and that the impetus for much of their expansionism and antagonism was the selfsame posturing that we claimed was our response to their antagonism. This is tantamount to the stance that Henry A. Wallace - the man who would have been president after FDR's death if not for the DNC pulling a Kamala at the 1944 convention - took (even if he walked that back amidst McCarthyism). I'm not saying that the US and Soviets ever would have been strict allies like we became with Japan, but a calmer entry to the post-war period might have cooled nerves and prevented the worst excesses of the Cold War. Do they seek the bomb? Do they ruin Afghanistan? Do we have flashpoints in Korea, Vietnam, South America? Are we still dealing with the negative ramifications of these events, decades on? And, in this hypothetical alternate history, did we have to employ and grant amnesty to literal Nazis to counter Soviets threatened by the Truman Doctrine? We can't know, but surely it's believable. Unless you think that mid-century communists were evil and irrational (and I suppose that you could (not me)).
HideousKojima 2y ago
>It becomes again wild when you remember that the Cold War was only "necessary" because of US antagonism post-war. Only if you ignore communist antagonism in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Up to and including their own allies when they gave their citizens a little too much freedom. I have several books in Czech on my shelf with a copyright date of 1968, a year in which far more books were published than years prior, I wonder why they share that year?
- underlipton 2y ago
  Do you have a more comprehensive timeline of communist antagonism in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America, in relation to American policy?
  - HideousKojima 2y ago
    Are you implying that all communist antagonism was in response to American policy? I believe there was plenty of aggression by all parties in the Cold War, but there are several instances where the communists were very clearly the aggressors. Just a couple of highlights: 1) The Soviet blockade of West Berlin. The Soviets did this in response to the horrifically aggressive acts of the US, Britain, and France to... manage their occupation zones in Germany differently than the Soviets wanted them to, and economic and currency reform in West Germany. 2) The Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. As far as I can tell, western involvement in Dubcek's reforms and the Prague Spring were about as non-existent as possible. This didn't stop the Soviets and other Warsaw Pact nations invading their own ally, and in explicit violation of the Warsaw Pact itself. 3) The Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia, and the Chinese invasion of Vietnam. The west's bizarre support of the Khmer Rouge after the successful Vietnamese invasion notwithstanding (for complex geopolitical reasons), prior to the invasion it treated both Cambodia and Vietnam as enemies and the war between the two nations was do to their own politics, not any US influence. And there are plenty more. And I'm sure there are instances you can bring up where the combloc countries were reacting to clear aggression by the west, but here's the thing: I'm not claiming that such aggression never happened. Meanwhile you seem to be arguing that the combloc countries would have been perfectly peaceful if they didn't need to react to aggressions by those damn western capitalists.
aguaviva 2y ago
It becomes again wild when you remember that the Cold War was only "necessary" because of US antagonism post-war. This is an extremely myopic point of view, and ignores a whole host of major events in Europe and Asia in the key years 1946-1950. I don't have time to lay them out for you, but if the topic is of interest to you, then you're welcome to do your own research.
- underlipton 2y ago
  That sounds like you don't really have an argument. Per previous replies, you're implicitly displaying your own myopia, considering that major events in 1945 and before were what set up major power behavior post-war.
  - aguaviva 2y ago
    Sounds like you don't really have an argument. Maybe I do, maybe I don't. But this we do know: per previous replies, if we can't agree on appropriate language to discuss the color of the sky on a given day -- that is, if I can't get a straight answer from you in response to an extremely straightforward question about a single event in 1948 -- then we're not going to be able to communicate with each other in regard to the bigger-picture stuff.

FredPret 2y ago

Are you saying the Soviets took the “kumbaya” approach to communism and if only the US chilled out, there would’ve been no conflict? Surely you cannot believe that?

underlipton 2y ago
No, because that's a straw man. The idea is that the Soviets were not looking to be in a half-century-long dick-measuring contest with the US, with the fate of the biosphere in the balance, and that the impetus for much of their expansionism and antagonism was the selfsame posturing that we claimed was our response to their antagonism. This is tantamount to the stance that Henry A. Wallace - the man who would have been president after FDR's death if not for the DNC pulling a Kamala at the 1944 convention - took (even if he walked that back amidst McCarthyism). I'm not saying that the US and Soviets ever would have been strict allies like we became with Japan, but a calmer entry to the post-war period might have cooled nerves and prevented the worst excesses of the Cold War. Do they seek the bomb? Do they ruin Afghanistan? Do we have flashpoints in Korea, Vietnam, South America? Are we still dealing with the negative ramifications of these events, decades on? And, in this hypothetical alternate history, did we have to employ and grant amnesty to literal Nazis to counter Soviets threatened by the Truman Doctrine? We can't know, but surely it's believable. Unless you think that mid-century communists were evil and irrational (and I suppose that you could (not me)).

HideousKojima 2y ago

>It becomes again wild when you remember that the Cold War was only "necessary" because of US antagonism post-war. Only if you ignore communist antagonism in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Up to and including their own allies when they gave their citizens a little too much freedom. I have several books in Czech on my shelf with a copyright date of 1968, a year in which far more books were published than years prior, I wonder why they share that year?

underlipton 2y ago
Do you have a more comprehensive timeline of communist antagonism in Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America, in relation to American policy?
- HideousKojima 2y ago
  Are you implying that all communist antagonism was in response to American policy? I believe there was plenty of aggression by all parties in the Cold War, but there are several instances where the communists were very clearly the aggressors. Just a couple of highlights: 1) The Soviet blockade of West Berlin. The Soviets did this in response to the horrifically aggressive acts of the US, Britain, and France to... manage their occupation zones in Germany differently than the Soviets wanted them to, and economic and currency reform in West Germany. 2) The Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. As far as I can tell, western involvement in Dubcek's reforms and the Prague Spring were about as non-existent as possible. This didn't stop the Soviets and other Warsaw Pact nations invading their own ally, and in explicit violation of the Warsaw Pact itself. 3) The Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia, and the Chinese invasion of Vietnam. The west's bizarre support of the Khmer Rouge after the successful Vietnamese invasion notwithstanding (for complex geopolitical reasons), prior to the invasion it treated both Cambodia and Vietnam as enemies and the war between the two nations was do to their own politics, not any US influence. And there are plenty more. And I'm sure there are instances you can bring up where the combloc countries were reacting to clear aggression by the west, but here's the thing: I'm not claiming that such aggression never happened. Meanwhile you seem to be arguing that the combloc countries would have been perfectly peaceful if they didn't need to react to aggressions by those damn western capitalists.

aguaviva 2y ago

It becomes again wild when you remember that the Cold War was only "necessary" because of US antagonism post-war. This is an extremely myopic point of view, and ignores a whole host of major events in Europe and Asia in the key years 1946-1950. I don't have time to lay them out for you, but if the topic is of interest to you, then you're welcome to do your own research.

underlipton 2y ago
That sounds like you don't really have an argument. Per previous replies, you're implicitly displaying your own myopia, considering that major events in 1945 and before were what set up major power behavior post-war.
- aguaviva 2y ago
  Sounds like you don't really have an argument. Maybe I do, maybe I don't. But this we do know: per previous replies, if we can't agree on appropriate language to discuss the color of the sky on a given day -- that is, if I can't get a straight answer from you in response to an extremely straightforward question about a single event in 1948 -- then we're not going to be able to communicate with each other in regard to the bigger-picture stuff.