From Allies to Enemies: The Cold War Genesis

Cold War Overview During WWII the United States and the Soviet Union fought together against the Germans and the Axis powers, yet after WWII these two powerful countries became enemies and dragged the world into what became known as “The Cold War”. The relationship between the two countries reached a fevered pitch after WWII ended and almost resulted in a near nuclear war. How could two nations that had stood together through so much in the past end up on a path that could have destroyed the world?1 There were many causes for the start of the Cold War. Both the U.S. and the Soviet Union were considered vast powers both in terms of size and influence over the rest of the world. Other countries that engaged in WWII were smaller and were vastly weakened after the war. Because these countries were smaller, their national economies couldn’t withstand the drain on their budgets that the fighting in WWII cost them. Both the

This was also a leading cause of the Cold War. The Soviet Union followed communism. This meant that everything should be owned by the government and then divided up among the people equally. All the power under this ideology was with the ruler of the U.S.S.R., which was Stalin. The United States was the polar opposite. We were a capitalist country which meant that people could own as much land and start as many businesses as they wanted. Americans could start businesses whenever and wherever they wanted and could compete among themselves without fear of their government taking their earnings and reallocating them. We were also a democracy; U.S. citizens had a vote in who ran the country by electing its leaders, a freedom that was not conceivable in the Soviet Union at that time. This stark difference between the forms of government led to strains in foreign relations and generally bitter feelings between the people of the two most powerful nations on