Assess the extent to which the cold war involved the nationas of the middle east and africa - Essay Example

This is because of the suspicious relationship that developed between these two nations at the time, whereby nations split into two with some supporting the US, and the others remained in support the USSR. Thus, even within these nations, leaders acted in a divided manner with some supporting the ideologies of the USSR communism, while other countries supported the capitalistic view of the US, and this propagated the social and political division of nations.4 Cold war involvement in Africa Because of its endowment with resources, Africa was a battleground for Cold War for quite a long period that led to many wars, which both sides of the conflict, namely the United States and the Soviet Union blamed on each other.

The harassment that was conducted by the Americans and the UK on Mugabe and Al-Bashir of Sudan was heaped on China and Russia with the aim of making the west to appear friendly and clean to Africa.5This has proved to be the new stage being set for fresh crop of Cold War in the African soil, as at the time USSR and US were engaged in Cold War, Africa was still involved in it, as some of the African states were surrogates of the two. Africa is a rich provider of the world’s major raw material for the production of goods for the industries in the west because a country is only able to engage in war if it has enough economic power and political influence for the purpose of protecting its interests.

6 Therefore, surrogate African States provide support to one of the side in the cold war for their own interests and for their leaders selfish interest; such support normally involved the use of their state resources, which involved workforce in form of soldiers when they are required. As a result of the Cold War, Zimbabwe being a surrogate to one of the main two countries involved in Cold War, their leader Robert Mugabe murdered and violently overthrew the opposition to the side that supported the Britons, Americans and the western powers.

7Moreover, because of the Cold War, nationalists and African leaders were frequently overthrown when they did not support the nations in such warfare. For instance, famous leaders like Kwame Nkrumah, Patrice Lumumba or Eduardo Mondlane among others were victims of claims that they were supporters of the Chinese or Russians and the East policies. In these cases, other African leaders have more often than not found themselves behind bars without the hope of ever being freed.8 In addition, the involvement of Africa in the Cold War has greatly affected the continent in terms of its human, society and economy; these impacts are still very fresh with the slow growth of the African continent attributed to the Cold War.

Furthermore, African resources that involved agricultural outputs and minerals were