position on communism. I was a believer that the Cold War was a stalemate between the two superpowers Russia and the U.S. in nuclear arms. The book is well written and help fills some gap in my American history. The book explains how the conflict between U.S. and Russia affected other nations. The strength of the book is how it goes in details about communism showing how it influenced America’s decision in the past, present, and the future.
Analysis of the Essays There are those who blame the United States, those that blame the Soviet Union, and there are the post revisionists, who take no side. In analyzing these two essays, we see the two opposing opinions quite clearly (there is no essay in this chapter supporting the post revisionists). In the first essay, “Truman’s Hard Line Prompted the Cold War” by Walter Lafeber, the United States is put at fault for instigating the war. Lafeber gives numerous reasons, examples and evidence to strengthen his argument, and among them are: Truman’s hunger for power, his stubbornness to show himself as ‘tough’, and several economic and political reasons as well. Lafaber uses phrases such as “highly insecure” and “tried to compensate for his insecurity” to paint a negative image of Truman.
The Cold War changed American culture in a number of important ways. Fear of communism greatly increased due to rising tensions with the Soviet Union. Politicians of both parties often tapped into that fear and ran for office based on how strong they would be against communists. And fighting communism always involved the threat of nuclear war since both the U.S. and Soviet Union had nuclear weapons trained on each other. President Dwight Eisenhower's military plan relied on nuclear stockpiles rather than land forces.
After WW2 tensions between the United State and the Soviet Union tightened resulting in what is known as the Cold War. Although the seeds of this rivalry were planted nearly a quarter of a century before its actual commencement with the Revolution of 1918 in Russia, the tension was also driven through occasions such as the Yalta Conference and resulted in proxy wars throughout the world and a Second Red scare in America. This period was full of tension and fear that the United States and the USSR would destroy each other and the world with their arsenals of atomic weapons. During the Yalta conference the US, Russia, Britain and France agreed on the splitting of central Europe. This Split ultimately divided Europe into two spheres of influence.
Chapter 32 Summary The Cold War is defined as the ideological struggle between communism (Soviet Union “Warsaw Pact”) and Capitalism (United States “NATO”) for world influence. In 1948 the united states begin to view the Soviet Union as an adversary and threat. Prior to the Cold War Was World War II. World War II (1939-1945) the United States decided to develop the Marshall Plan to aid European recovery from the devastation of World War II. During The Cold War there began a development of nuclear weapons; It was a race for nuclear supremacy.
His nuclear deterrent foreign policy played a very large role in the Cold War, and is still effective today. Nuclear deterrent means if a country launches nuclear weapons against the United States, The United States would retaliate with its own nuclear strike (“Dwight D. Eisenhower” 304). In the end there would be no real winner, just total destruction. Eisenhower demonstrated this when he said “I would say a preventive war, if the words mean anything, is to wage some sort of quick police action in order that you might avoid a terrific cataclysm of destruction later.” (“Dwight D Eisenhower” 136). Knowing this, other countries will try to avoid total destruction instead of starting a nuclear war.
NSC-68 largely shaped U.S. foreign policy in the Cold War and involved a decision to make containment against Communist expansion the highest priority. It pledged the US not only to contain communism, but to take a further step to drive back Communist influence wherever it appeared. The Cold War dated from 1947 to 1991 and it was a struggle of tension between the Western Bloc and Eastern Bloc which Soviet Union was trying to control. The Cold War was an idealistic struggle for control. We have conflicting values protecting our country and the rise of communism.
And also to make the situation better which USA had big nuclear bases and land on West Germany and Turkey. He had make a really clever decision to make USSR better through the struggle between each other. He make a proposal on source D to Kennedy. To said that they would be willing to remove the nuclear sort of weapons on Cuba if the USA would remove these kind of harmful weapons on Turkey as
The United was easily the most powerful nation in the world because of its war efforts, and defeating the Soviet Union. The United States also, created the chemical ingredient, Plutonium which was the main chemical element used in the nuclear weapon that mad them so explosive. So how can we prevent another cold war? I think in order to be peaceful; we could create a feign friendship between the two presidents of the United States and the Soviet Union. We should also, negotiate a peace treat, and become allies with the Soviet Union once
The Cold War was a result of the failed alliance between the US and Soviet Union. For forty years, the two nations were at odds. Each tried to become better than the other, spread their political systems, and achieve world domination. During this time period, the rivals were always on the verge of a war. The Cold War was fought with thinly veiled threats and began due to the iron curtain.