Fearing the Worst: How Korea Transformed the Cold War
![Fearing the Worst: How Korea Transformed the Cold War](/sites/default/files/styles/book/public/media/images/book/9780231192743.jpg)
![Fearing the Worst: How Korea Transformed the Cold War](/sites/default/files/styles/book/public/media/images/book/9780231192743.jpg)
Übersicht
After World War II, the escalating tensions of the Cold War shaped the international system. Fearing the Worst explains how the Korean War fundamentally changed postwar competition between the United States and the Soviet Union into a militarized confrontation that would last decades.
Samuel F. Wells Jr. examines how military and political events interacted to escalate the conflict. Decisions made by the Truman administration in the first six months of the Korean War drove both superpowers to intensify their defense buildup. American leaders feared the worst-case scenario—that Stalin was prepared to start World War III—and raced to build up strategic arms, resulting in a struggle they did not seek out or intend. Their decisions stemmed from incomplete interpretations of Soviet and Chinese goals, especially the belief that China was a Kremlin puppet. Yet Stalin, Mao, and Kim Il-sung all had their own agendas, about which the United States lacked reliable intelligence. Drawing on newly available documents and memoirs—including previously restricted archives in Russia, China, and North Korea—Wells analyzes the key decision points that changed the course of the war. He also provides vivid profiles of the central actors as well as important but lesser known figures. Bringing together studies of military policy and diplomacy with the roles of technology, intelligence, and domestic politics in each of the principal nations, Fearing the Worst offers a new account of the Korean War and its lasting legacy
About the Author
![Samuel Wells](/sites/default/files/styles/square/public/media/images/person/02192019-10.jpg)
Samuel Wells
Former Deputy and Associate Director, Woodrow Wilson Center; Former Director, West European Studies Program, Woodrow Wilson Center
History and Public Policy Program
The History and Public Policy Program makes public the primary source record of 20th and 21st century international history from repositories around the world, facilitates scholarship based on those records, and uses these materials to provide context for classroom, public, and policy debates on global affairs. Read more