Dbq Essay On The Cold War

Could you imagine living in a time of constant fear of nuclear war? For many people living today, this was once a daily reality. From 1945 to 1991, the two world superpowers, the United States and the USSR clashed in a series of ideological political battles that completely changed and defined the post-WWII world. This was known as the Cold War. After founding and developing Marxist ideologies over two world wars, the USSR naturally wanted to spread communism across the world. To combat this, the U.S. followed a policy called ‘containment’ that strived to ‘contain’ communism rather than fight it directly, much like combating a virus; There is no direct way to outright kill a virus, it has to be contained. The policy of containment was needed

The fatal noise of sirens ring out, while children in your class duck under desks for safety. This was one of the reasons the United States wanted containment in the world. During this time period of containment, the Cold War was going on with the U.S. and the Soviet Union (now Russia). This cold war was a name for the period of conflict between the Soviet Union and her communist allies and the United States and her democratic, capitalist allies. The Cold War lasted from 1945 to 1991 when the Soviet Union fell apart. But really, how did the United States and their allies contain communism. What exactly is containment? The definition of containment in this case is the US policy of not letting the Soviet Union expand its empire. The U.S. contained communism at The Berlin Air lift, The Korean War, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

During the Cold War, the Cuban Missile Crisis took place. It was when two superpowers were close to causing a nuclear war. Its main origin was when the United States invaded Cuba, on April 10, 1961; which is also known as the Bay of Pigs invasion. After the invasion, previous Prime Minister; Fidel Castro of Cuba, was ‘paranoid’ because he felt like America was planning another attack. So in order to protect his nation, he sought military and economic help from the Soviet Union. Late president Nikita Khrushchev (from USSR), agreed to assist Castro and took immediate action. He installed missiles in Cuba, which the US thought was a threat to the security of their nation. In summary, I think that this was a defensive move by the Cubans.

The Cold War lasted forty plus years and these conflicting ideologies threatened peace throughout the world, consequently the battle verses communism and democracy was at the root of the Cold War conflict. Social, political, and economic conditions of the world were influenced by the ongoing threats of the Cold War. In the Soviet Union, communist rulers firmly controlled all aspects of Soviet life and they dominated Eastern Europe through imperialism. The Soviet government held a tight grip on its citizens and used fear to control them, hence western influences were forbidden because the government thought it would poison and threaten their beliefs. The government and economy was often unstable and was frequently on the verge of collapse,

The Cold War refers to the hostile political relations between the Soviet bloc countries, and the US-led Western powers from 1945-1991, resulting from ideological and political differences (http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/cold-war). It is considered one of the most important events of the 20th century, and its effect can still be seen in contemporary world affairs. The Cold War was characterized by the omnipresent feeling of distrust, suspicion and fear. In the United States, this culture of fear was often called the Red Scare, or the era of McCarthyism. It was most prominent during the early fifties, but started to die down when Senator McCarthy was discredited and relations between the US and USSR thawed.

Around 1945, tensions began arising between the US and the USSR, which lead to the Cold War. During a 40 year time period, each nation tried to spread their political and economic systems. Both the US and the USSR wanted to spread their ideologies across the world. The origin of the Cold War was distrust; in “fighting” this war, the political and military tactics were the most effective.

“Communism has never come to power in a country that was disrupted by war or internal corruption, or both.” - John F. Kennedy, July 1963. All of the Cold War Presidents had some ways of dealing with Communism. Truman and also Eisenhower had their same ways of dealing Communism.However Eisenhower was using Military Response, but Kennedy used Flexible Response. Edward Ayers stated in their book, The American Anthem, the Cold War was an time period when the US and the Soviet Union were against each other because of when they had conflicts between each other, but mostly from the Berlin Crisis (819). A Belief that all property and resources are owned by a certain person (Ayers 594). Two of the most superpower nations were struggling with each other

he first chapter of The Cold War: A New History begins by comparing the United States to the U.S.S.R. and talking about the similarities between the two. It also talks about Communism and how Marx deemed it necessary in order to build up the economy. Lenin tried to implement Communism in Russia. They were not quite ready for that kind of system, so Stalin tried to modernize the economy. The U.S.S.R. had more casualties in World War II, but things were not necessarily looking great in America either. U.S. citizens were afraid that the Great Depression could return. Many Americans were tired of helping out other nations and just wanted the war to be over completely. John Lewis Gaddis, the author of The Cold War: A New History, is talking about the fact that just because the war was over, Americans were not necessarily at peace. There were many different economic and social factors that the United States had to deal with in the post World War II years.

Firstly, Cuba and the Soviets already had a very bad relationship with the United States. Research shows that, “Another key factor in the Soviet missile scheme was the hostile relationship between the United States and Cuba.” (“Cuban Missile Crisis”) The quote makes the statement in the second sentence true. The United States did not agree on how the government in Cuba was run and tried to overthrow it before but did not win.

Slide 1 Cold War Task 5 By: Cristina Prince Slide 2 The Soviet Union and the United States rose as superpowers, and the world progressed towards bipolar politics, a state in which two rather equally matched sides confronted one another. The United States strengthened much of Europe through the Marshall Plan, giving $12 billion dollars in aid to Western Europe after WWII. Resulting in implementing of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a defense agreement meant to organize opposition to the Soviet Union and China, both politically and militarily.

The Cold War is a very significant event, and perhaps one of the most important throughout US history. The Cold War shaped American in many aspects like, foreign policy, political ideology (ism’s), economy, the presidency, and lives of American’s. According to APA, (American Psychological Association) the Cold War was, “intense economic, political, military, and ideological rivalry between nations, short of military conflict; sustained hostile political policies and an atmosphere of strain between opposed countries.” The Cold War on foreign policy had to step up against the Soviet Union, the strategy they implemented was called “containment”. Containment was a policy used by the US using strategies to prevent the spread of communism overseas

According to Winston Churchill, “A communist is like a crocodile: when it opens it 's mouth you cannot tell whether it is trying to smile or preparing to eat you up.” Communism is an economic and social system that was designed by Karl Marx to ensure a classless society (Luthra, 1). In theory, all property and assets in a communist society are to be owned by the government, and then equally divided among the people so that no one is ever poverty stricken. Unfortunately, this is only in theory because a true communist society has never existed. These governments tend to have ruthless leaders that hold too much power and the citizens still suffer from poverty (Hoyt, 1).The threat that communism would expand to other countries by force and through

The accumulation of weapons and changes made to the defense system in Cuba was a source of concern and attracted the attention of the presidency and the top brass of the military in eliminating the threat presented by Cuba way before its eruption. In the course of the crisis, the President relied heavily on the intelligence system for the much-needed information to enable the making of informed decisions, all of which functioned to rescue the nation from the most serious crisis since the conclusion of the Second World

Some historians believe the Cold War was inevitable because of the hostilities from both America and the Soviet Union after World War II. America believed that the USSR was an expansionist country trying to spread an evil, communistic idea throughout the world. Although the countries never directly fought against each other, as they only fought in proxy wars, there was still extreme conflict. The United States responded to the Soviets actions in Germany, Europe, and their national actions. These responses were justifiable, or so many Americans at the time believed. Many realized that the Soviet Union was a terrible foe to face, as George Kennan, a respected American diplomat, noticed. He said in “The Sources of Soviet Conduct,” “This means

"The Cold War was an ideological contest between the western democracies especially the United States and the Communist countries that emerged after the Second World War" (Tindall 972). The United States and the Soviet Union had differences over issues such as human rights, individual liberties, economic freedom, and religious belief. "Mutal suspicion and a race to gain influence and control over the so called nonaligned or third world countries further polarized" (Tindall 945). After the WWII Soviets dominate European countries and thought the U.S. had the same motives.