Cold War Causes During World War II, the United States and Soviet Union stood by each other as allies fighting against Nazi Germany and other Axis powers. When World War II ended, political differences caused the Soviet Union and the United States to go in war. The Soviets believed in a political and economic theory called communism, where factories or farms or mines are owned by the public/ the state, and the wealth is divided among citizens equally or according to individual needs. Whereas the United States believed in capitalism, where everything is privately owned, instead of the government, and all profits go to the owner and/ or company. As time progressed, these conflicts began to grow, turning into the Cold War. The Cold War wasn’t …show more content…
differences began to show up due to their political and economic systems, communism and capitalism, they both went their separate ways. The Soviets turned to communism and the U.S turned to capitalism. Communist Russians wanted to end capitalism around the world and spread communism. Soon they began to clash on which was the most powerful political system. The Soviets wanted to expand and spread communism so that their ideas will spread to other countries. On the other hand, the United States didn’t like the ideas of communism being spread or Soviet borders to expand and gain power. To stop Russia from expanding their borders and spreading communism, the United States came up with “Containment”. Containment was the plan of the U.S. to make sure the Soviet Union and communism did not spread and expand. The Cold War lessons in containment have been demonstrated by the Truman Doctrine, the Marshall Plan, and the 8,000 word telegram written by George Kennan; when evaluating these lessons, it is clear that the American policy of containment was the best solution to stop the expansion of …show more content…
containment policy is found in the Truman Doctrine. “…in 1947, President Harry Truman declared that the United States would support ‘free peoples,’ like those in Greece and Turkey, who were being threatened by communists.” This quote from the background essay suggests that the United States was very urged to stop the spread of communism that they would even go out of their way to protect other countries from the communists. The U.S. even helped to protect South Korea from the communist invasions of North Korea (Document C). Based on this document, it appears that the US has strong intentions of getting rid of communism that they were against so much. However, on the contrary, Document C also states that the Chinese pushed the United States back into South Korea from North Korea after they went to try and put an end to the big communist threat
The alliance formed between the US and USSR during the second world war was not strong enough to overcome the decades of uneasiness which existed between the two ideologically polar opposite countries. With their German enemy defeated, the two emerging nuclear superpowers no longer had any common ground on which to base a political, economical, or any other type of relationship. Tensions ran high as the USSR sought to expand Soviet influence throughout Europe while the US and other Western European nations made their opposition to such actions well known. The Eastern countries already under Soviet rule yearned for their independence, while the Western countries were willing to go to great lengths to limit Soviet expansion. "Containment of 'world revolution' became the watchword of American foreign policy throughout the 1950s a...
A war does not necessarily require physical weapons to fight. From 1947 to 1991, military tension and ideological conflicts held place. Cold War is defined as a state of political hostility existing between countries, characterized by threats, violent propaganda, subversive activities, and other measures short of open warfare, in particular. The causes of the Cold War between United States and the Soviet Union were the mutual distrust that had taken place in World War II, intense rivalry between the two super powers, and conflicting ideologies. The two superpowers differed in views of political and economic principles and were eager to spread their ideologies to other countries. The United States were in favor of democracy and capitalism while the Soviet Union sought for the chances of influencing communism. Cold War did not involve the use of physical arms but was intensely fought. Propaganda, economic aids, Arms Race, and the creation of alliances were the main methods to fight the war. The use of propaganda played a crucial role in containment by criticizing the other power and raised the morale and spirit of their nation. The economic support for nations helped them recover from the desperate situation after World War II, which prevented the nations from falling under communism. Also, the Arms Race and forming alliances between the two main powers were important weapons for competition and rivalry in Cold War.
The Cold War was a post-World War II struggle between the United States. and its allies and the group of nations led by the Soviet Union. Direct military conflict did not occur between the two superpowers, but intense economic and diplomatic struggles erupted in the country. Different interests led to mutual suspicion and hostility in a rising philosophy. The United States played a major role in the ending of the Cold War.
containment. By breaking down containment in this manner, historians and researchers alike can look at containment like never before. Instead of containment all being viewed as the same, Gaddis differentiates among many of the different presidents to prove the different types of containment and how each president believed their type of containment would be successful in handling the spread of communism. By beginning with Kennan, the original believer in containment and ending with Kissinger, who used a hybrid of many of the different approaches, the reader can fully understand the progress, both positive and negative. The book is an essential read for those who want to perform research on cold war policy in the United States, as well as political decisions on many of the Presidents throughout the cold war, as the book is full of sources, both primary and secondary.
After World War II, the last remaining Superpowers became the two most powerful countries in the world. These two nations being the United States and Soviet Union. But because of each country's strong and different views on things like economics and government, a Cold War was started. This war was a battle fought of ideas, not a physical clash. One of the main differences in ideas was communism. The Soviet Union were communist which basically meant the government was in charge of/controlled everything and everyone was paid relatively the same. The United States, on the other hand, were capitalists, which means the people of the US control the production of goods, what they did as work, etc. The Soviet Union had control over Eastern Europe and
The Cold War was a conflict between the Communist nations led by the Soviet Union
The Cold War was an argument between the Soviet Union and the United States of America after WWII. During WWII the USA and the Soviet Union were allies fighting a common cause: Adolph Hitler who was attempting to overthrow the surrounding countries. Although the USA and the Soviet Union were allies, the relationship between the two countries was very tense (What Was). Neither country trusted the other. After WWII their relationship became even more tense due to the building of new weapons capable of destroying entire countries.
The term containment was initially introduced by George F. Kennan, a diplomat and State Department advisor on Soviet affairs. The policy of containment was introduced by the Truman Administration. It describes the foreign policy pursued by the USA after WWII to contain the spread of communism. In retrospect, this policy was in an attempt to contain the spread of Soviet expansion in the West.
Dwight D. Eisenhower once said, "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signified, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold but not clothed." There was never a war that this idea can be more correct applied to than the Cold War. According to noted author and Cold War historian Walter Lippman, the Cold War can be defined as a state of tension between states, which behave with great distrust and hostility towards each other, but do not resort to violence. The Cold War encompasses a period from the end of the Second World War (WWII), in 1945, to the fall of the Soviet Union, in 1989. It also encompassed the Korean and Vietnam Wars and other armed conflicts in the Middle East and Africa, that, essentially, were not wars for people but instead for territories and ideologies. "Nevertheless, like its predecessors, the Cold War has been a worldwide power contest in which one expanding power has threatened to make itself predominant, and in which other powers have banded together in a defensive coalition to frustrate it---as was the case before 1815, as was the case in 1914-1918 as was the case from 1939-1945" (Halle 9). From this power contest, the Cold War erupted.
During the Truman and Eisenhower administration a policy of containment served to save the free world from communism. But at times these two administrations put world peace on the line to prove its superiority as a nation. One cannot judge these events to being wrong or right because values of a nation and people change with time, we can just learn from these events and know that the next time United States has a contest of superiority it could cost us the world.
Containment , what an extremely mixed and diverse topic. Containment is the action of keeping something harmful under control or within limits. It was a describing policy of The United States to stop the spreading of communism, which they absolutely hated and some even feared it. Communism is a political theory from Karl Marx that advocates class war and leads to a society. In which all property is publicly owned and each person works and is paid according to their abilities and needs. The most popular time that the United States used containment was between the times of 1947 and 1989. Let’s now look at some benefits and disadvantages of containment, along with some examples of it we saw in the Cold War.
The Cold War was a rivalry between the Soviet Union and the United States from 1945-1990, even though it was originated after the end of WWII. Both countries were allies and fought together against Germany during the WWII, but after the war, Stalin blamed US and Britain for delaying the entrance of the US in the WW2 with the purpose to weaken the Soviet Union. Another factor was that after Stalin did not keep his promise to hold free election in Poland, the US President Truman decided to cancel Lend-Lease payments to put pressure on Stalin to keep his word, and as a result denied the most wanted post-war aid to Soviet Union (Cornell, Keene, & O’Donnell, 2013).
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
With a new war on the horizon America began to disregard some of its values as well as adopt new ones. Following the end of World War II an iron curtain fell across Europe, on one side the capitalist nation of America and on the other the communist nation of Soviet Russia. As a result of the Ideological differences between these two superpowers, America embraced a new value which would drive foreign policy for decades on; containment. The value of containment which, according to George Kennan, can be described as “long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of [Soviet] expansive tendencies." was first introduced to American foreign policy through the Truman Doctrine in 1947. Containment was the value which drove U.S. foreign policy post-WWII as seen by the division of Berlin, Bay of Pigs, and Vietnam.
Opalisime After World War II there was a strong anti-communist movement in America for decades prior to the 1950s. Nuclear weapons also sent a shot at distrust and fear between America and Russia. Information about nuclear weapons is very limited to the public. There are some facts, details, and reasons on why this war happened, the effects of the Cold War, and how society reacted to the War. It began in the 1945-1948 timeframe and ended in 1989, having been a dispute over the division of Europe.