The Geography of the Cold War: What was Containment?
Vihaan Mathur
What would our world be like if the Soviets and communism took over the world? It would be chaos. Thanks to the U.S effort on what was called “containment”, communism stayed in Russia for the most part. It started after World War II ended, when the U.S, and the Soviet Union were on opposite ends of what they believed society should be like. In the U.S, the government believed capitalism should be the universal government, while the Soviet Union beloved in communism. Communism, was a government where individuals didn’t own property or land, instead the community owned them, and everybody was equal. Germany was also split in half, and the Allied powers controlled West Germany
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The Soviet Union blockaded any supplies coming in to West Berlin, so it’s citizens were starved of resources as well as food. The U.S brought supplies and food to West Berlin via hundreds of planes, which was later called the Berlin Airlift. Document B details the Berlin Airlift, and the importance of it to the Cold War. It also shows where the Soviet Blockade was and the major airfields where the U.S planes landed in Berlin. Document B also stated that if the U.S hadn’t have helped Berlin, it would have had to surrender to the Soviet Union. The Berlin Airlift was an example of containment in the Cold War. One of the reasons the U.S engaged in the Berlin Aircraft, was because they didn't want communism spreading to West Berlin, and they didn't want the Soviet union to have control over all of Europe. The U.S also felt that gaining the support of the citizens of West Berlin would also assist in achieving containment in the Cold …show more content…
Cuba is located just south of the U.S, and Cuba was testing nuclear missiles in their country with the aid of the Soviet Union who were also sending warships and other military weapons to Cuba. According to Document D, U.S spy planes were flying over Cuba and they observed the test sites, and in turn enacted a quarantine against ships carrying ships to Cuba. The Soviet Union started operating missiles and then they agreed with the U.S to stop the conflict, and international ruin was avoided. This was the prime example of containment in the Cold War. Communism was only a couple hundred miles from the US, at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the U.S needed to push it back strategically. The U.S could’ve easily declared war on Cuba and the Soviet Union, but they only wanted to keep communism from spreading. This is an example of containment, because the U.S got the Soviet Union to take the nuclear weapons off of Cuba, which got rid of communism as
The United States and The Soviet Union were originally joined together by the want to defeat The Nazi army, in 1941-1945. The alliance remained, and strengthened, among the two until the end of World War II. At the end of World War II, a rupture between the two occurred. The differences began earlier, but there was a straw that broke the camels back. The reason The United States and The Soviet Union’s alliance did not work out is because The Soviet Union and The United States were complete opposites, The Soviet Union proved to be faulty, and they were never truly allies.
In January of 1959 , Communist dicator Fidel Castro took over Cuba. The United States in 1961 tried to overthrow Fidel by arming rebels and attempting to support them. This was the failure known as the Bay of Pigs. In October of 1962 , The US finds evidence that medium range nuclear sites had been installed in Cuba. They annonce that on the twenty-third that a quatntine was being Cuba and that any ship carrying offensive weapons to Cuba wasn’t allowed. Five days later , the crisis was averted when the Soviets began to remove the
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 time of the Cuban Naval Blockade the Unites States was at war with the Soviet Union, the war already preexisting for almost twenty years. The war already had United States and all its citizens at the edge of their seats. The rise of nuclear weapons was relevant and a high scare factor for everyone.
The Soviet Union and the United States were very distant during three decades of a nuclear arms race. Even though the two nations never directly had a battle, the Cuban Missile Crisis, amongst other things, was a result of the tension. The missile crisis began in October of 1962, when an American spy plane secretly photographed nuclear missile sites being built by the Soviet Union in Cuba. JFK did not want the Soviet Union and Cuba to know that he had discovered the missiles, so he made his decisions very secretly. Eventually, Kennedy decided to place a ring of ships around Cuba and place missiles in Turkey. Eventually, both leaders superpowers realized the possibility of a nuclear war and agreed to a deal in which the Soviets would remove the missiles from Cuba if the US didn't invade Cuba. Even though the Soviets removed took their missiles out of Cuba and the US eventually taking their missiles out of Turkey, they (the Soviets) continued to build a more advanced military; the missile crisis was over, but the arms race was not.
At the end of WWII, the United States, Great Britain, and France occupied the western zone of Germany while the Soviet Union occupied the east. In 1948, Britain, France, and the U.S. combined their territories to make one nation. Stalin then discovered a loophole. He closed all highway and rail routes into West Berlin. This meant no food or fuel could reach that part of the city. In an attempt to break the blockade, American and British officials started the Berlin airlift. For 327 days, planes carrying food and supplies into West Berlin took off and landed every few minutes. West Berlin might not have made it if it wasn’t for the airlift. By May 1949, the Soviet Union realized it was beaten and lifted the blockade. By using the policy of containment, the Americans and the British were able to defeat the Soviets.
...hed between the two countries to end the possibility of a nuclear war. America agreed to never invade Cuba and Russia agreed to remove all of the systems support and missiles from Cuba. The quarantine ended on November 20, 1962 after the Russians removed all of their missiles systems and support equipment and left the Cuban island. This dispute ultimately led to the Moscow-Washington Hotline, and American deactivated their weapons systems eleven months after the standoff.
Due to the Soviet Union's attempt to block out the western allies through road, railway, and canals, in an attempt to starve the allies in West Berlin; the Western Allies organized the Berlin airlift, which carried supplies to those blocked off in West Berlin. This lasted almost a year, with allies flying in planes daily bringing in new food and supply.
The Cuban Missile Crisis was a major event in U.S History that almost led to nuclear destruction. It was over a period of thirteen days in which diplomats from the U.S and the Soviet Union were trying to reach a peaceful resolution so that they wouldn’t have to engage in physical warfare. The crisis was the hallmark of the Cold War era which lasted from the 1950’s to the late 1980’s. The Cold War was a power struggle between the U.S and Soviet Union in which the two nations had a massive arms race to become the strongest military force. The U.S considered Communism to be an opposing political entity, and therefore branded them as enemies. Khrushchev’s antagonistic view of Americans also played a big role in the conflict. The Cold War tensions, coupled with a political shift in Cuba eventually lead to the military struggle known as the Cuban Missile Crisis. The Cuban Missile Crisis was the point of most tension and near collapse causing the Cold War to almost shift from a passive and underground struggle to a violent and catastrophic one.
One day, in the early 60s the US Government discovered that the Soviet Union had a nuclear missile on the island of Cuba. So, the US government asked the Soviets to get rid of them. It was a bold thing to do because anything could have happened. Things between the US and the Soviets were already tense because of the cold war. For fourteen days, tension grew between the nations. Not knowing if this missile aimed and ready to fire at the US. Kennedy decided to give this speech the “Cuban Missile Crisis Address”. The address was used was to announce there will be a naval blockade on Cuba until the crisis is solved. This address was very effective because Kennedy did not say he was going to start
In 1945, most of the countries around the world are devastated further to World War II which had stroke the globe for six years. Only the United States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republic, also called USSR, seem to be in a stable economic situation despite weighty losses. Both states are considered to be the great winners of the war and this is the beginning of a confrontation between two superpowers but also the confrontation between two distinct ideologies: communism and capitalism.
Cuban mistrust and nationalism, was resulting to secret agreements allowing the Soviet Union to build a missile base on the island. The U.S. found out those plans setting off a fourteen-day standoff. U.S. shi...
The extent to which the fact that the Western Allies did not respond with violence but with the airlift and its success was a main factor to its end will be assessed. The significance of the agreement made between the Soviets and the US in lifting not only the Berlin Blockade but also the Western counter blockade will also be evaluated. The reasons for the implementation of the blockade, the actions of the superpowers that do not contribute to the failure of the blockade, and the consequences of this crisis will not be investigated. The analysis will be done by researching different views on the blockade’s failure and the events leading up to it.... ...
Even though the United States had a major goal of containing communism during the Cold War, the actions of U.S. president John F. Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis differed greatly in practice from the principles of containment. By 1962 containment was not really working because the U.S. faced many problems with their foreign policy. Tensions ran high, especially with Cuba and the Soviet Union. Some issues were: the placement of U.S. missiles in Turkey, tension with communist Cuba, and discrepancies in the policy of containment (Beck). The U.S. had made an agreement with Turkey to place Jupiter missiles in Turkey, an allied country of the U.S. that shared a border with the Soviet Union.
The U.S. had just elected President Kennedy two years prior to this very threatening occasion, and every nation thought he was a weak leader who just craved attention. During this time, the Soviets and the U.S. were right in the middle of the Cold War (1947-1991): the period of time when both nations were trying to spread their type of government and become superior, making us enemies. Just a year before the Cuban Missile Crisis, the U.S. had made a failed attempt at invading Cuba at the Bay of Pigs to overthrow their communist dictator, Fidel Castro. Once Russia caught wind of this failed invasion, they quickly jumped at their chance at becoming allies with Castro, and started building nuclear bombs in Cuba. Kennedy had recently placed bombs in Turkey, Russia’s neighbor, probably leading the Soviets to place some of theirs in Cuba, because of how close it was to America.