Afghanistan and the 'Second Cold War'

In 1978 communists took power in Afghanistan, a country on the USSR's southern border. Their government was unpopular, and Muslim rebels, the mujahideen, rose against it. In 1979 its new leader, Hafizullah Amin, could not defeat them, and Soviet leaders feared he might turn to the USA.

In late December 1979, Soviet troops invaded. Amin was killed and replaced by a leader loyal to Moscow.

Causes: the USSR wanted a friendly communist government on its border, and feared that Islamic rebellion might spread to its own Muslim republics.

Consequence: the war lasted nearly ten years. About 15,000 Soviet soldiers died, and the last Soviet troops left in February 1989.

To the USA, the invasion looked like Soviet expansion towards the oil of the Persian Gulf. US President Jimmy Carter responded firmly.

The region which is now threatened by Soviet troops in Afghanistan is of great strategic importance: It contains more than two-thirds of the world's exportable oil.

Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.

('Repelled' means 'driven back'.) This promise to defend the Gulf, by force if necessary, became known as the Carter Doctrine.

Carter also:

• asked the Senate to delay SALT 2, which was never ratified
• stopped sales of American grain and technology to the USSR
• sent aid and weapons to the mujahideen.

Significance: détente was over.

The 1980 Olympic Games were held in Moscow. In protest at the invasion of Afghanistan, the USA led a boycott: it and around 60 other countries refused to send teams.

In 1984 the Games were held in Los Angeles. The USSR and most of its allies boycotted them in return, saying their athletes would not be safe.

Significance: the boycotts showed how far relations had fallen. Even sport had become part of the Cold War.

Ronald Reagan became US President in 1981. He was strongly anti-communist, and in 1983 called the USSR an 'evil empire'.

Reagan believed the USA should negotiate from strength. He greatly increased defence spending, and from 1983 new American nuclear missiles were placed in Western Europe.

Meanwhile the USSR had three elderly leaders in three years, as Brezhnev (1982) and then Andropov (1984) died.

Significance: with no détente, a huge arms build-up and little trust, the early 1980s became known as the 'Second Cold War'.

In 1983 Reagan announced the Strategic Defence Initiative (SDI), nicknamed 'Star Wars': a plan for a system, partly in space, to destroy Soviet missiles before they reached the USA.

Why it worried the USSR:

• Nuclear peace rested on mutually assured destruction: neither side would attack, because the other could strike back. SDI threatened to make the USA safe from Soviet missiles.
• The USSR could not afford to build a system of its own.

SDI was never completed, and many scientists doubted it would work.

Significance: it increased tension, but it also put pressure on the struggling Soviet economy.