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Cold War Vs Communism

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Although America and the rest of human history have presumed a future of boundless joy and civil peace after the end of World War II, the differences in the political and economic perspectives between the United States and the Soviet Union caused a rift in their convenient relationship and ceased the warmth of their shared handshakes. With the Soviet Union’s preference for a communist government, its principles of authoritarianism and limited freedom ignited a conflict with the democratic United States which, on the other hand, valued capitalism, independence, and freedom of expression. The Soviet Union was confident that their communist influences would outrule capitalism and ultimately become the dominant driving force of government in the …show more content…

These opposing views caused the formation of an iron curtain, a physical boundary that separated the Soviet-controlled countries in Eastern Europe from the Western democracies. The United States utilized a policy of containment, a strategy of retaliation against the Soviet Union’s policy of communist expansion, in attempt to defeat the spread of communism and save allied nations from becoming chained under Soviet control. The United States was devoted in its battle against communism with instances such as the Truman Doctrine, which promised to aid anyone who was being threatened by communist rule, and the Marshall Plan, which provided over 12 million dollars in aid to help rebuild European democracies like France and West Germany. All in all, containment was a foreign policy of the United States in which subtle, yet effective actions were to be executed during the Berlin airlift, the Korean War, and the Cuban Missile Crisis in an effort to halt Soviet expansion and suspend the spread of …show more content…

The communist, Soviet-Union-favored North Korea engaged in a military combat against the democratic, U.S.-supported South Korea, which eventually resulted in a death count of over two million people, including over 50,000 Americans (Doc C). Due to the fact that the Korean War was fought more in terms of political power rather than military objectives, it easily deteriorated into a deadlock as both the United States and the Soviet Union took advantage of the battlefield to negotiate for political supremacy. The prime motive of the United States during the Korean War was not merely to impede Soviet expansionism, but moreover to preserve the remains of democratic ideals in other territories around the earth. The United States desired to sustain the American emblem of democratic morals in other nations apart from its own; this idea of democratic expansionism served as a gateway towards political authority in the world. In addition, America’s participation in the Korean War illustrates the nation’s loyalty to its containment policy because the it willingly took extreme measures, such as risking the lives of over 50,000 Americans, in order to protect the democratic South Korea

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