Ronald Reagan was especially good at this technique of
brinkmanship - taking us to the edge of war, and pulling back to make favorable peace
deals. He sent medium range Pershing nuclear missiles into Europe to face off against
the Warsaw Pact, and built a whole new class of MX nuclear ICBM, then used the
threatening buildup of power to successfully negotiate the START treaties - the world's
first actually reducing the number of atomic weapons held by each
side.
He did not hesitate to demonstrate America's
willingness to use force in countries like Libya and Grenada, but almost always did so
on his own terms, against countries that could offer little resistance. He ordered a
massive, trillion dollar military buildup from 1980 - 1988, and during that time we were
not in any major war.
Some say his military spending
bankrupted the Soviet Union and helped to "win" the Cold War - I think that's a kind of
a stretch.
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