Douglas J. Macdonald

Cold War scholars who study the war’s origins fall into three general categories: traditionalists, who believe that Soviet expansion precipitated the Cold War; revisionists, who claim that U.S. hostility toward communism led to the Cold War; and post-revisionists, who argue that mutual misperceptions led to shared responsibility for the Cold War. Over the years, many Cold War scholars have dismissed the traditionalist argument. However, in the following viewpoint, Douglas J. Macdonald, professor of political science at Colgate University in Hamilton, New York, argues that post–Cold War evidence supports the traditional view that the Soviet Union’s foreign policy led to Cold War hostilities. Macdonald cites evidence that the Soviet Union dictated policy in Communist-bloc nations across Europe and Asia to refute claims that...