Jimmy Carter In The Cold War

Throughout the roughly 50 years of the Cold War, United States Presidents attempted to exert their power and authority over American foreign policy with vastly different results. Presidents during the war faced an increasingly disaffected general American population. Securing their support was a cornerstone in determining the effectiveness of any President’s foreign Policy. The Cold War challenged the security of the US as a unified hegemon, forcing Presidents into making tough decisions on behalf of the American People. As the world grew ever more interconnected, defining and defending US global interests against Communism became less black and white. In my own personal view Jimmy Carter was the least effective Cold War President, while Ronald

Reagan, his successor, was the most effective. In analyzing their foreign policy decisions, Carter’s attempts to defend and establish peace resulted in instability and greater violence, when Reagans promotion of a renewed Cold War plan encouraging defense spending and use of force ultimately established peace between the Soviets and US.

Regan is the most effective President and Carter is the least effective because both men took on the same issues, but Carter’s decisions were ineffective and lost him support, while Reagan’s decisions ended conflicts and the Cold War. There is not one set of unique characteristics that define a good or bad President in the foreign policy arena, but rather the success of US Presidents’ foreign policy is dependent on how each President chooses to use their authority.

President Jimmy Carter assumed the role as Commander-in-Chief with very little experience in foreign policy, hence why the few diplomatic achievements and foreign affairs he orchestrated were overlooked due to being too regionalized and or utterly ineffective. Carter was a sensational humanitarian, with the emphasis of his foreign policy on human rights, but it was also his kryptonite to being an effective leader. His policy efforts to achieve peace took decades to see results, and moreover ironically produced greater global instability and never established peace. Carter’s international campaign to bring awareness towards human rights and the negative impacts of communism on the people lives failed because “By the time Carter became

president, the military balance had shifted toward the USSR.” Carter made the mistake of denouncing all nations who either supported communism or were led by dictators not adhering to his human rights policies. While Carter’s decision was righteous it was also foolhardy. The United States relied on several of those states as allies to fight with the weaker US in larger Cold War battles. A prominent mistake of Carters human rights foreign policy was in Nicaragua. Carter’s decision to encourage a revolution within the Nicaragua, as “even on the doorstep of the United States, forces friendly to Cuba in the Soviet Union seized power.” Anastasio Somoza, was an ally of the United States, but he was “a major obstacle to the policies of moderation in central America, and the White House dropped its military assistance program and prohibited new economic aid projects in an attempt to force him from power” In turn, Carter’s human rights aimed revolution backfired, taken over by the Sandinistas, a Nicaraguan militant communist group. United States and Nicaraguan relations were destroyed, and communist territory in the Americas had increased, and Carter had helped communism get a hold in Nicaragua. Furthermore, Carter’s ineffectiveness is expressed when he “permits Panama to gain control over the canal” , which relinquished control of the resource specifically built to aid US strength. Also, Carter failed on all fronts to “obtain the freedom of the hostages, through negotiations or a bizarre rescue attempt” being held inside the US Embassy in Tehran. Carter’s safe harboring of the Shah of Iran correlates to his incompetency, contradicting his actions in Nicaragua by protecting the Shah of Iran before the lives of innocent American hostages. Simultaneously in 1979 when Soviet forces entered Afghanistan, Carter proved he was useless, as first not entering the United States into the conflict to prevent the spread of Communism and was imparting the weakened view of the US hegemony. Then with the Carter Doctrine, Carter attempted to impose several diplomatic and economic sanctions against the Soviet Union, but it was too little and too late, and did more to hurt hardworking Americans than Soviets.
Ronald Reagan was the most effective Cold War President because he was optimistic and built support for his leadership by showing a willingness to pursue his primary foreign policy objective, to reestablish US Cold War defenses and combat the spread of Communism on all fronts, with all necessary force at at all costs.

His extreme effectiveness feeds from decision-making ability that turned the country away from the negative and instable foreign policy of Carter and back to support winning the Cold War and promoting the strength of the US. In the 1970s, because Carter allowed Communism to gain military and territorial advantages, and failed to impose American hegemon and his own power as President. Reagan took office in 1981, “he was determined to rebuild that power, regain for the United States the capability to wage war successfully against the Soviets, to act with impunity against Soviet Third World clients, and to regain its status as the world’s dominant military force.” Reagan handled the Iran hostage Crisis within the hour of assuming the Presidency. Simultaneously, doing what was necessary to free Americans, and to use his power as President to go outside the constitution and congress and secure funding for the Contras to overthrown the Sandinistas in Nicaragua and restore the nation to a pro-American government. Unlike Carter Reagan wanted to make it clear he only cared about protecting American security, and that human rights could be an after

thought.