Examine the Reasons Why Nuclear Tensions Between the USA and the USSR fell during the period from 1962-1969. Barnaby West – AM-330 The nuclear tensions faced by both the United States and the Soviet Union throughout the 1960s were unprecedented and would continue to shape policy for decades after. To understand why tensions decreased during the 1960s we must first understand why they were so high to begin with. The era of the 1950s witnessed the peak of nuclear weapons testing from both sides, as the arms race developed so did the size of the bombs as well as the destructive effects to both the environment and amity between the two superpowers. The biggest ever recorded detonation was Russia’s test of the Tsar Bomba in 1961 recorded at 57 megatons, 3,200 times more powerful than that of the Atom bomb dropped on Hiroshima by the U.S. 223 This demonstrates the unbridled advancement of nuclear technology within only 15 years. Knowing that each side were in possession of devices of destruction undoubtedly escalated heightened tensions. Also in 1961, the Berlin crisis threatened to escalate tensions to unprecedented levels as the Soviet Union cut off West Berlin to the Rest of world. Washington responded with brinksmanship politics and threatened the use of nuclear weapons if West Berlin should be occupied. A similar heightening of tensions would be repeated during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 leaving both sides on the brink of a nuclear war which threatened to extinguish all life on earth. It is with this backdrop that this essay examines how tensions fell from 1962. Firstly, the shockwaves of the Cuban crisis will be analysed with focus on how both countries looked to abandon brinksmanship and focus on limiting the prominence of nuclear weapons in global politics. Secondly the effect of China joining the nuclear club in 1964 would give both the U.S. and the USSR a common objective of limiting the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Finally, the essay will look at how further events
223 Gerard DeGroot, The Bomb, A life, RUSI Journal, Vol. 149, Issue. 3, June 2004.
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