- Published: September 27, 2022
- Updated: September 27, 2022
- University / College: The University of Adelaide
- Level: Masters
- Language: English
- Downloads: 11
Full Sino-Soviet Split (Cold War Era) 30 January (estimated word count = 307) The Sino-Soviet split during the critical period of the Cold War era happened from a difference in viewpoints between the leaderships of the two communist giants. Disagreements arose from their ideologies regarding the correct structural model to pursue under communist centralized planning of the economy, and another probable reason is their fight for supremacy to influence satellite states (Luthi 11). However, the new revisionist historians of the Cold War period claim that economic disagreements had also very deep ideological roots.
Along this line, it can be posited that had the split not occurred, the Cold War could have gone on for much longer, as the two big socialist countries could have presented a united front against their counterpart democratic, free-capitalist countries like the United States of America, Great Britain, France, and all the other countries belonging to the free world. Some historians assert the real cause of the split was the transfer of nuclear technology (Khoo 19) as Russia feared a nuclear-armed China, unsure what China will do with such a capability.
The ultimate importance, significance, and also benefit of the split was an earlier end to the proxy wars between the communist and democratic countries, made the world probably a safer place as it allowed the two sides to reduce their nuclear arsenals. The split could have contributed to the bankruptcy and eventual collapse of the Soviet Union while it also allowed China to pursue another ideological alternative when it concerns its economic policies, which is now capitalist and enabled China to become an economic superpower itself. China is now the worlds second-largest economy with the biggest foreign currency reserves. If the split did not happen, the world could be still in Cold War uncertainties. The split made for a warmer and improved relationship between China and America possible (Arnold & Wiener 363).
Works Cited
Arnold, James R. and Roberta Wiener. Cold War. Santa Barbara, CA, USA: ABC-CLIO, 2012. Print.
Khoo, Nicholas. Collateral Damage: Sino-Soviet Rivalry and the Termination of the Sino-Vietnamese Alliance. New York, NY, USA: Columbia University Press, 2011. Print.
Luthi, Lorenz M. The Sino-Soviet Split: Cold War in the Communist World. Princeton, NJ, USA: Princeton University Press, 2010. Print.