David Hudoba

American Achievement/Block 1
Mr. Costello
April 26, 2011

A. One similarity between the war on terror and the Cold War is that each had a global wake-up

call to let the U.S and the rest of the world that they had the power to hurt and interfere with the world.

The wake-up call for the Cold War was dubbed the “Year of Fear” in 1949, this was when the Soviet

Union tested their first atomic bomb and beginning the 1.“red scare” and when China fell to Mao.

Similarly, the war on terror was brought to the forefront of the world's attention with the 1972

2.Munich Olympics, the Iranian 3.Hostage Crisis, and the 4.Siege of Mecca in 1979. Another similarity

that both wars shared was 5.propaganda. During the Cold War the Soviets pointed out our flaws such as

the Civil Rights of African American's or played us off as the large colonizing super-power to the 6.3rd

world who were colonized at one time while we did the same to them with an example being the Berlin

Airlifts. We do the same thing today with 7.Al Queda, demonizing what they do and their goals.

Conversely they do the same thing to us infidels or the invading demons. They played the entire Arab

world against us in the Siege of Mecca making the Arab world believe we stage the entire thing. A third

similarity is iconic images to the two wars, the Berlin wall to the Cold War and the World Trade Center

and the Pentagon.

B. A major difference to the war on terror to the Cold War is that there is 8.“no there, there”. I

believe that makes it real dangerous because we have no definable target we can attack and strike a

decisive blow to their cause. Anything we do just ends up strengthening their cause and makes more

recruits join them. Another major difference to the war on terror to the Cold War is the increased

9.probability of attack but less of a chance of mass destruction. This causes more danger because their

isn't the sense of 10.M.A.D that their was during the Cold War. We may be able to kill many of their

soldiers but we have nothing to 11.deter them from attacking soft targets. Another major danger to this

is the unknown because there is a likelihood of them causing mass casualties because with the fall of
the Soviet Union there are tons of Nuclear ordnance out there that at the right price Al Queda can buy.

The third biggest and yet another dangerous aspect to the war on terror is the difference in warfare. In

the Cold War it was symmetrical warfare with specific people and specific targets. I the war on terror

there isn't a structure to their fighting which is termed 12.asymmetrical warfare. I think the best way to

describe this is your analogy of the monkeys and gorillas. Sure if two 1000 pound gorillas go at it one

will eventually win but 1000 one pound monkeys can be just as effective as the gorilla. So the terrorists

can hit us with as big of a punch as the Soviets could.

C. I'm not to sure if this is correct but I believe it was the idea of we can win it. Early in the

Cold War the US and USSR matched each other punch for punch so it seemed like we would be at a

teetering stalemate forever, there was no foreseeable end. While in this war now there is no foreseeable

end. We don't even have a definition for what the end of this war would be or look like. This is

dangerous because if you don't have an endgame than you don't know the quickest path to get there, so

we can spend time, money, and lives taking a path that would never end, which is dangerous to a

countries morale and support for a cause that is good.

D. Well the iceberg effect on both wars is that most people only know 10% of what the

countries doing in it and only knows 10% of the reason why its being fought to begin with. An example

of this is that many people don't know that part of the Cold War goes back to the deception and mistrust

between Truman and 13.Stalin. While in the war on terror, the main cause goes back to our

involvement in Saudi Arabia, and many people on the street wouldn't know that. The misconception

this addresses is that although all these wars may appear on the service to be driven by superficial

reason, while actually there truly is cause behind all of it.

E. With the 14.Truman Doctrine it aimed at containing Communism. When it says contain it

means that that we would help any country that asked for our help that was having trouble with

Communist power, and again by help we would send troops, supplies, and money into certain

15.hotspots where communism was flaring up. The 16.Bush Doctrine is similar to the Truman Doctrine
because it basically was if your country was having trouble with terrorism we would help you. Again

by sending troops, supplies, and money. Both could be summed up as 17.containment doctrines.

F. The war I believe is most challenging and dangerous is definitely the war on terror. Although

with the Cold War if we were to ever directly fight each other, it would be best summed up by being

Armageddon. But with the war on terror the terrorists have done a huge amount of damage both in

dollar figures and lives. There is no way we can do a 18.per-emptavie strike to deter them from

attacking us. In recent years they have even become more embolden to attack military targets directly

like the 19.USS Cole. Another dangerous aspect to the war on terror is that they don't even have to do

physical damage to hurt us, along with a physical war, they are also waging a 20.cyberwar. But behind

all of this, what I believe makes it really dangerous is that it is basically an unknown war, no end in

sight, no idea how to cripple them, no idea if they can get their hands on a nuclear device. There is just

to many unknowns to this war for me to consider the Cold War more dangerous.