Was the Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars) instumental in ending the Cold War?

Question

Under Ronald Reagan's presidency

Answer 1

Seeing how it was more of dream than a reality I would say no. It was the Russian dream of prosperity, some visionary actions by Gorbachev and the will of the eastern European peoples, not anything Reagan did that helped end the cold war.

Answer 2

To some degree. Many of the systems planned under this program never saw the light of day because they were too expensive, ineffective or impractical. However, some great technology spun off from Star Wars into systems that caused the downfall of the Soviet Union.

Both side engaged in "maskarova", deception designed to hide capabilities or to give the impression of capabilities one doesn't have. Anything to make the other guy spend money in the wrong area.

Therefore, the USSR got a rude shock when they saw the performance of the US military in Desert Storm. They saw cruise missiles guiding over thousands of miles to a single target. They saw Stealth fighters invisible to radar, silent to the ear. And laser guided bombs that hit the exact window targeted. They saw things they couldn't match or stop.

They also figured that all of their defenses were now obsolete. There was no way they could spend enough money to upgrade their defenses enough to deter the new US juggernaut. The Soviet Union was essentially defenseless. Something they couldn't handle. That was a direct result of Reagan's Star Wars.

Answer 3

YES, it is likely the greatest cause of the fall of the USSR. Once the US made very public that the SDI program was being developed, it served its purpose. The Soviets came to the conclusion that SDI was possible, but had no idea how far along the US was in making it a reality. Several start ups happened in the USSR to create a like system, and it was determined they could not be done. Once this became accepted, the Soviet leadership realized that their nuclear threat was no longer the big bargaining chip that it had been.
The fact that the US never deployed an SDI system did not matter, the Soviets were already spent into ruin and the rest is history.

Answer 4

Star Wars was never implemented for two main reasons. First, it was considered way too expensive. Second, the opinions of how effective it would be were in debate. So since the program was never put into place, and the Cold War ended anyway(under George Bush Sr.'s presidency), I would say no.

Answer 5

Not directly as it really did not produce anything useful. But it was part of the huge build up in defense spending of the early and mid 80's. There are some who say that we won the cold war in part by spending the soviet block into submission. There is probably something to that, but its not the whole story.

Answer 6

No, and you know why? It wasted a ton of money and never worked.