During the Cold War, the US and Soviet Union were direct rivals between 1970-1980 by engaging in proxy conflicts supporting civil wars in the midst of the battle of Communism vs democracy. These conflicts were very important due to the fact that it allowed for these superpowers to compete for influence without having to directly fight each other. It was a great way to test different military strategies, and help develop technologies, to outshine each other and have everlasting effects on the countries involved. It was a demonstration of the ideological war between the US and Soviet Union, with both sides competing for global dominance, without the consequences of conflict against each other. Strong examples of the proxy wars that both the Soviet …show more content…
Overall the reasoning behind the opposition between the US and Soviet Union was ideological opposition, the more the US can prevent the spread of Communism the bigger of a superpower they can be. Major covert operations during the Cold War proxy events include the Bay of Pigs, which was a failed military landing using Cuban exiles who hated Castro to overthrow Cuba during times of communism, but ended up failing because the US pulled out at the last second, leaving the soldiers stranded (Szulc 1961). Another major operation was Operation Cyclone which was a covert CIA program to arm, fund, and train Afghan Mujahideen fighters to fight against the soviets. And helped the Soviet withdrawal (Crile 2003). Operation Mongoose was an operation that was launched by the CIA to assassinate Castro, and Sabotage operations in Cuba(Dallek 2011). The Bay of Pigs resulted in a US loss due to the fact that the US pulled support after sending them to south of Cuba, more than 1,100 men were captured, Fidel then held them for ransom in exchange for 53 million dollars worth of food and medicine(Szulc