Buzz Aldrin Quotes
Us reaching the moon convinced Gorbachev and other leaders that the Soviet Union couldn't compete with the U.S., so they revised their agenda. But people have short memories.
Murray, Noel. "Buzz Aldrin." The A.V. Club, 24 June 2009.
At the time, the Red Scare was prevalent and many Americans were terrified of communists. It was a very effective political tactic to imply that an opponent was a communist or communist sympathizer. For another harsh smear of Stevenson, see {619523}.
In 1992 Russia was in terrible economic shape after the fall of the Soviet Union. Keeping up with the United States military expenditures had bankrupted the Russians. The United States which had strategically increased its defense spending to break the Russian economy if they tried to keep up. However, the U. S. expenditures had forced America into a deficit spending period which produced a national deficit greater than all the previous cumulative deficits in our history. So the American economy was not in great shape either. Meanwhile, Japan, whose constitution (imposed by America after WWII) forbade having a military and funding a military. The result was the Japanese economy was growing at a much more rapid rate, and did not have the unbalanced budget of the United States and Russia. Hence, Tsongas’ observation.
Russia then had designs on Afghani Territory. About a century later, Russia Invaded Afghanistan and tried to impose a communist government. It failed and the Afghans drove out the Russians.
Nixon, when he took office, berated the CIA Director in front of the entire National Security Staff for underestimating Soviet Military capability. His intense pressure caused the CIA to go through a period where they constantly overestimated Russian capability and intentions. They found that most politicians preferred a serious threat rather than be accused of spending so much of the government’s budget—roughly half—for Defense.
Buzz Aldrin is an American former astronaut, engineer and fighter pilot. Aldrin made three spacewalks as pilot of the 1966 Gemini 12 mission, and as the lunar module pilot on the 1969 Apollo 11 mission, he and mission commander Neil Armstrong were the first two people to land on the Moon.
