The Cold War Essay Example for Free

The Cold War Essay Who was to Blame? Historians have changed their views about who was to blame for the cold war over the years. Soviet Historians: They blamed to the United States. The Traditionalits: They blamed to the USSR for the Cold War and its attempt to impose its ideology on the of the world Until the 1960s, most historians followed the official government line – that the Cold War was the direct result of Stalins aggressive Soviet expansionism. Allocation of blame was simple – the Soviets were to blame! This view of the Cold War has never really gone away, and there have always been people who have seen the Soviet Union as the cause of the confrontation. It is, by far, the most common opinion of people who post on the web. In the following collection, note that all the contributors seem to come either from America or Britain : An extract form Michael Hart’s Book: The 100: A ranking of the most infuencail persons in History which supports the idea of USSR being blamed for the Cold War. The Cold War was caused by the military expansionism of Stalin and his successors. The American response†¦ was basically a defensive reaction. As long as Soviet leaders clung to their dream of imposing Communism on the world, the West had no way (other than surrender) of ending the conflict. When a Soviet leader appeared who was willing to abandon that goal, the seemingly interminable Cold War soon melted away. Summary of Michael Hart’s argument justifying placing Mikhail Gorbachev in his top 100 most influential persons in history. Michael H Hart worked for NASA and is currently a professor of astronomy and physics at a US college. He holds degrees in physics, astronomy, and law and is author of: The 100: A Ranking of the Most Influential Persons in History (1986) The truth of the matter, Andrew insisted, responding to the statement of Dr James Leutze that US intellectual thought places blame for the Cold War equally between the US and the Soviet Union, is that the whole cost and  length of the Cold War rests almost completely with the men who led the Soviet Union to its ultimate implosion. â€Å"The Cold War was caused by the Soviet Union , was sustained by the Soviet Union , and was ended by the Soviet Union when it collapsed,† he said emphatically. â€Å"It was—and is—as simple as that.† Report of a QA session with Christopher Andrew (a Cambridge University don and expert on Cold War espionage) at the first Raleigh International Spy Conference, August 2003 The cold war was caused by the USSR s imperial appetite. US Naval War College Review of Eugene V Rostow, Violent peace and the management of power: dilemmas and choices in US policy (1988) Stalins bad behavior was the primary cause of the Cold War J.R. Nyquist styles himself ‘a WorldNetDaily contributing editor and a renowned expert in geopolitics and international relations. He is the author of Origins of the Fourth World War. The cause of the Cold War was the totalitarian nature of the Communist system itself. Posted by ‘Dangus’ on a webforum called @forumz, 11-06-2002 The Cold War happened because Stalin decided that he could not allow the Russians to be behind the US. He chose confrontation because he could not accept the cosquences of being behind †¦ The US is already supreme,why be provocative and upset it further? Posted by ‘PainRack’ on a webforum called Spacebattles.com, Jun 21st 2001, The Cold War was caused by the attempt of one state to impose its ideology on the rest of the world. That state was not the US , which demilitarized immediately after the war. That ideology was not democracy. Posted by Brian Grassie, United States of America on Thursday, December 12, 2002 The United Nations OnLine is a virtual model United Nations sponsored by a Non-Profit Organization from Texas . The UNOL Lobbying Area is for students from around the world to discuss topics concerning the work of the United Nations. The puppet governments [of Eastern Europe] were a huge source of anxiety for the West and were the main cause of the Cold War, the forty-five year long period of tension between the Soviets and the capitalists. thinkquest.org an international website-building competition, sponsored by the Oracle Education Foundation. The Cold War was caused by America s attempt to cooperate with Russia as a country that had common enemies rather than taking a firm stance against Russia from the beginning. posted by someone who calls himself ishalltriumph, 2004-03-16, on a web-forum called livejournal The Rivisionists: †¢ In 1959 the historian William Apple man Williams was the first to suggest that America was to blame. †¢ The revisionists said that America was engaged in a war to keep the countries open to capitalism and American trade. †¢ Rivisionists said that Truman’s use of atomic bomb without telling Stalin was the cause of the beginning of the Cold War. Canadian Ambassador arguing that The American atomic bomb was the main cause of the Cold War: The atomic bomb did help seed the Cold War. Lets face it, the bomb was not just meant to buckle Japan into surrender, it was also a political statement towards the Soviet Union . A statement of power towards a nation who practiced a political ideology different from America which was unacceptable to the free democractic United States†¦ posted by Michael Hughes, ‘Ambassador from Canada ’, on 11 Dec 2002 on the ONOL webforum The United Nations OnLine is a virtual model United Nations sponsored by a Non-Profit Organization from Texas . The UNOL Lobbying Area is for students from around the world to discuss topics concerning the work of the United Nations. The Pro-revisionists: John Lewis Gaddis first published this idea in 1972.The post-revisionists argues that neither Russai nor America was to blame both the sides wanted to keep the peace after the war..the Cold war was a cause of mutual misunderstanding and the failure to appreciate eachother’s ideas. | |P| |The Cold War was caused by the conflicting interests of the United States and the U.S.S.R., compounded by miscommunication and poor diplomacy. The |o| |differences in the cultures of the American political leaders and their moral and righteous justifications for diplomacy from Soviet leaders communist |s| |expansionist policies led to the unraveling of the new international order nearly established in Roosevelts wartime conferences with Churchill and |t| |Stalin. |-| |Analysis of President Truman’s ideas at a site called Innocents Abroad: Presidents and Foreign Policy |r| | |e| |The Cold War was caused by the social climate and tension in Europe at the end of World War II and by the increasing power struggles between the Soviet |v| |Union [and the United States]. Economic separation between the Soviets and the west also heightened tensions, along with the threat of nuclear war. |i| |A muddled free essay at: netessays.net |s| | |i| |The most important cause of the Cold War was the suspicion and rivalry between Truman and Stalin. |o| |Essay title at: coursework.info |n| | |i| |The Cold War occurred because defensive positions were viewed as aggression, |s| |Oakland School , US, Social Studies department essay title. |t| | |s| |The Cold War was caused by fear, not aggression | | |Statement from IB Standard Level History paper, May 2001 | | | | | | | | |and not forgetting some other, very strange conspiracy theories†¦ | | |   | | |In view of this reviewer†¦ much of the cold war was caused by these NAZI spooks who we hired to watch the Russians and that it was beyond comprehension | | |the number of NAZI officials who we illegally allowed to come here. America has always had a very strong German base and as one T.V. show observed the | | |NAZIS did not loose the war they simply had to relocate. | | |Statement made in a review of a book The Good German by John Acuff, ‘Country Lawyer’, | | |a Christian lawyer who writes reviews of the 3-books-a-week he reads. | | | | | |Its just a coincidence that the Cold War was caused by the Second World War which was caused by the First World War which was caused by a | | |dysfunctional trans-national banking system. | | |Jonathan P. Chance, Imperial Mammonism is Just a Coincidence on a pro-Palestinian site | | | | | | | | | | | After the Collapse of Communism:Post 1991 †¢ Russian historians such as Zabok and Pleshavok have been able to study the Soviet Union’s secret files for the first time. †¢ These files show the Soviet leaders during the cold war were genuinely trying to avoid conflict with the USA.This puts more of the blame on the US. †¢ Modern historians clash the cold war as the clash between capitalism and communism. Timothy White’s overview of the historiography of the cold war Despite the divergence of opinion concerning the origin and nature of the Cold War, there is an increasing consensus that shapes Cold War historiography. While scholars may have been blinded by loyalty and guilt in examining the evidence regarding the origins of the Cold War in the past, increasingly, scholars with greater access to archival evidence on all sides have come to the conclusion that the conflicting and unyielding ideological  ambitions were the source of the complicated and historic tale that was the Cold War. Timothy Whi te, Cold War Historiography: New Evidence Behind Traditional Typographies (2000) This is a difficult but very informative overview on the web of the historiography of the Cold War. Timothy White is on the faculty of Xavier University, Cincinnati, USA.

Censorship Online :: essays research papers

Censorship Online There is a section of the American populace that is slowly slithering into the spotlight after nearly two decades in clandestine. Armed with their odd netspeak, mouses, glowing monitors, and immediate access to a world of information, both serious and amateur Hackers alike have at last come out of the computer lab and into mainstream pop culture. Since I despise pleading ignorant about anything, I chose to read Mr. McDonalds article because of its minutia concerning the future of the more amusing aspect of computing: the game. This article is relevant because whether we like it or not, the PC (personal computer) is only going to grow in popularity and use, and the best weapon against the abuse of this new gee-whiz technology is to be educated about it. It is simply amazing how far gaming has come in the past decade. We have gone from stick figures on a blank screen to interactive movies. The PC is the newest way to play because it has the capability to process and display much more complex games than anything by Nintendo or Sega. Some problems with this, however, are the enormous cost of s descent system and software and the technology that moves at lightning speed. The computer you buy tomorrow will not be able to handle any of the new software two years from now. Owners must not only keep up with the new trends but must also be well aware of what their own system can sustain so that they do not overload it and cause it to crash. This article focuses on interactive video, which is a relatively new field in the gaming industry. The games that have been on the market have not lived up to the bombardment of advertising gamers have been subjected to. The video itself is often choppy and blurry, it rarely enhances the plot of the game, and has yet to be truely interactive. This is because it is not part of a movies nature to mingle with the audience. New software consumers should be aware of this before shelling out $60-$80 for an over-hyped game.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  This article offers the titles of the few good interactive games that have hit the shelves this year as well as a list of ones to avoid. It also describes several of the video cards (special flat chips that can be inserted into the back of your machine to help it process data) that you would have to

Virgin

289 CASE EXAMPLE The Virgin Group Aidan McQuade Introduction The Virgin Group is one of the UK’s largest private companies. The group included, in 2006, 63 businesses as diverse as airlines, health clubs, music stores and trains. The group included Virgin Galactic, which promised to take paying passengers into sub-orbital space. The personal image and personality of the founder, Richard Branson, were highly bound up with those of the company. Branson’s taste for publicity has led him to stunts as diverse as appearing as a cockney street trader in the US comedy Friends, to attempting a non-stop balloon flight around the world.This has certainly contributed to the definition and recognisability of the brand. Research has showed that the Virgin name was associated with words such as ‘fun’, ‘innovative’, ‘daring’ and ‘successful’. In 2006 Branson announced plans to invest $3bn (A2. 4bn; ? 1. 7bn) in renewable energy. Virgi n, through its partnership with a cable company NTL, also undertook an expansion into media challenging publicly the way NewsCorp operated in the UK and the effects on British democracy. The nature and scale of both these initiatives suggests that Branson’s taste for his brand of business remains undimmed. Origins and activitiesVirgin was founded in 1970 as a mail order record business and developed as a private company in music publishing and retailing. In 1986 the company was floated on the stock exchange with a turnover of ? 250m (A362. 5m). However, Branson became tired of the public listing obligations: he resented making presentations in the City to people whom, he believed, did not understand the business. The pressure to create short-term profit, especially as the share price began to fall, was the final straw: Branson decided to take the business back into private ownership and the shares were bought back at the original offer price.The name Virgin was chosen to repr esent the idea of the company being a virgin in every business it entered. Branson has said that: ‘The brand is the single most important asset that we have; our ultimate objective is to establish it as a major global name. ’ This does not mean that Virgin underestimates the importance of understanding the businesses that it is branding. Referring to his intent to set up a ‘green’ energy company producing ethanol and cellulosic ethanol fuels in competition with the oil industry, he said, ‘We’re a slightly unusual company in that we go into industries we know nothing about and immerse ourselves. Virgin’s expansion had often been through joint ventures whereby Virgin provided the brand and its partner provided the majority of capital. For example, the Virgin Group’s move into clothing and cosmetics required an initial outlay of only ? 1,000, whilst its partner, Victory Corporation, invested ? 20m. With Virgin Mobile, Virgin built a business by forming partnerships with existing wireless operators to sell services under the Virgin brand name. The carriers’ competences lay in network management. Virgin set out to differentiate itself by offering innovativeThis case was updated and revised by Aidan McQuade, University of Strathclyde Graduate School of Business, based upon work by Urmilla Lawson. Photo: Steve Bell/Rex Features 290 CHAPTER 7 STRATEGIC DIRECTIONS AND CORPORATE-LEVEL STRATEGY services. Although it did not operate its own network, Virgin won an award for the best wireless operator in the UK. Virgin Fuels appears to be somewhat different in that Virgin is putting up the capital and using the Virgin brand to attract attention to the issues and possibilities that the technology offers.In 2005 Virgin announced the establishment of a ‘quadruple play’ media company providing television, broadband, fixed-line and mobile communications through the merger of Branson’s UK mobile inter ests with the UK’s two cable companies. This Virgin company would have 9 million direct customers, 1. 5 million more than BSkyB, and so have the financial capacity to compete with BSkyB for premium content such as sports and movies. 1 Virgin tried to expand this business further by making an offer for ITV. This was rejected as undervaluing the company and then undermined further with the purchase of an 18 per cent share of ITV by BSkyB.This prompted Branson to call on regulators to force BSkyB to reduce or dispose of its stake citing concerns that BSkyB would have material influence over the free-to-air broadcaster. 2 Virgin has been described as a ‘keiretsu’ organisation – a structure of loosely linked, autonomous units run by self-managed teams that use a common brand name. Branson argued that, as he expanded, he would rather sacrifice short-term profits for long-term growth of the various businesses. Some commentators have argued that Virgin had become an endorsement brand that could not always offer real expertise to the businesses with which it was associated.However, Will Whitehorn, Director of Corporate Affairs for Virgin, stated, ‘At Virgin we know what the brand means and when we put our brand name on something we are making a promise. ’ Branson saw Virgin adding value in three main ways, aside from the brand. These were their public relations and marketing skills; its experience with greenfield start-ups; and Virgin’s understanding of the opportunities presented by ‘institutionalised’ markets. Virgin saw an ‘institutionalised’ market as one dominated by few competitors, not giving good value to customers because they had become either inefficient or preoccupied with each other.Virgin believed it did well when it identified such complacency and offered more for less. The entry into fuel and media industries certainly conforms to the model of trying to shake up ‘institutiona lised’ markets. Corporate rationale In 2006 Virgin still lacked the trappings of a typical multinational. Branson described the Virgin Group as ‘a branded venture capital house’. 3 There was no ‘group’ as such; financial results were not consolidated either for external examination or, so Virgin claimed, for internal use.Its website described Virgin as a family rather than a hierarchy. Its financial operations were managed from Geneva. In 2006 Branson explained the basis upon which he considered opportunities: they have to be global in scope, enhance the brand, be worth doing and have an expectation of a reasonable return on investment. 4 Each business was ‘ring-fenced’, so that lenders to one company had no rights over the assets of another. The ring-fencing seems also to relate not just to provision of financial protection, but also to a business ethics aspect.In an interview in 2006 Branson cricitised supermarkets for selling cheap CD s. His criticism centred on the supermarkets’ use of loss leading on CDs damaging music retailers rather than fundamentally challenging the way music retailers do business. Branson has made it a central feature of Virgin that it shakes up institutionalised markets by being innovative. Loss leading is not an innovative approach. Virgin has evolved from being almost wholly comprised of private companies to a group where some of the companies are publicly listed. Virgin and BransonHistorically, the Virgin Group had been controlled mainly by Branson and his trusted lieutenants, many of whom had stayed with him for more than 20 years. The increasing conformity between personal interest and business initiatives could be discerned in the establishment of Virgin Fuels. In discussing his efforts to establish a ‘green’ fuel company in competition with the oil industry Branson made the geopolitical observation that non-oil-based fuels could ‘avoid another Middle East war one day’; Branson’s opposition to the Second Gulf War is well publicised. In some instances the relationship between personal conviction and business interests is less clear cut. Branson’s comments on the threat to British democracy posed by NewsCorp’s ownership of such a large percentage of the British media could be depicted as either genuine concern from a public figure or sour grapes from a business rival just been beaten out of purchasing ITV. More recently Branson has been reported as talking about withdrawing from the business ‘which THE VIRGIN GROUP 291 more or less ran itself now’,6 and hoping that his son Sam might become more of a Virgin figurehead. However, while he was publicly contemplating this withdrawal from business, Branson was also launching his initiatives in media and fuel. Perhaps Branson’s idea of early retirement is somewhat more active than most. Corporate performance By 2006 Virgin had, with mixed results , taken on one established industry after another in an effort to shake up ‘fat and complacent business sectors’. It had further set its sights on the British media sector and the global oil industry. Airlines clearly were an enthusiasm of Branson’s.According to Branson, Virgin Atlantic, which was 49 per cent owned by Singapore Airways, was a company that he would not sell outright: ‘There are some businesses you preserve, which wouldn’t ever be sold, and that’s one. ’ Despite some analysts’ worries that airline success could not be sustained given the ‘cyclical’ nature of the business, Branson maintained a strong interest in the industry, and included airline businesses such as Virgin Express (European), Virgin Blue (Australia) and Virgin Nigeria in the group.Branson’s engagement with the search for ‘greener’ fuels and reducing global warming had not led him to ground his fleets. but rather to pr ompt a debate on measures to reduce carbon emissions from aeroplanes. At the beginning of the twenty-first century the most public problem faced by Branson was Virgin Trains, whose Cross Country and West Coast lines were ranked 23rd and 24th out of 25 train-operating franchises according to the Strategic Rail Authority’s Review in 2000. By 2002 Virgin Trains was reporting profits and paid its first premium to the British government. xperience with any one of the product lines may shun all the others’. However, Virgin argues that its brand research indicates that people who have had a bad experience will blame that particular Virgin company or product but will be willing to use other Virgin products or services, due to the very diversity of the brand. Such brand confidence helps explain why Virgin should even contemplate such risky and protracted turnaround challenges as its rail company. Sarah Sands recounts that Branson’s mother ‘once proudly boasted that her son would become Prime Minster’.Sands futher commented that she thought his mother underestimated his ambition. 10 With Virgin’s entry into fuel and media and Branson’s declarations that he is taking on the oil corporations and NewsCorp, Sands may ultimately prove to have been precient in her comment. Notes 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. Sunday Telegraph, 4 December (2005). Independent, 22 November (2006). Hawkins (2001a, b). PR Newswire Europe, 16 October (2006). Fortune, 6 February (2006). Independent on Sunday, 26 November (2006). Ibid.The Times 1998, quoted in Vignali (2001). Wells (2000). Independent on Sunday, 26 November (2006). Sources: The Economist, ‘Cross his heart’, 5 October (2002); ‘Virgin on the ridiculous’, 29 May (2003); ‘Virgin Rail: tilting too far’, 12 July (2001). P. McCosker, ‘Stretching the brand: a review of the Virgin Group’, European Case Clearing House, 2000. The Times, ‘Vi rgin push to open up US aviation market’, 5 June (2002); ‘Branson plans $1bn US expansion’, 30 April (2002). Observer, ‘Branson eyes 31bn float for Virgin Mobile’, 18 January (2004).Strategic Direction, ‘Virgin Flies High with Brand Extensions’, vol. 18, no. 10, (October 2002). R. Hawkins, ‘Executive of Virgin Group outlines corporate strategy’ Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News, July 29 (2001a). R. Hawkins, ‘Branson in new dash for cash’, Sunday Business, 29 July (2001b); South China Morning Post, ‘Virgin shapes kangaroo strategy aid liberalisation talks between Hong Kong and Australia will determine carrier’s game-plan’, 28 June (2002). C. Vignali, ‘Virgin Cola’, British Food Journal, vol. 103, no. 2 (2001), pp. 31–139. M. Wells, ‘Red Baron’, Forbes Magazine, vol. 166, no. 1, 7 March (2000). The future The beginning of the twenty-first century also saw furt her expansion by Virgin, from airlines, spa finance and mobile telecoms in Africa, into telecoms in Europe, and into the USA. The public flotation of individual businesses rather than the group as a whole has become an intrinsic part of the ‘juggling’ of finances that underpins Virgin’s expansion. Some commentators have identified a risk with Virgin’s approach: ‘The greatest threat [is] that . . Virgin brand . . . may become associated with failure. ’8 This point was emphasised by a commentator9 who noted that ‘a customer who has a bad enough Questions 1 What is the corporate rationale of Virgin as a group of companies? 2 Are there any relationships of a strategic nature between businesses within the Virgin portfolio? 3 How does the Virgin Group, as a corporate parent, add value to its businesses? 4 What were the main issues facing the Virgin Group at the end of the case and how should they be tackled?

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