Perhaps the best example of direct use of Westad’s methods, however, can be seen in the work of one of his former students, Jeffrey Byrne,* a historian at the University of British Columbia. Byrne is studying the history of the so-called “Third Worldist” movement* using archival research from numerous countries, including Algeria, France, the United States and the former Yugoslavia.7
NOTES
1. Gilbert M. Joseph and Daniela Spenser, In from the Cold: Latin America’s New Encounter with the Third World (Durham: Duke University Press, 2008), 30–40.
2. Tanya Harmer, Allende’s Chile and the Inter-American Cold War (Chapel Hill: North Carolina University Press, 2011).
3. Christian Emery, “The Transatlantic and Cold War Dynamics of Iran Sanctions, 1979–80,” Cold War History 10, no. 3 (2010): 371–96.
4. Christopher R. W. Dietrich, “‘Arab Oil Belongs to the Arabs’: Raw Material, Sovereignty, Cold War Boundaries, and the Nationalization of the Iraq Oil Company, 1967–1973,” Diplomacy & Statecraft 22, no. 3 (2011): 450–79
5. Christopher J. Lee, “The Indian Ocean During the Cold War: Thinking through a Critical Geography,” History Compass 11, no. 7 (2013): 524–30.
6. Bryan R. Gibson, Sold Out? US Foreign Policy, Iraq, the Kurds, and the Cold War (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2015).
7. Jeffrey Byrne, “Subversive Globalism: Revolutionary Algeria in the Third World’s Vanguard, 1954–1973,” University of British Columbia Profile. http://www.history.ubc.ca/people/jeffrey-james-byrne
Module 11
Impact and Influence Today
Key Points
The Global Cold War remains a seminal book on non-European Cold War* studies.
Westad’s multidisciplinary, multi-archival methodology has been copied widely.
Westad’s narrow focus on ideology is perhaps the only valid weakness of the book.
Position
Odd Arne Westad’s The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times remains a seminal book in the fields of Cold War and Third World* studies. At the time of writing this, the book has been cited in more than 725 academic works, and continues to garner glowing reviews.1
Westad’s multi-archival research methodology has become the standard in the field of international history since the book’s publication in 2005. In fact, the book has become so influential that college history departments are not only encouraging students to adopt multi-archival, internationalist approaches to their studies, but are adding the word, “international,” to their names: Departments of History are becoming Departments of International History.
Westad’s argument that Cold War interventions* by superpowers* destabilized much of the Third World continues to gain clout as instability has yet to wane nearly 25 years after the end of the war. His work is especially helpful to scholars researching the post-Cold War interventions by the United States in Afghanistan* and Iraq.*
“In the most original part of Westad’s book, the author uses primary sources from recently opened archives in the former communist world to describe the Soviet Union’s own Third World interventions, which accelerated especially in the 1970s.”
Jerald Combs, H-Diplo Roundtable Review
The war in Afghanistan, for example, cannot be understood without an appreciation of Westad’s account of previous Soviet interventions, and the relationship between the US Central Intelligence Agency and Mujahideen* guerrilla fighters. Similarly, Westad’s accounts of Cold War interventions elsewhere in the Third World—including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Iran, Libya, North Korea and Syria—help readers view current instability through the prism of the Cold War, and not as historical oddities.
Interaction
The influence of The Global Cold War on scholars the world over has transformed the book into something more than a book: it has propelled an entire school of thought, the “New” Cold War History, into the mainstream.2 At the same time Westad used The Global Cold War to challenge both the post-revisionist* fixation on diplomacy* and the Eurocentric* focus of Cold War studies, he also encouraged other academics to build on the school of thought he and others began in the 1990s.3 Today “New” Cold War History continues to evolve, and recent scholarship holds promise.
The collection of essays co-edited by Gilbert Joseph* and Daniela Spenser,* In from the Cold: Latin America’s New Encounter with the Cold War, compensates for Westad’s limited expertise in Latin American history.4 Historian Paul Chamberlin’s* study of the Palestine Liberation Organization* evokes parallels with Westad’s argument that the Cold War laid the foundation for today’s conflict.5 Scholars like Daniel Berger* and his colleagues at New York University have taken a wider look at the role of US interventions, namely whether American measures have undermined the chances of respective Third World states becoming democratic.6
Like Westad, all these scholars argue that interventions by the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War have had a disruptive effect on the potential for post-Cold War stability.
Supporters of the “New” Cold War History school of thought are divided, however, over the role of ideology in the decisions by superpowers to intervene in the Third World. Some, like John Lewis Gaddis,* David Painter,* and Natalia Yegorova* argue that Westad’s argument is reductive,* or fails to take into consideration political, strategic and economic factors. Painter argues, for example, that a key factor in the interventions of superpowers was competition for strategic resources, such as oil.7 Others, like Westad, are adamant that ideology was central to Cold War decision-making.
The Continuing Debate
Even post-revisionist* Cold War scholars, like Gaddis—who don’t believe ideology propelled the Cold War—acknowledge the contribution Westad’s book has made in the advancement of the historiography* of the Cold War.8 Research continues, and some post-revisionists have even collaborated with Westad.
While editing The Cambridge History of the Cold War, Westad and co-editor Melvin Leffler* commissioned an article from Gaddis, who for the first time incorporated the Third World into his analysis of US and Soviet “grand strategies.”9 Like Westad, Gaddis went on to argue that the superpowers had much in common. Unlike Westad, however, Gaddis argued that their common bond was the competition between grand strategies, not ideologies.
Although Westad still faces resistance to the idea that ideology was the driving force behind Cold War interventions, the inclusion of the Third World in post-revisionist talk of grand strategy suggests his research has successfully reconfigured the debate over the origins of the conflict.
NOTES
1. See Jeremy Black, “Review of The Global Cold War,” The Journal of Military History 70, no. 4 (2006): 1191–2; James Buchan, “The Cold War and The Global Cold War,” The Guardian, January 28, 2006; Ian Roxborough, “Review of The Global Cold War: Third World interventions and the Making of Our Times,” American History Review 112, no. 3 (2007): 806–8; and Jean-François Morel, “WESTAD, Odd Arne, The Global Cold War. Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2005, 484,” Études internationales 38, no. 1 (2007): 127–9.
2. See Harmer, Allende’s Chile; Christopher J. Lee, “The Indian Ocean,” 524–30; Christian Emery, “The Transatlantic and Cold War Dynamics of Iran Sanctions, 1979–80,” Cold War History 10, no. 3 (2010): 371–96; Christopher R.W. Dietrich, “‘Arab Oil Belongs to the Arabs’: Raw Material, Sovereignty, Cold War Boundaries, and the Nationalisation of the Iraq Oil Company, 1967-1973,” Diplomacy & Statecraft 22, no. 3 (2011): 450–79; Bryan R. Gibson, Sold Out?; and Jeffrey Byrne, Mecca of Revolution: From the Algerian Front of the Third World’s Cold War (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014).
3. See Piero Gleijeses, Shattered Hope: The Guatemalan Revolution and the United States, 1944–1954 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992); and Greg A. Brazinsky, “Koreanizing Modernization: South Korean Intellectuals and American Modernization Theories,” in Staging Gro
wth: Modernization, Development and the Cold War, edited by Michael Latham et al. (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 2003): 251–74.
4. Joseph and Spenser, In from the Cold, 30–40.
5. Paul Thomas Chamberlain, The Global Offensive: The United States, the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the Making of the Post-Cold War Order (New York: Oxford University Press, 2012).
6. Daniel Berger et al, “Superpower Interventions,” 22–34.
7. David S. Painter, “Oil, resources, and the Cold War, 1945–62,” in The Cambridge History of the Cold War, Volume I: Origins, edited by Melvyn P. Leffler & Odd Arne Westad (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010): 486–507.
8. John Lewis Gaddis, “Grand Strategies of the Cold War,” in Melvin Leffler and Odd Arne Westad eds., The Cambridge History of the Cold War: Volume II: Crises and Détente (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010): 1–21.
9. John Lewis Gaddis, “Grand Strategies of the Cold War,” in Melvin Leffler and Odd Arne Westad eds., The Cambridge History of the Cold War: Volume II: Crises and Détente (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010): 1–21.
Module 12
Where Next?
Key Points
The Global Cold War will continue to influence the fields of politics, international history, and international relations.
The book’s enduring influence is as a model that can be applied to almost any historical research.
The Global Cold War is a seminal book because it reoriented the focus of an entire field of study on the Third World,* underscored the importance of ideology in superpowers’ decision making,* and tested a valuable research methodology.
Potential
Odd Arne Westad’s The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times showed the Cold War* is still important to international affairs today.1 The book is relevant to scholars in three ways:
First, Westad demonstrates how assumptions and pre-existing accepted beliefs can be challenged by using a multidisciplinary approach that examines complex issues from a number of different points of view. In his case this is by closely researching formerly closed archives in China, Eastern Europe and Russia. Westad’s methodology opened new avenues for original historical research.
Second, Westad changed the nature of the way we study and understand Cold War history. He does this by showing how twenty-first century interventionism* undermines the post-revisionist* claim that US strategy resulted in a post-Cold War democratic peace.
Lastly, Westad reveals that the consequences of many Cold War interventions across the Third World are still being felt today, more than 20 years after the end of the tensions.
“Remarkably for a work of this breadth, Westad has combined the use of a wide array of secondary works with significant research in recently available primary documents. He has written clearly and vividly in a way that is accessible to the wider public yet sufficiently detailed, documented, and balanced to be convincing to a professional audience. While he does not offer any startlingly new information, his book will inspire some rethinking by many Cold War historians regardless of their politics.”
Jerald Combs, H-Diplo Roundtable Review
Future Directions
Westad’s footnotes alone serve as a scholars’ guide to archives the world over. This is important because, while The Global Cold War is very detailed, it is by no means exhaustive. There is a need for further study of the Cold War beyond Europe, particularly in the contests and forgotten conflicts of the Third World.
Among the scholars who have adopted Westad’s multidisciplinary, multi-archival approach to Cold War studies are his former doctoral students: Arne Hoffman,* Tanya Harmer,* Jeffrey Byrne,* Sergey Radchenko,* Artemy Kalinovsky,* and nearly two dozen others. Other young scholars—notably Christian Emery,* Christopher Dietrich,* and Bryan R. Gibson*—have embraced Westad’s methodologies and ideas, and, over time, are bound to pass on to their own students what they’ve learned from Westad’s important work.
Westad has been integral to the intellectual movement that culminated in The Global Cold War. Although the book is grounded in diverse influences, ideology looms large in Westad’s analysis. This does not detract, however, from the book’s most important argument: the Cold War was an international conflict.
Summary
Odd Arne Westad’s The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times is a key book within the “New” Cold War History school of thought, which has revised former commonly-held ideas about the war. Prior to the book’s publication the dominant idea had been that the Cold War was a geostrategic* struggle between the United States and Soviet Union* focused primarily on Europe. In 2005, however, Westad challenged that idea. The Global Cold War argued that the most significant arena of the conflict had not been Europe, but the Third World.
Almost everything about The Global Cold War challenged convention. The book broke even more new ground by introducing a multidisciplinary, multi-archival approach to historical research. Westad scoured previously unavailable documents that linked Cold War era interventions to post-Cold War interventions. His research showed that the Cold War superpowers were driven mainly by ideology: the United States and the Soviet Union tried to impose their visions of modernity on the newly independent states that arose from decolonization.*
Westad’s argument—that the Cold War was, in fact, an international battle for Third World influence—established him as one of the world’s leading scholars of Cold War history. His work has had an enormous impact on his discipline by firmly establishing the “New” Cold War History school of thought, as well as demonstrating the potential for future international research.
The Global Cold War is an important and provocative book that will continue to inspire those who want to build on Westad’s research, and to challenge those who seek new lines of argument to prove that the Cold War was, in fact, a strategic battle over Europe.
NOTES
1. Odd Arne Westad, The Global Cold War: Third World Interventions and the Making of Our Times (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), 2.
Glossary of Terms
Afghanistan The Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, in South-central Asia experienced a Soviet-led Civil War from 1979 to 1989 and a US-led invasion from 2001 to 2015.
Afghanistan War (2001–15) refers to the military intervention by the United States and, from 2003, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and allied forces following the September 11 attacks in the United States.
Al-Qaeda a militant Islamic fundamentalist group that was behind the terrorist attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001.
Angola a coastal country in Southern Africa, founded by the Portuguese, which gained its independence in 1975 after a lengthy civil war.
Angolan Civil War (1961–74) a multifactional, Cold War struggle for control of Angola, at that time a province of Portugal.
Anti-colonialism a political science and international relations concept used to explain any form of opposition to imperialism and colonialism.
Arab Spring the name given to the series of protests and wars that broke out across the Arab world at the end of 2010.
Arab-Israeli wars (1948–) a series of military conflicts (in 1948, 1956, 1967, and 1973) between Israel and the Arab states of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria.
Azerbaijan crisis (1945–46) began following British forces’ agreed withdrawal from Iran after World War II, while Soviet forces remained. The United States demanded that the Soviets withdraw too and they eventually complied in December 1946. Also known as the Iran-Azerbaijan Crisis.
Bandung Conference (1955) a meeting of predominantly newly independent Asian and African states that took place in Bandung, Indonesia.
Capitalism economic system based on private ownership, private enterprise and the maximization of profit.
Chinese Civil War (1927–50) a civil war fought between the Kumantang (Chinese nationalists) and the Chinese Communis
t Party. In 1950 the communists, led by Mao Zedong, defeated the Kumantang, who fled to Taiwan.
Cold War (1947–91) a period of tension between the United States and the Soviet Union, which sidestepped direct military conflict in favor of espionage and proxy wars.
Collective security the cooperation of several or more countries in an alliance to strengthen the security of each.
Colonialism the creation or acquisition and exploitation of a colony in one territory by people from a different territory. It results in a set of unequal relationships between the colonial power and the colony, and often between the colonists and the native population.
Comintern a Soviet organization founded in 1919 (and dissolved in 1943) to support socialist movements in overthrowing governments of the capitalist world.
Communism a political and economic doctrine that rejects private ownership, and advocates that all property should be vested in the community for the benefit of all.
Containment the action or policy intended to prevent the expansion of a hostile country or influence.
Cuba a Caribbean island state, 180 kilometers south west of Florida, which has been controlled by a single socialist party since 1961.
Decolonization refers to the period between 1946 and 1975, when European imperial powers granted independence to their colonies.
Democracy a system of government by the whole population or all the eligible members of a state, typically through elected representatives.
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