Googling around for pics for the blog I ran into this image. ”Stalin’s race car”. Sorry for my predilection for motor-head paraphernalia. I’m sure you get tired of it, but I like to think that I am at least consistent while also modeling that an interest in nearly anything, from cars to music to movies to fashion to trains, can be a really fun way to cleave into the past.
So; “Stalin’s race car”. Was he really seriously considering going up against the Ferraris, the Alfas, the Renaults and the Jaguars? Was the international sports car arena going to be another field of propaganda points like the Olympics and the space race? If so, what happened to it?
Well, for one thing of course Stalin died. If you really want to follow the course of the chapter you are really looking at the last years of Stalin’s life and most especially, the Peace Note. Kissinger dismisses the Note rather nonchalantly. I’m not so sure. Maybe it was a bona fide opportunity lost. Look at it in comparison to the disengagement scheme. Was it possibly our fear of worldwide communist domination that led to the Cold War as we know it. Did we take too literally the lesson of Hitler’s Mein Kampf and apply that to the Communist Manifesto and convince ourselves that anything resembling appeasement would tempt worldwide communist domination? I’m afraid we might have.
On a side note, Beria is executed in 1953. I can’t remember where I read it but somewhere I saw a first hand account, it might be in one of those old life magazines, of someone traveling the through the USSR shortly after his death. They made some casual inquiry about him, an old poster with his likeness had been left somewhere. The inquiry met a stony reception. Beria was an un-person. Not just a traitor, not another Benedict Arnold, but he not only no longer existed, he never did. Another source confirmed for me that an encyclopedia published in ’53 had an usually long entry under “Bergund” or some such name, noting t he editors had undoubtedly rushed to fill the space where Beria had been deleted.
You really have to read Orwell’s 1984.
Maybe our fears were well founded after all.
As you said we were paranoiac and as soon and afraid of the consequences if some country from the Eastern Hemisphere (Stalin especially) offered a “peaceful coexistence” as Stalin had said so. What is interesting, in my opinion, is what Kissinger had stated in the beginning of the chapter, he said if Stalin had given the peace note four years earlier, the note would have been received well by the West. At that point however, there was enough hostility to not see the Soviet Union as sincere. Interestingly enough, Kissinger also states that if Staling had given the peace note, there could have been a chance that Germany would not have joined NATO and would have become a neutral country. However, the past is the past, and like you said, we might have been responsible for the Cold War due to the fact that were terrified of any communist dominance.
Just as a side comment, oh how did I miss Kissinger, compared to Spence.
As Kissinger states in the chapter, the Soviet Union was trying to offer a form of peace. The Peace Note was something that Stalin envisioned and both the Soviet Union and Great Britain were willing to negotiate but the US was not. Kissinger states that the US wanted to changed the Soviet system rather than negotiate.
It’s funny that you mention meinkampf because Stalin’s plan failed because he forgot his mortality whereas hitler was so aware of it and that’s why he pushed his plans. Also find it funny that Stalin’s willing to challenge the us cars but not arms.
Reading this chapter, I was reminded that Kissinger always gives the feeling that world governments are in constant peril. I really do have to wonder if a permanent and effective end to the cold war could have been found in the 1950s. Had that happened, would it have lasted? I’m sure that the world today would be very different. It’s an interesting concept that all the tensions of the cold war were driven by overestimating the hostility of the opponent. I think that the powers had a real opportunity to recognize this, but failed. Also, did you add that part about trains because of me?
Our perception of the Cold War today could be the effect of either. Due to prior actions Stalin wasn’t trusted by the U.S, and therefore his proposal was probably seen as another of his well known schemes. It could also have been the U.S.’s fear of the perils of communism, . More than that however, I think the point Kissinger wants to make is that what occurred, and how it occurred, is mostly due to misunderstanding; neither party was able to fully understand the other’s reason for action, which led to what eventually became the Cold War we know today.
I like how Kissinger really likes German statesmen, first Bismarck and now Konrad Adeneur, who’s sense of security derived from faith rather than books and education like other leaders.
I think the most significant aspect of this chapter was the fact that Stalin attempted to propose peace, which is why he wrote his Peace Note. He offered German reunification if Germany were to become neutral. The west on the other did not want this to happen because it could threaten the foundations of NATO. I never expected Stalin to compromise and talk about peace, but in reality Stalin never confronted the US, he always withdrew in the end.