Topic 9.3 Notes – The End of the Cold War

How the Cold War Ended

The Cold War did not end with a peace treaty or a U.S. battlefield victory. It ended when communist rule collapsed across Eastern Europe in 1989, Germany reunified in 1990, and the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991.

Before that, the U.S. had followed containment, and the 1970s brought détente, a temporary easing of tension. That mood broke after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, which pushed the superpowers back into sharper conflict.

The main causes worked together:

• Reagan’s pressure raised military and ideological pressure on the USSR.
• Soviet economic weakness made the arms race and global commitments harder to sustain.
• Gorbachev’s reforms loosened communist control.
• Democratic and nationalist movements challenged Soviet rule in Eastern Europe and inside the USSR.
• Soviet refusal to use force let those challenges succeed.

That’s the key interpretation you want to keep straight. Reagan mattered, but “Reagan alone won the Cold War” is too simple for APUSH.

Reagan’s Pressure Campaign Against Communism

Reagan rejected détente. He believed the U.S. should confront Soviet power, then negotiate from strength.

Ideological offensive

Reagan treated the Cold War as a moral fight, not just a strategic one.

• “Evil empire” speech in 1983 framed the USSR as illegitimate and oppressive.
• Brandenburg Gate speech in 1987 included “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.”
• This rhetoric aimed to undercut communist legitimacy, rally Western allies, and encourage resistance behind the Iron Curtain.

That message was especially visible at Berlin, where Reagan spoke with the Brandenburg Gate and the divided city behind him.

Reagan at the Brandenburg Gate, 1987

Military buildup

Reagan increased spending on both nuclear and conventional weapons.

• B-1 bomber
• MX missile
• 600-ship navy
• Pershing II and ground-launched cruise missiles placed in Western Europe to counter Soviet SS-20s
• Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) or “Star Wars”

SDI mattered because it challenged mutual assured destruction, the idea that neither side attacks because both would be destroyed. It scared Soviet leaders with the possibility of a new arms race they could not afford. Still, SDI alone did not bankrupt the USSR.

Reagan Doctrine and limited interventions

Reagan also backed anticommunist forces abroad:

• Afghanistan: aid to the mujahideen fighting Soviet occupation
• Nicaragua: support for the Contras against the Sandinistas; Congress passed the Boland Amendments, and secret funding produced the Iran-Contra scandal
• El Salvador: aid to an anti-leftist government despite human rights abuses
• Grenada invasion in 1983
• Libya bombing in 1986
• Lebanon peacekeeping mission, followed by the 1983 Beirut barracks bombing

Why the Soviet Bloc Collapsed

Pressure from outside hit a system that was already weak inside.

Soviet internal weaknesses

• Centrally planned economy struggled with shortages, low productivity, weak innovation, and farm problems.
• Heavy military spending and support for allies drained resources.
• Afghanistan became a costly, demoralizing war.

Gorbachev’s reforms

• Glasnost meant openness. Less censorship meant more criticism of the regime.
• Perestroika meant restructuring. It introduced limited market reforms and decentralization.

Gorbachev wanted to save communism, but the reforms weakened Party control instead. He also improved relations with the West and stopped enforcing the Brezhnev Doctrine by force.

Revolutions of 1989 and Soviet breakup

• Poland: Solidarity, Round Table Talks, partly free elections
• Hungary: reforms and opening the border with Austria
• East Germany: protests, refugee crisis, fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989
• Czechoslovakia: Velvet Revolution, Václav Havel
• Romania: violent overthrow of Nicolae Ceaușescu

Inside the USSR, nationalist movements grew in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Ukraine, Georgia, and Armenia. After the failed August 1991 coup, Boris Yeltsin gained power. In December 1991, Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus declared the USSR over and formed the Commonwealth of Independent States. Gorbachev resigned, and 15 independent states emerged.

Diplomacy, Reunification, and the New World After 1991

Pressure and diplomacy came together in summit meetings:

The INF Treaty eliminated an entire class of missiles and used on-site inspections. START I followed in 1991 under George H. W. Bush.

German reunification needed agreement from the U.S., USSR, Britain, and France. Bush backed it, and Germany reunited in 1990 while staying in NATO.

After 1991, the U.S. became the sole superpower in a unipolar world. Relations with Russia changed, but worries remained about former Soviet nuclear weapons. NATO survived and expanded in 1999 to Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.

New interventions showed that the Cold War was over, but arguments over U.S. power were not:

• Persian Gulf War / Operation Desert Storm against Saddam Hussein after Iraq invaded Kuwait
• Somalia
• Bosnia and the Dayton Accords
• Kosovo

These raised lasting debates over world leadership vs. “world’s policeman,” unilateral action vs. multilateralism, and national interest vs. humanitarian intervention.