Introduction

Steven Casey

Jonathan Wright

pp. 1-5

in: Steven Casey, Jonathan Wright (eds), Mental maps in the era of détente and the end of the Cold War 1968–91, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2015

Abstract

The final two decades of the Cold War were marked by profound, and ultimately dramatic, change. The simple bipolarity of the late 1940s had long since been superseded by a complex configuration of power, especially as the process of decolonization created new states which either tried to remain neutral or exerted significant influence over their superpower allies. But from the late 1960s, the underlying tectonic plates of international relations underwent an even greater transformation. The two superpowers were both struggling: the United States smarting from the economic and political disruption caused by its failing war in Vietnam; the Soviet Union suffering from poor grain harvests, which were a harbinger of the more general economic problems to come. Meanwhile, the alliance blocs they had created during the first phase of the Cold War began to fray. The Americans faced an economically resurgent West Germany, ready to develop a more independent foreign policy. The Soviets clamped down hard on a Czechoslovakian bid for greater independence in 1968; a year later, they fought a major border clash with their erstwhile Chinese ally, turning the long-brewing Sino—Soviet split into something more ominous.