COLD WAR

Introduction

After WW2 Two superpowers emerge—the United States and the Soviet Union.

They are divided by national interests, ideologies, and mutual misperceptions. These divisions
are projected into different geographic areas.

The term “Cold War” had an American origin and was used for the first time by Bernard Baruch
who observed thus on 16 April 1947.

The term was picked up by Walter Lippmann who through his book on the Cold War popularised
it. After that, the term Cold War was used to describe the relations between the Soviet Union and
the Western Powers after the World War 11.

Broadly cold war is the ideological war between communism (USSR) and capitalism (US).

■ A series of crises occurs—Berlin blockade (1948–49), Korean War (1950–53), Cuban missile
crisis (1962), Vietnam War (1965–73), Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan (1979–89).

■ A long peace between superpower rivals is sustained by mutual deterrence.

We can characterize the Cold War itself (1945–89) as 45 years of overall high-level tension and
competition between the superpowers but with no direct military conflict.

Origin

There is a difference of views regarding the origin of Cold War. One view is that its beginning
can be traced back to the time of the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 when the Communists openly
declared their intention to control and dominate the world. Still another view is that the Cold
War actually crystallized only in 1947 when the Soviet Union and the Western Powers
intensified and formalized the differences in the interpretation of the provisions of the Yalta and
Potsdam Agreements.

Ideological incompatibilities/Domino effect

The United States and the Soviet Union also had major ideological differences. The
United States’ democratic
liberalism was based on a social system that accepted the
worth and value of the individual; a political
system that depended on the participation of individuals in the electoral process;
and an economic system, capitalism that provided
opportunities to individuals to pursue what was economically
rational with
minimal government interference. At the international level, this translated into support
for other democratic
regimes and support of liberal capitalist
institutions and processes,
including, most critically, free
trade.

Soviet communist ideology also influenced that country’s conception of the international
system and state practices. Marxism insisted that peasants and workers would spontaneously
rise up and overthrow their capitalist
masters, but this had not happened. The crisis in
Marxist theory was partly resolved by Vladimir Lenin’s “vanguard of the proletariat”
amendment, in which Lenin argued that the masses must be led or “sparked” by
intellectuals who fully understand socialism. But the end result was a system in
which any hope of achieving communism—a
utopian vision in which the state withered
away along with poverty, war, sexism, and the like—had
to be led from the top
down.

 The Soviet Union believed in communism – a system where the government controls and
owns the nations natural and capital resources.

As communist ideology expanded after World War II, western governments feared a domino
effect as countries succumbed to communism. The Truman Doctrine called for action to contain
the communist threat, by economic or military action, if necessary. The domino theory was a
Cold War policy that suggested a communist government in one nation would quickly lead to
communist takeovers in neighboring states, each falling like a perfectly aligned row of dominos.
In Southeast Asia, the U.S. government used the now-discredited domino theory to justify its
involvement in the Vietnam War and its support for a non-communist dictator in South
Vietnam.

Conflict of interests/ after ww2

After WW2 Two superpowers emerge—the United States and the Soviet Union.

They are divided by national interests, ideologies, and mutual misperceptions. These divisions
are projected into different geographic areas. The conflicts of interest between the new world
powers gradually multiplied, and a climate of fear and suspicion reigned. Each country feared the
newfound power of the other. The Soviets felt surrounded and threatened by the West and
accused the United States of spearheading ‘imperialist expansion’. For their part, the Americans
were concerned at Communist expansion and accused Stalin of breaching the Yalta Agreement
on the right of free peoples to self-determination.

Stalin Foreign Policy/USSR influence in Europe/Poland, Finland, Romania

Stalin goal based national and ideological level was that he want to create a USSR that was
strong enough to counter the West and US. His motivation was to spread communism
across the world. Stalin wanted continued co-operation, but on his own terms, and ultimately
he chose the Sovietisation of Eastern Europe over continued alliance. He was not willing to
compromise on governments that might be unfriendly to Russia, which meant that they had to be
picked by Stalin himself. And gradually he strengthen USSR influence in Europe such as
Poland, Finland and Romania. By 1949, all the governments of Eastern Europe, except
Yugoslavia, were hard line Stalinist regimes.
In 1946, in a speech at Fulton in the USA, Churchill declared that an Iron Curtainhad come
down across Europe, and that Soviet power was growing and had to be stopped. Stalin called
Churchill's speech a "declaration of war". In 1947, Stalin set up Comintern - an alliance of
Communist countries designed to make sure they obeyed Soviet rule.

Misperceptions

These
“bottom up,” “top down” differences were
exacerbated by mutual misperceptions.
Once distrustful, each side tended to view the other side’s policies as necessarily
threatening. For example, the formation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(or NATO) became a contentious worldwide issue. On the Western side, NATO
represented a desperate effort to defend indefensible Western Europe
from the fully
mobilized Soviet Army; while from the Soviet perspective, NATO seemed clearly an
aggressive military alliance aimed at depriving the USSR of the fruits of its victory
over the Third Reich. When the USSR reacted in ways it took to be defensive, Britain
and the United States interpreted these
actions as dangerous escalations.

Stages of Cold war

Truman doctrine

The Truman Doctrine was an American foreign policy whose stated purpose was to counter
Soviet geopolitical expansion during the Cold War. It was first announced to Congress by
President Harry S. Truman on March 12, 1947,[1]:547–9 and further developed on July 12, 1948,
when he pledged to contain threats to Greece and Turkey. Truman asked Congress for $400
million in military and economic aid for Greece and Turkey in March 1947. Direct American
military force was usually not involved, but Congress appropriated financial aid to support the
economies and militaries of Greece and Turkey. More generally, the Truman Doctrine implied
American support for other nations allegedly threatened by Soviet communism. The Truman
Doctrine became the foundation of American foreign policy, and led, in 1949, to the formation
of NATO, a military alliance that is still in effect. Historians often use Truman's speech to date
the start of the Cold War.

Truman Doctrine, appeared to work: the Communists were defeated in the Greek Civil War in
October 1949, and the foreign aid helped strengthen the Turkish economy.

Containment as policy—essentially,
the use of espionage,
economic pressure, and forward-deployed
military resources—emerged
from a comparative
asymmetry of forces in Europe.

Marshal Plan

The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, ERP) was an American
initiative to aid Western Europe, in which the United States gave over $13 billion[1] (nearly
$110 billion in 2016 US dollars)[2] in economic assistance to help rebuild Western European
economies after the end of World War II.

It also underlined American determination to fight against Communism. The situation in France
and Italy was a source of great anxiety to the United States. The Communist parties of France
and Italy were gaining in strength. It was felt that in order to put a check on Communist
influence, the United States must come to their help.

The Soviet Union and the Communist and non-Communist countries of Eastern Europe were
invited to accept the Marshall Plan but the offer was rejected. It was contended that under the
cover of the Plan, the United States aimed at creating an economic empire by taking advantage
of the conditions in Europe.
Berlin Blockade

Berlin, Germany’s capital, was similarly divided but lay within Soviet-controlled East Germany.
In 1948, the Soviet Union blocked land access to Berlin, prompting the United States and Britain
to airlift supplies for 13 months. In 1949, the separate states of West and East Germany were
declared. In 1961, East Germany erected the Berlin Wall around the West Germanportion of the
city to stem the tide of East Germans trying to leave the troubled state.

Not surprisingly, the dismantling of that same wall in November 1989 became the most iconic
symbol of the end of the Cold War.

Korean War

After having spent years seeking support from the USSR to unify the Korean peninsula under
communist rule, North Korean leader Kim Il-Sung finally persuaded Joseph Stalin to lend him
the tanks, heavy artillery, and combat support aircraft needed to conquer non-communist South
Korea.

On June 25, 1950, communist North Korean forces crossed the frontier into South Korea and
rapidly overwhelmed the South’s defenders.

In one of the most dramatic military reversals in history, U.S. forces—fighting for the first time
under the auspices of the United Nations because of North Korea’s “unprovoked aggression” and
violations of international law—landed a surprise force at Inchon.

By mid-October, UN forces had captured North Korea’s capital, Pyongyang, and by the end of
the month, the destruction of North Korea’s military was nearly complete.

The relatively poorly equipped but more numerous and highly motivated Chinese soldiers
attacked the UN forces, causing the longest retreat of U.S. armed forces in American history.

But, as with the Berlin crisis, numerous diplomatic skirmishes followed the armistice over the
years—provoked by the basing of U.S. troops in South Korea, the use of the demilitarized zone
between the north and the south, and North Korean attempts to become a nuclear power; even
after the end of the Cold War, the last is still a source of conflict today.

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War was a long, costly and divisive conflict that pitted the communist government
of North Vietnam against South Vietnam and its principal ally, the United States. which began
in 1954, though ongoing conflict in the region had stretched back several decades.The conflict
was intensified by the ongoing Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Opposition to the war in the United States bitterly divided Americans, even after President
Richard Nixon ordered the withdrawal of U.S. forces in 1973. Communist forces ended the war
by seizing control of South Vietnam in 1975, and the country was unified as the Socialist
Republic of Vietnam the following year.

Cuban Missile crisis

The 1962 Cuban missile crisis was a high-profile direct confrontation between the superpowers
in another area of the world. The United States viewed the Soviet Union’s installation of nuclear
missiles in Cuba as a direct threat to its territory: no weapons of a powerful enemy had ever been
located so close to U.S. shores.

The United States chose to blockade Cuba—another example of containment strategy in action—
to prevent the arrival of additional Soviet missiles.

Through behind- the- scenes, unofficial contacts in Washington and direct communication
between Kennedy and Soviet premier Nikita Khruschev, the Soviets agreed to remove the
missiles from Cuba and the United States agreed to remove similarly capable missiles from
Turkey. The crisis was defused, and war was averted.

PTBT (Partial nuclear test ban treaty)

After the Berlin crisis and the Cuban crisis, the stage was set for a thaw in the Cold War. It was
realised by both sides that any nuclear war between them would lead to mutual destruction. That
realisation pointed to the necessity of peaceful coexistence.

The result was the signing of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty on 5 August 1963 between the Soviet
Union, the United States and Britain. It provided for a limited ban on nuclear tests in the
atmosphere including outer space or under water. A Hot Line Agreement was signed between the
Super Powers.

NPT

The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty was signed in 1968 between the Soviet Union and the
United States. On 25 May 1972, two agreements were signed in Moscow by President Nixon and
Communist Party Chief Brezhnev. Those agreements were the Treaty on Limitation of Anti-
Ballistic Missile System and the Interim Agreement on certain measures with respect to the
Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms.

SALT 1 & 2

Amidst the Cold War, a series of treaties was issued under the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty
to curtail the build up of nuclear weapons. SALT I, as it is commonly known, was the first of the
Strategic Arms Limitation talks between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S.

n November of 1969, President Richard Nixon and Soviet Union General Secretary Leonid
Brezhnev opened up the official strategic arms limitations talks (SALT). Talks lasted for over
two years. During this time, the United States and the Soviet Union hammered out the first of
two major agreements. On May 26, 1972, Nixon and Brezhnev signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile
Treaty and the Interim Agreement and Protocol on Limitation of Strategic Defense
Weapons (SALT I).
This treaty was ratified by the U.S. Senate on August 3, 1972. As a part of the treaties, the U.S.
and the Soviet Union agreed to:

 limit the number of interceptors (a type of strategic missile defense) to 200

 limit missile defense to just two sites (to defend the capital and a single ICBM field)

SALT I acted as a preliminary agreement. However, there were still a number of issues the U.S.
and Soviet Union did not agree upon

In late 1972, negotiations began for SALT II and continued for seven years. Finally on June 18,
1979, in Vienna, Brezhnev and President Jimmy Carter signed the SALT II treaty. Since the two
countries had developed different strategies, with the U.S.S.R. focusing on larger warheads and
the U.S. concentrating on missiles with a greater accuracy, specifications of the previous treaties
had to be changed. SALT II set more specific regulations on the different missiles. Limits were
set on the number of strategic launchers, and the various types of missiles. Each side was limited
to no more then 2400 weapons systems. SALT II was sent to the Senate to be ratified, but due to
tensions between the two countries, Carter pushed the treaty aside. In the years following, some
of the standards set in SALT II were voluntarily being observed by the two sides, but the treaty
was never ratified. Later negotiations took place in Geneva that were known as the Strategic
Arms Reduction Talks, or START.

Afghan War
The Soviet–Afghan War lasted over nine years, from December 1979 to February 1989.

The Soviet Afghanistan War was fought between Afghanistan rebels called the Mujahideen and
the Soviet supported Afghanistan government. The United States supported the Afghanistan
rebels in order to try and overthrow the communist government and to prevent the spread of
communism.

Soviet failure to quell the Afghan mujahideen insurgency

 Geneva Accord (1988)

 Withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan

 Continuation of the Afghan Civil Warwithout Soviet troops

At this point during Cold War, the Soviet Union was already in a downward turn. Their economy
was in trouble, and their country was not nearly as unified as it was during the early promise of
communism post WWII. The new leader of the USSR, Mikhail Gorbachev, was much more
moderate than previous leaders and was, therefore, much more willing to engage in diplomatic
discussions with the US. By the mid-point of the Soviet War in Afghanistan, it seemed inevitable
that the Soviet Union would dissolve; it was just a matter of how soon.

The end of cold war

The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 symbolized the end of the Cold War, but its actual end was
gradual.
Mikhail Gorbachev's declaration that the Soviet Union would no longer use its military to subdue
the satellite states of the Warsaw Pact in 1988, and the reunification of Germany in October
1990.

As a consequence of the Revolutions of 1989 and the adoption of a foreign policy based on non-
interference by the Soviet Union, the Warsaw Pact was dissolved and Soviet troops began
withdrawing back to the Soviet Union, completing their withdrawal by the mid-1990s

Communist regimes everywhere in eastern Europe. In late 1991 the Soviet Union itself dissolved
into its component republics. With stunning speed, the Iron Curtain was lifted and the Cold War
came to an end.

Implications

Armaments
An arms race denotes a rapid increase in the quantity or quality of instruments of military power
by rival states in peacetime.

If one of the superpowers augmented

its power through the expansion of its alliances or through the acquisition of deadlier,
more effective armaments, the other responded in kind.

The buildup of arms was also a characteristic of the Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet
Union, though the development of nuclear weapons changed the stakes for the par. After the
United States did greatly increase its nuclear and conventional arms during the Korean War, the
Soviet leadership for its own domestic reasons made only a partial response. When from the
mid-1960s the Soviets undertook the most massive peacetime military buildup in history, the
United States chose to disengage somewhat from the race.

Nations were involved in nuclear armament in fears of external aggression and also to show
strength. eg.- china, India, Pakistan, Israel , north Korea , south Africa acquired nuclear weapons

Alliances

Cold War was sustained in various parts of the world through alliances by both the super powers.
In Europe, the battle lines were drawn between NATO and Warsaw Pact, where as in Asia, USA
formed CEATO and CENTO to contain the Southward expansion of communism. Cuba served
Soviet interests in the backyard of USA .Egypt; Syria, Libya and Iraq were Soviet allies for most
part of the Cold War whereas Israel served American interests in the region. Paradoxically some
Arab states like Jordan and Arabian Peninsular kingdoms allied themselves with USA though
having great sympathy for anti –Israel cause of the Arab world. Pakistan and pre- revolution Iran
remained American allies while India despite pretending to be neutral was profoundly pro-
Soviet. This division of world in every region was not mainly due to ideological reasons rather
for the vested interests of regional antagonists.

NAM

Non-Aligned Movement was formed as an attempt to throw out the Cold War. The Movement
advocates a middle course for states in the developing world between the Western and Eastern
Blocs during the Cold War. The phrase itself was first used to represent the doctrine by Indian
diplomat V. K. Krishna Menon in 1953, at the United Nations.

Rise of non aligned nations …….sick of all the wars they’ve seen and forcibly been part, of
many newly formed nations in Africa and Asia have started a third bloc which does not
support any bloc and have their own interests. Ex- India, Latin america, African countries.
Although many of the Non-Aligned Movement's members were actually quite closely aligned
with one or another of the superpowers, the movement still maintained cohesion throughout the
Cold War, even despite several conflicts between members which also threatened the
movement.
UN ineffectiveness/Rivalry

After the failure of the League of Nations, the establishment of the United Nations was the
second attempt at creating a collective security system within only a few decades. Yet, during the
Cold War collective security was going to fail once again, as most of the world was divided into
two blocs. Due to the rigid structure of the UN that was intended to maintain the status quo of
the international world order, the Security Council (SC) often found itself in a stalemate
situation, unable to act efficiently. Indeed, on several occasions it can be said that the SC was
used as a tool of superpower influence.

Thus, from the beginning the UN also reflected a realist Great Power chain of command, as the
main decision-making organ of the UN, the Security Council, included only five permanent
members: the US, the UK, the USSR, France and China (Cassese, 2005: 317). These five Great
Powers agreed to maintain peace and security for the common good, but especially, of course,
when it was in their own interests. In 1956, the Suez Canal crisis was rather different from the
Korean War. After Egyptian President Nasser had nationalised the Suez Canal, France, Britain
and Israel claimed the right to the use of force to re-open the Canal and thus attacked Soviet-
backed Egypt against the will of the US. SC action was blocked by the French and British vetoes

In conclusion, efficient UN action was in fact stymied by superpower conflict that was based on
both geopolitical and ideological factors. These circumstances led to many brutal proxy wars,
such as in Korea, the Congo and Vietnam, which were often even prolonged by superpower
divisions. Many peacekeeping missions failed or never left. Atrocious genocides such as in
Cambodia and in Guatemala were not prevented by the UN. Rather than acting as a collective
security system, the SC mostly remained divided throughout the Cold War.

Why cold war ended peacefully?

Nuclear deterrence

Since the advent of nuclear weapons in 1945, deterrence has taken on a special
meaning

With the advent of nuclear weapons, the term deterrence largely has been applied to the basic
strategy of the nuclear powers and of the major alliance systems.

The advent of nuclear weapons created a deterrence stalemate in which each side
acted, at times reluctantly, with increasing caution. As nuclear technology advanced,
both sides realized that a nuclear war would likely result in the destruction of each
power beyond hope of recovery. This state of affairs was called “mutual assured
destruction”—aptly
underlined by its acronym: MAD. Though each superpower
tended to back down from particular
confrontations—either
because
its national
interest was not sufficiently strong to risk a nuclear confrontation

Alliances

The first big alliance was in 1949, when the U.S. started creating NATO,” . “The USSR
responded with the Warsaw Pact.” The thing is, these ally structures on each side comprised
alliances of minor nations, which could be “managed” by a single superpower. This facilitated
the ability of either the U.S. or USSR to control minor disputes from escalating toward war
between the two. It’s easier for them to stop allies from running amok and drawing them into a
direct war.

Which side to blame?

Western interpretation/ NATO-Korean war defensive

At first, western writers blamed Russia. They said Stalin was trying to build up a Soviet
empire.

We are accustomed to viewing the cold war as a determined and heroic response of the U.S. to
communist aggression spearheaded and orchestrated by the Soviet Union. This image was
carefully constructed by presidents and their advisers in their memoirs (1). This view also was
incorporated in some of the first scholarly works on the cold war and argue that creation of
NATO was defensive not aggressive and same was the Korean War.

Soviet interpretation/ Truman doctrine was aggressive/ Vietnams

Russian historians blamed Churchill (the British Prime Minister) and Truman (the American
president, 1945–1953). They said Truman and Churchill wanted to destroy the USSR, which
was just defending itself.
 • central argument was that the Cold War was launched by imperialists and the U.S.

• Reasons of the Cold war are:

a political vacuum in Europe;

aim of the U.S. to fill this space

Washington was the victim of 3 paradigms of how to behave:

• -to be a global power

• -to be hard with Russians

Revisionist/Post revisionists. Both should take the blame, marshal plan- US influence,
USSR- Eastern influence

The revisionists’ arguments that the Americans are more responsible for the outbreak of the great
powers conflict can be seen in the role played by President Harry Truman and the nature of
United States capitalism.

Later, however, some western historians blamed America. They said Truman had not
understood how much Russia had suffered in the Second World War.

Soviet leadership was influenced by national security interests rather than by communist
ideology. US want their influence on the world and USSR spreading their influence on Eastern
Europe which US considered threats to their national interests. Although some revisionist is also
agreed on aspect that the incompatible difference between the ideology and cultural values has
also impacted the cold war;

, but was then rebutted by a wide variety of revisionist historians who blamed officials in
Washington as well as those in Moscow for the origins of the Soviet-American conflict (2).

The Post-Revisionists
Later still, historians think BOTH sides were to blame – that there were hatreds on both sides.

Most recently, historians agree that the Cold War was primarily a clash of beliefs -
Communism versus Capitalism.
Why cold war was a long peace?

The Long Peace is a term for the historical period following the end of World War II in 1945.
This period of Cold War (1945–1991) was marked by the absence of major wars between
the great powers of the period, the United States and the USSR

Nuclear deterrence

Since the advent of nuclear weapons in 1945, deterrence has taken on a special
meaning

With the advent of nuclear weapons, the term deterrence largely has been applied to the basic
strategy of the nuclear powers and of the major alliance systems.

The advent of nuclear weapons created a deterrence stalemate in which each side
acted, at times reluctantly, with increasing caution. As nuclear technology advanced,
both sides realized that a nuclear war would likely result in the destruction of each
power beyond hope of recovery. This state of affairs was called “mutual assured
destruction”—aptly
underlined by its acronym: MAD. Though each superpower
tended to back down from particular
confrontations—either
because
its national
interest was not sufficiently strong to risk a nuclear confrontation

Bipolarity

Bipolarity can be defined as a system of world order in which the majority of global economic,
military and cultural influence is held between two states.

In the bipolar system of the Cold War,

each of the blocs (the North Atlantic Treaty Organization,
or NATO, and the Warsaw
Pact) sought to negotiate rather than fight, and to fight proxy wars, rather than major
wars, outside of Europe.
In a bipolar system, alliances tend to be longer term, based on
relatively permanent interests, not shifting ones. Unlike in a multipolar system, each
bloc in a bipolar system is certain about the direction and magnitude of its biggest
threat. In a tight bipolar system, international organizations
either
do not develop or
are relatively ineffective,
as the United Nations was during the height of the Cold War.

During much of the

Cold War era, particularly in the 1950s and 1960s, the international system was
bipolar—the
United States, its European
and Asian allies (NATO, and Japan, South
Korea,
South Vietnam [until
1975], the Philippines, and Australia, respectively) faced
the Soviet Union and its European
and Asian allies (the Warsaw Pact, and the People’s
Republic of China, North Korea,
and North Vietnam, respectively; and after
1962,
Cuba).

Eco liberalism/ transnational agreements

The New Economic Plan (NEP) and the Great Depression (culminating in the New Deal) saw
either side adopting ideals from the other. Seeing the benefits of a free market, Lenin introduced
the NEP, allowing a limited form of Capitalism in the USSR.[10] Similarly, the United States
was facing the Great Depression, which resulted in the New Deal embracing forms of economic
planning similar to the Soviets.[11] During this time, American companies were even known to
invest in the USSR.

Although economic liberals can also be supportive of government regulation to a certain degree,
they tend to oppose government intervention in the free market when it inhibits free
trade and open competition. Both US & USSR were the belivers of free trade and free market.
Also both were the members of some international trade organizations such WTO, IMF, and lots
more which supports free trade and free market through the world.

US hegemonic economic power

At the end of World War II, the U.S was incontestably the most powerful nation on the earth.
The U.S. was also the richest nation in the world. It possessed two-thirds of the world's gold
reserves and three-fourths of its invested capital. Its gross national product was three times that
of the Soviet Union and five times that of the United Kingdom. Its wealth had grown enormously
during the war while the Soviet Union had been devastated by the occupation by Nazi Germany.
USA were outproducing Soviet Union and the gap was just getting wider. Throughout the Cold
War the United States of America saw economic prosperity and a dramatic improvement in its
standards of living. This gave the US a huge degree of power in the international arena.

Based on the initial positions of the two superpowers in 1948 and using only information that
was known at the time, John Gaddis predicted that that the US had a 78% probability of winning
the Cold War against Russia peacefully. This information suggests that it was due to the
advantageous economic position that the US held in the beginning of the war and continued to
have throughout that the US was destined to victory from the outset

Both powers were predictable

The fourth outcome was the realization that the differences between the two
emergent superpowers would be played out indirectly, on third-party
stages, rather
than through direct confrontation. Both rivals came to believe the risks of a direct
military confrontation were
too great.
The “loss” of any potential ally, no matter
how
poor or distant, might begin a cumulative process
leading to a significant shift in the
balance of power. Thus, the Cold War resulted in the globalization of conflict to all
continents. International relations became truly global.
Other parts of the world did not merely react to U.S.

Was ideology the primary source?

Ideology did matter

There were long seeded differences between the United States and the Soviet Union over
ideologies. At the time, the Soviet Union was a communist nation that was based on the
principles of collectivism, while the United States was a modern liberal nation based primarily
on the principles of individualism. The Western European nations were self-governing and based
on the western principles of capitalism and democracy, while the Eastern European nations were
under Soviet communist control. Throughout the rest of the Cold War, many of the most
significant events can be best understood, by viewing them as part of this ideological conflict.

For example, in both the Korean War and Vietnam War, the Soviet Union was seeking to expand
communism into the countries while the United States was fighting to stop the spread of
communism and instead support the values of capitalism and democracy. However, to identify
the extent of conflicting ideologies as a cause of the Cold war, other issues surrounding the
origins of the Cold War must also be considered.

Fear of other side world dominance

The American creation of the atomic bomb resulted in the biggest split in the balance of power
that both sides had desired. Truman's announcement of the creation of the atomic bomb at the
Potsdam conference in 1945 corrupted the balance of power. America now had more 'power'
than Russia, which was a threat to Stalin and his communist regime. The balance of power is
also seen here as the origins of the Cold War, as in retaliation to America's atomic bomb, Stalin
set up a 'special committee' to spy in America in order to allow Russia to create their first Soviet
atomic bomb, rival to America. In retaliation to America's atomic bomb, Stalin successfully
tested the atomic bomb in August 1949 which would suggests that it was in Russia's best
interests to level out the balance of power. The Cold War saw battles for a balance of power
through the arms race which was a battle for the amount of nuclear power they each possessed.

However, this later led to the space race between superpowers where the superpowers made an
agreement not to fight an ideological battle but to compete in other ways, for example, the first
power to go to space. Therefore the Cold War not only started as a desire for a balance of power
but continued to be a competition throughout the whole of the war.

Both the USA and the USSR recognised that if either side gained more territory than the other
then this would upset the balance of power, this is what, therefore, caused the Cold War.

Post ww2- power vacuum forced them into competition

The bipolarity international relations structure after World War II created a power vacuum into
which the United States and the Soviet Union were both drawn. Both powers were bound to
come into conflict. Both sides were bound to expand their sphere of influence. Neither the
United States nor Soviet Union could allow the other to dominate Europe and Pacific Asia
region. The role played by the both great powers in the East and Southeast Asian region conflict
was one of the series of the international economy and political process in the bipolarity
structure. The political development in the East and South East Asia were related with the power
vacuum and strongly influenced by the two great powers and bipolarity structure

Ideology become an excuse

The conflicting ideologies of both sides, contrasted one another completely, which also meant
that either superpower presented a threat to the other side. However, the ideologies were not
enough to start the Cold War, as we see how the powers were willing to put their differences
aside to defeat Hitler.
Neither America nor Russia was willing to let the other become more powerful, this again looks
at the desire for a balance of power between the powers. The conflicting ideologies after World
War Two are what made both superpowers even more determined to stop the other side
becoming more powerful. Therefore, conflicting ideologies were not the causes of the Cold War
but the reasons for both superpowers to carry on pursuing a political battle for a balance of
power.

Therefore the conflicting ideologies between the superpowers have been highlighted to be a
significant contribution to the Cold War and its developments but not as causes to why the Cold
War began. The causes of the Cold War look at how the superpowers had an almost equal desire
for a balance of power; this was the initial causation of the Cold War. Even though conflicting
ideologies were important to the Cold War, they were just reasons to carry on pursuing the
political battle for a balance of power. Adding to this, ideological differences were brought about
by the desire for a balance of power. Therefore it was this push for a balance of power between
the USA and the USSR that caused the Cold War to start in 1945. Caroline Kennedy-Pipe
supports this by saying that "the Cold war was not 'caused' by ideological rivalry - but certainly
as matter of the framing of the conflict and implications."

CONCLUSION

The Cold War between two super powers remained dominant international power paradigm for
about half a century .The era was marked with intense struggle for supremacy between two super
powers. Rest of the world was also plunged into the crises generated by Cold War every now and
then and especially Europe lived in constant fear and insecurity during Cold War. The demise of
the Cold War was supposed to be the harbinger of peace and stability and provide justice and
equitable world order. Now only a decade later, all such hopes have been vanquished .Wars are
taking place with same frequency and the sole power has failed to bring justice and equality in
the world order. The counter balancing force of USSR is no more available to inject sanity and
caution in US actions. Regional hegemons have found a happy union with the ultimate hegemon
and embarked upon a vicious path of destroying the aspirations of hapless people through the
instrument of state terrorism. The hindsight suggests that Cold War was rather a blessing than a
menace for the world.