ABSTRACT
Alexis de Tocqueville, in his famous book Democracy in America, pointed out that democratic systems suffer from a structural deficiency in pursuing long-term continuity in foreign policy. It is the great advantage of the democratic systems, the innovative capacity that results from changes in party government that may cause the lack of foreign policy continuity. Similar arguments have been presented by other critics of the democratic system. During the period of the Cold War, public attitudes were characterized by a profound understanding of the Communist threat and public support for North Atlantic Treaty Organization and related defense efforts. First, the term Cold War is a pejorative one based on the idea that peace is a situation without conflict, a realistic definition of peace is that it is the absence of the use of military force to settle conflicts. In this sense, the period of the Cold War was a period of peace.
