On Nov. 9, the Western world will celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall, the symbolic moment that seemingly captures the subsequent collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War all in one physical manifestation. With the end of the Cold War, capitalism and democracy were trumpeted as the best system for all of humanity and the international arena changed forever as the United States held sway over virtually all issues of consequence. The U.S. was declared the victor of the Cold War.
But who said the war ended? In a battle between two ideologically opposed superpowers, the fact that one superpower falls out of contention may point to an obvious end to the conflict. So when the Soviet Union could no longer compete, and in fact dissolved into the independent nation states we see today encircling Russia, it was tempting for spectators to call the fight. But at what point did the Cold War end? Was it after the dissolution of the Soviet Union? Or maybe when Russia accepted democratic reforms? Or maybe it all came crashing down on Nov. 9, 1989 when the Berlin Wall began its physical demise?
One organization has chosen a day to commemorate the victory, rather than become entangled in the debate over when the Cold War actually ended. The Cold War Veterans Association has lobbied state and national governments to declare May 1 as Cold War Victory Day. According to their Web site, Kathleen Sebelius, currently serving as Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, was the first to declare Cold War Victory Day on May 1, 2003 when she was governor of Kansas. That same day, Rep. Dennis Moore of Kansas spoke before Congress in support of the May 1 commemoration. He listed a number of events that occurred in the month of May between 1953 and 1987, and finally concluded by asking then President George W. Bush to create a Cold War Victory Medal for all those who served in the military and intelligence agencies during the Cold War period.
The Cold War Veterans Association claims wide support for the Victory Medal proposal. The House of Representatives version of the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2008 included a provision creating the Cold War Victory Medal, but it ultimately did not become law.
The U.S. does not do enough for its veterans, but does a Cold War Victory Medal really send the right message? The victory medal assumes that the Cold War is over, but has the world really warmed up?
One of the first uses of the term “cold war” appeared in an Oct. 19, 1945 editorial in the Tribune entitled “You and the Atomic Bomb,” penned by George Orwell. Just two months after nuclear bombs were dropped on Japan, Orwell presciently predicted the course of international affairs. Orwell foretold how nations with the bomb would tacitly agree not to use it on one another, and would instead further consolidate state power.
The atomic bomb, the ultimate weapon, would rob the “people of all power to revolt” while placing nuclear armed nations at military parity. Orwell was concerned with the internal makeup of these “super-states”—“that is, the kind of world-view, the kind of beliefs, and the social structure that would probably prevail in a state which was at once unconquerable and in a permanent state of ‘cold war’ with its neighbors…. If, as seems to be the case, [the atomic bomb] is a rare and costly object as difficult to produce as a battleship, it is likelier to put an end to large-scale wars at the cost of prolonging indefinitely a ‘peace that is no peace’.”
In perhaps its earliest use, the term “cold war” referred to the security threat posed by nuclear weapons, and how that threat would shape the world. Today, at least eight countries have nuclear weapons, and at least three more are seeking to attain them. Russia still has around 13,000 strategic and tactical nuclear warheads. According to the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, the explosive yield of all the world’s nuclear weapons is around 5,000 megatons. Dean Babst and David Krieger of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation estimated that it may only take around 100 megatons to destroy human civilization. That means we could destroy ourselves 50 times with currently known nuclear stockpiles.
The security threat of a cold war is still there. Somehow, the Cold War was redefined to become the Soviet-American conflict, and was used to create an international caste system pinning the third world at the bottom and the U.S. at the top (the term “third world” was a product of the Cold War conflict). As the Berlin Wall was falling, another wall was built around the concept of U.S. superiority. A celebration of Cold War victory not only embraces a dangerously false sense of security, but promulgates an arrogant view of U.S. global dominance that only contributes to our world being forever cold.
Elad Gross is a Trinity senior. His column runs every Wednesday.