Soviet-American Relations: A New Cold War

Abstract

The conduct of relations with the Soviet Union has been the natural focal point for American foreign policy since World War II. In the formulation of that policy, two major questions have bedeviled policy-makers: What are Soviet intentions? What are the prospects for a favorable evolution inside the USSR? These were the two issues around which the original policy of containment was constructed in the early 1950s. At that time it was believed that Soviet policy reflected a combination of traditional Russian expansionism and Marxist-Leninist revolutionary aspirations. But it was also argued that if contained over a sufficiently long period, the failure of the Soviet Union to achieve its expansionist goals would induce a benevolent evolutionary process.