Detente

1968- Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: powers with nuclear weapons agreed not to give any other countries nuclear technology.
1971- The US table tennis team played in China.
1971- The US dropped its veto and allowed China to join the United Nations.
1972- The US President Nixon visited China.
1972- Russia and America signed the SALT1 Treaty(Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) agreeing to limit their anti-ballistic missiles and bombers.
1975- The Helsinki Agreement recognised Soviet control over Eastern Europe, concluded a trade agreement, and Russia promised to respect human rights.
1975- Russian and American spacecraft docked in space.

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Detente- Causes

America was shocked by the Vietnam War and wanted to stay out of world affairs. There was also a vociferous CND movement in the West.
The arms race was very expensive for both superpowers.
The price of oil rocketed in the 1970s, and both superpowers experienced economic problems.

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The Non-Proliferation Treaty did not stop other countries developing nuclear weapons (eg China, and perhaps South Africa and Israel).
Neither Russia or America kept to the SALT1 agreement. Neither side reduced their conventional weapons. Further talks were much less successful and a SALT2 Treaty in 1979 added little.
In the Arab-Israeli War of 1973, America supported Israel, and Russia supported Egypt and Syria.
The Helsinki Agreement achieved nothing - it confirmed the Iron Curtain and Russia ignored its promises about human rights.
Table tennis and space meetings were just one-off propaganda stunts.
Brezhnev said that Communists would still try to destroy capitalism. Some historians suggest that Nixon only went to China to drive a wedge between Russia and China

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