To what extent did the USA win the Cold War through economics?
As tensions continued to build the US and their newly elected President, Ronald Reagan, sought out a way to end this war and end the threat of communism. The US had recognized that in sheer numbers the USSR had them beat in almost every statistic. This made them think, "Where do we have the upper hand?" This problem was answered, like most other problems in the US, with money. The concept of Reaganomics was put into play. This was the idea of investing money into research and development of their armed forces. Not only did this new technology advance the US above all other countries, but also created a much stronger economy in the states. The USSR felt it had to stay on the same level if not better then the US in this technology. To do this they had to spend large amounts of money, which in turn, did nothing to help the economy because of the communist government. To try and make money, leader of the USSR, Gorbachev tried to generate money by taxing vodka and this more then anything else made the population mad. Annually the deficit grew as the taxing wasn't making enough money and the eventual collapse of the USSR came.
As tensions continued to build the US and their newly elected President, Ronald Reagan, sought out a way to end this war and end the threat of communism. The US had recognized that in sheer numbers the USSR had them beat in almost every statistic. This made them think, "Where do we have the upper hand?" This problem was answered, like most other problems in the US, with money. The concept of Reaganomics was put into play. This was the idea of investing money into research and development of their armed forces. Not only did this new technology advance the US above all other countries, but also created a much stronger economy in the states. The USSR felt it had to stay on the same level if not better then the US in this technology. To do this they had to spend large amounts of money, which in turn, did nothing to help the economy because of the communist government. To try and make money, leader of the USSR, Gorbachev tried to generate money by taxing vodka and this more then anything else made the population mad. Annually the deficit grew as the taxing wasn't making enough money and the eventual collapse of the USSR came.