Joseph Mccarthy Enemies From Within Analysis

For decades, the United States population had an overreaching fear of communism, and were afraid that it could take over America. Although hatred for communists began as early as the 1910’s and 1920’s, it was the most intense during the period of the Cold War, which lasted from 1949 to 1989 . It was considered a period of extreme dishonesty and disloyalty, as Americans who may have been innocent were accused of aiding the Soviet Union. The main leader of these manhunts for disloyal citizens was Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin. He was known to have instilled fear in the American people, by saying how communists were aiming to corrupt America, and their lives were at stake. He rose to fame on February 10, 1950 with his “Enemies from Within” …show more content…
His first inconsistency is the list of people he has who are supposedly associated with the communist party. In his speech, he states that he has 205 people on that list, while in his telegram the next day to Truman he lowers that number down to 57. The fact that his numbers change shows flaws in his logic. If he really had a list of all these people, the number wouldn’t suddenly drop nearly a quarter in size in a single, either it would remain the same or alter by a handful of people. The fact that he never showed anyone his list adds fuel to the fire, so it’s extremely likely that he didn’t have any name at all, and he was just trying to frighten the people. He repeats another inconsistency within his telegram, that he knows there were 300 people with communism in the government, however the “records are not available” to him. How is it possible for someone to know this without having a record? Unless he had inside sources to tell him this, which likely wasn’t the case, there is no possible way that he could have known the exact number of people who were associated and who were actually discharged. This is a major flaw in logic on his part, and by making accusations that the government is associated with communism, especially to the President, looks especially dishonest on his part. When Truman replied to McCarthy, he states that this is the first time he’s heard of a Senator trying to …show more content…
Despite the latter, people still took these beliefs and passed them on throughout the entirety of the Cold War. People still feared communism, and came to despise the nations that institutionalized it. This need for containing communism started some of the wars that the United States was involved in, such as the Korean and Vietnam Wars, and to some of the legislation passed in the period, such as the Taft-Harley Act. It wasn’t until the end of the Cold War that we start seeing the end of hatred towards communists, and when the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union disintegrated, we thought we would finally be at peace. Little did we know, that these sentiments of abhorrence would continue through to modern times. Instead of communists, however, it’s on terrorists, and anyone who appears terrorist-like can get arrested, just like how anyone could get arrested for being a communist. Although McCarthyism and hate towards communism may no longer be problematic to date, but it remains a significant influence and similar ideals still