Reagan's Struggle Against Communism

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President Ronald Wilson Reagan was the fortieth president of the United States from 1981-1989. During his two terms in the Office President Reagan became popular for his gratification and accomplishments of his inventive program known as the Reagan Revolution. This program intended to strengthen American people and reduce their dependence upon the government (). During his presidency, President Reagan focused on the goals of “achieving peace through strength” () such as increasing employment, economic growth, cutting taxes, etc. The Reagan Doctrine was the most important political strategy executed by the U.S. administration during the presidency of Ronald Reagan. This political strategy was conveyed by the Reagan’s administration in order …show more content…
His main objective was to limit and restrain the Soviet political power and limit communism from spreading across the world. Through his doctrine, he supported democratic who was working against communism and wanted to stop the Soviet Union from taking over the world. One of the ways that President Reagan found success in limiting communism is by supporting a group of people who were against communism initiated by the Soviet Union. The group of people was called “freedom fighters” (). Due to events taking place in multiple parts of the world such as Nicaragua and Afghanistan with their conflict against communism, Reagan’s administration stepped in to support those nations with their beliefs about communism (that was fed by the Soviet Union) should end before it continues spreading, which in turns led to Regan’s administration to create the doctrine. (“Feb 6, 1985: The “Reagan Doctrine” is announced”, n.d.). Not to mention that Washington was encouraging Afghanistan’s resistance to communism by agreeing to supply them with all needed materials to succeed with their battle against The Soviet Union taking over their country “Washington was willing to provide material assistance to Afghan resistance fighters facing Soviet occupation forces and to Nicaraguan contras seeking to oust the Sandinista government” (Carpenter, …show more content…
Although Reagan had good intentions with his doctrine and his ultimate goal was to promote and spread liberal democracy and defeat The Soviet Union and stop communism from spreading, President Reagan’s doctrine brought many negative effects to both the U.S. and multiple other countries such as Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, and parts of Latin America and Asia. For an instance, the disruption created by the Doctrine by supporting rebels in Afghanistan. The effects of this support brings distress and disturbance to the region until today’s date (“The Reagan Doctrine”, n.d.). Not to mention the doctrine’s support to Iraq in the Iran-Iraq war which worsen the relations between the U.S. and Iran and brought negativity not only to both countries but to the Middle East in general. By supporting Saddam Hussein politically and economically with his war against the Iranian and allowing the usage of chemical weapons on Iranian, this led Iran to develop a negative reaction towards the U.S. and its policies “The scandal seriously weakened the influence of the president” (“The Reagan Doctrine”, n.d.). On the other hand, President Reagan’s Doctrine brought positive effects as well such as freedom to Nicaragua from the Soviet Union. In addition to that the Geneva Summit meeting held in Switzerland on July, 1955 between four presidents of the largest