Топики по Английскому
Методическое пособие - Разное
Другие методички по предмету Разное
War and Peace.
The greatest problems that have faced men throughout his history have been the problems of war and peace.
In the XIX century and before war was quite common. It did not touch the majority of nations and was fought by professional and semi-professional armies. War was not total war. It was fought within limited territories.
However, the XX century brought about a profound change in the character of war and its consequences. The most important event in this was, perhaps, the First World War, which lasted from 1914 till 1918, The World War I was perceived to be just the war to teach the Russians a lesson. But that war became total war with the most horrendous loss of life, the World War I destroyed the creation of the generation. The number of talented people who were killed during that war was uncountable.
The Second World War is known in this country as the Great Patriotic War. WWII showed how war could affect total nations. That war was waged by Hitler against (Hitler waged that war against) complete populations. All of us know of the famous Siege of Leningrad, which people held out against horrendous conditions and total bombing for many, many months. There was also that terrible Blitzkrieg in which Stalingrad, Moscow, Leningrad and hundreds of other cities and towns were continuously bombed. WWII was total war against populations and it made Governments and people very (unwilling) reluctant to embark on war. Therefore, we have to struggle for peace and how to keep the peace.
After the WWI there were five great Powers in the world: the Soviet Union, Great Britain, France, the USA and Germany. It was (Sell???)(decided) that to keep the peace in the world, it was necessary to set up a World Organization.
Therefore the League of Nations was set up. However, its life was not very long. It existed from 1919 to 1939. And the advent of the WWII marked its death knell because what it had been set up for, to avoid another bloody WW, it failed to do. After the WWII there was no longer great powers, there were only two superpowers: the SU and the USA.
And what happened next was the most terrible act for the civilization of the Earth; it was the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the Americans, which ushered in the nuclear age with the possibility of the destruction of the whole planet at the use of “the press of a button”. It caused a great split between the two superpowers. Besides the two superpowers had ideologies, which were completely opposed to each other and that, meant that there could be no dialogue, no compromise between the USS and the USA, though the people of the world were eager to avoid war at all costs.
However, peace did not mean it was for all the nations, as the world knows Stalin and his killing of fifty million of the Russian people waging a war against his own population. Thus, in peacetime we have the problem of Tyrants and dictators who have control over almost all the people. The two greatest tyrants of history were Hitler and Stalin.
One more problems for us now are to avoid nuclear war. Still we have many trouble spots in the Middle East, Iran, Iraq, Yugoslavia, and Chechnya. The Soviet Union had problems in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and also Afghanistan and for the US there were problems in South America (in such countries as Nicaragua, Salvatore, Mexico, Brazil, etc).
Now the two superpowers are talking more freely. The reasons for that are, perhaps, the facts that they have both been hurt by their interference in other countries and bloody wars, which affected their prestige. Vietnam was a complete disaster for the American policy and Afghanistan proved to be the same disaster for the Soviet Union.