Question

Connect and Reflect

Reflect on your experience of comparing and contrasting Reagan's and Bush's foreign policies. How do you feel attitudes toward foreign policy changed from the beginning to the end of the Cold War? Do you feel the United States was justified in getting involved in the foreign conflicts that you learned about in this unit? Why or why not?

Answer 1

Reagan and Bush both played roles in the end of the Cold War, with Reagan taking a hardline interventionist approach and Bush focusing on easing tensions. Their policies reflected the changing attitudes towards foreign policy of the era, marked by successes, controversies, and debates regarding U.S. involvement in foreign conflicts.

Step-by-step explanation:

The foreign policy approaches of U.S. Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush were pivotal during the closing years of the Cold War. Reagan, known for his hardline stance against the Soviet Union, which he famously dubbed the "evil empire," focused on ending what he saw as 'Vietnam Syndrome' and took an interventionist approach, bolstering U.S. military might and providing support to anti-Communist forces globally. His administration saw both success and controversy, like supporting freedom fighters in Afghanistan but also getting entangled in the Iran-Contra Affair.

Bush, while inheriting a similar stance, worked to soften tensions with the Soviet Union and emphasized international cooperation, as demonstrated by his response to the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq which led to the Persian Gulf War. Both administrations' foreign policies were shaped significantly by the end of the Cold War which they helped facilitate through different strategies, including diplomacy and military power. This era saw the U.S. engaging in various conflicts, sometimes controversially, with the aim of securing its interests and promoting democracy, prompting mixed reactions on whether U.S. involvement was always justified.

Answer 2

Explanation: The cold war was designed to make the United States or the Soviet Union the most powerful and influential nation on the planet. As a result, the two countries engaged in political, economic, scientific, technological, and social conflicts. At the start of the cold war, state leaders' attitudes toward the competing nation were softer, but they became more serious and rigid over time, leading to very serious secondary conflicts with bloody wars in other countries. The emergence of serious problems in other countries, as well as the control and expenditure of public funds, were contentious issues that could not justify the US and foreign countries' involvement in the cold war, because these were resources that could not have occurred or were not available.