Syllabus
The course will focus on the following topics:
1. The rise of détente
2. The Prague spring and the Soviet invasion of 1968 in international context
3. The Sino-Soviet split
4. The U.S. triangular diplomacy (Kissinger & Nixon in Moscow and Beijing)
5. The Vietnam War and its end
6. Latin America and the Cold War (Che Guevara and guerilla warfare, The United States and Allende's Chile, The Reagan Doctrine in Central America)
7. The Helsinki summit, the CSCE and the human rights issue
8. The fall of détente and the "Second Cold War" (the missile deployment crisis, Afghanistan, SDI, KAL 007, Able Archer)
9. The Polish Crisis of 1980-1981
10. The Reagan - Gorbachev summits
11. 1989: annus mirabilis in U.S. and Soviet diplomatic reports
12. The end of the U.S.S.R., 1989-1991
Annotation
This course is drawn up as one-semester seminar, concluded by an exam. Its major content comprises detailed analysis of strategic and diplomatic documents related to the key stages of the bipolar struggle between the United States and the Soviet Union (and their respective Allies) in the years 1963-1991.
It thus focuses on the later stages of the Cold War, starting from the years of détente, through the "second Cold War" up to the Gorbachev period, the fall of the Iron Curtain and the break-up of the Soviet Union.