Compare And Contrast Reagan And Bush

Both Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush served as presidents of the United States of America during the late 20th century, from 1981-89 and 1989-93 respectively. Their presidencies covered the ending of the Cold War and the transition from a bipolar to a unipolar world. The Cold War was a hegemonic struggle between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union/USSR (which later became Russia) and dominated world relations since the end of the Second World War. Primarily, the Cold War was marked by the ideological and economic expansion of US capitalism and Soviet communism, which underlined many proxy wars and self-determination struggles. Both presidents sought to promote the US’ best interests, but the execution of these was determined by

He thought that negotiating from a position of strength was vital in order to end the Cold War so that the US remained prosperous afterwards. Reagan’s aggressive approach to achieve this was due to his view of the Soviet Union as an “evil empire”, as known through his 1983 speech of the same name. This is quite different to George H. W. Bush’s perspective of the Soviet Union, although Bush still viewed the Soviet Union and Mikhail Gorbachev with “extraordinary caution” and “suspicion”. Both Presidents saw the USSR as a significant threat to US security and power and therefore were committed to containing Soviet expansionism. Despite this, the threat was significantly reduced when Bush came into power due to the efforts of Reagan and Gorbachev, which explains President Bush's comparatively less aggressive

It became evident that the position of strength was achieved through the commencement of negotiations to reduce arms. For example, in 1988, Reagan and Gorbachev implemented the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty) which banned all land-based missiles with ranges between 500-1000km from both nations. This was a significant step in the ending of the cold war as it reduced the nuclear arsenal which enabled a period of relative peace afterwards. This treaty highlights the clear shift in Reagan’s policies between his first and second term, as the SDI (although defensive) increased the military strength of the US but only a few years later Reagan implemented treaties aiming to reduce this