Alliances in International Relations - 2
Just a Brief Introduction Knowledge For Those Who Want To Learn About Alliances
There is no such thing as cultural alliances or economic alliances in International Relations. Alliances should be militarily and they should be official. We need the document to prove alliances in a signed way.
After the Cold War, we saw that there were two important alliance groups: NATO and Warsaw Pact. First, in 1949, NATO was founded. In 1955, Warsaw Pact was. Both alliances’ founding motivations were the same.
In Cold War Era, NATO was using the famous strategy of the US: Containment Policy. The purpose of the strategy is that start with the East to incorporate countries that have borders with the USSR and to leave the USSR alone. The main goal of starting with the East of NATO is that at that time, the North of Russia was the sea of ice (Ships could not sea in the North of Russia at that time.). Moreover, even though people do not talk about it much, Soviet Union’s land forces were double that of NATO's. Because two big power (the USA and the USSR) in the world had nuclear weapons, because of that those powers could not invade each other’s lands.
However, when we start to talk about differences between NATO and Warsaw Pact, the biggest difference is that Warsaw Pact did not exist anymore but NATO continues to exist. After the 1970’s Soviets’ economy was getting worse, Soviets could not adapt their economic policies according to the requirements of the day. On the other hand, the most significant thing in motivation to ally with NATO countries was liberalism can / which could adapt economic policies according to the requirements of that day. Also thanks to the values of liberalism, there was an atmosphere of democracy in NATO, whereas this was not the case in the Warsaw Pact. It is fact that the leader of the USSR could put defense ministers in charge of other Warsaw Pact countries.
After the collapse of the Soviets, NATO changed its mission in the international areas also, after the collapse of the bipolar world order, there became a new sphere for the US to influence itself.