ABSTRACT
At the end of the 1970s diplomacy gave way to renewed confrontation and a revival of the cold war. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, coupled with the Iran hostage crisis and US economic woes, facilitated the landslide election of Ronald Reagan in 1980. Branding the USSR an “evil empire,” Reagan escalated the cold war, expanded the nuclear arms race, and vigorously opposed communism from Central America to southern Africa.
