As relações dos Estados Unidos durante o governo Ronald Reagan (1981 - 1989) com a União Soviética

Abstract

The 1980s were the scene of the intensification of the Cold War, followed by a relaxation of tensions between the superpowers, opening the way to the end of the conflict and to the current multipolar order. The Conservative Reagan Government purposefully invigorates the conflict, seeks to strengthen the American military power and carries forward its crusade against communism. However, after a series of fatalities, Gorbachev arrives at the General Secretariat and his government changes the direction of the Soviet Union, its interests and initiates an unprecedented reform in national history. In the concomitant period of the Reagan’s and Gorbachev’s governments, there is a restraint in the once very tense relations between the superpowers, with the signing of a treaty for the destruction of an entire class of nuclear weapons, a period sometimes called the “New Détente”. Such an occurrence is complex, and it is unusual for a country as powerful as the Soviet Union to change its interests so radically in such a short time, also it is intriguing the fact that the country gives in so much in negotiations involving its security with its biggest rival. This paper proposes to analyze the relations between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Reagan period and to understand why tensions are so small in the second half when compared with the first. The monograph notes that non-coincidentally relations between those countries improve and the United States slows down its speeches when Gorbachev's Soviet Union changes its interests and agrees to negotiate from a position of inequality, making very generous offers and receiving little in return. The monograph states that the main cause of this reduction of tensions was the Gorbachev Government and its policies. To argue, we analyze the relationship between Reagan's first term of office and compare it with the second, noting the difference between the four general secretariats that existed at this time, as well as interests and visions of the US and the USSR.