Who Caused The Cold War Analysis

The Cold War, a period of sustained political and military tension between the USA and the USSR, resulted in various viewpoints concerning the cause of the tension emerging. Until today the question remains unresolved, even after the 1991 release of Soviet archives. The main point of disagreement relates to the roles that ideology played in the events between 1945 and 1949. Was it the strongly opposing ideologies, capitalism and communism, or power and material interest that drove both superpowers to the decades of struggle for global supremacy.

The Cold War was the rivalry between the two superpowers of the world, The United States and the Soviet Union, this war lasted about 45 years and fought each other indirectly for power and control of the world. This battle began towards the end of the World War II in 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union started noticing their differences and this caused conflict between them.This war was unlike other wars, there was no fighter planes flying over countries dropping bombs, no ground troops,and no deployment of missiles, however there was nuclear weapons being used,plenty of money being spent,propaganda and two powerful enemies against each other like other wars. Who was to blame for this war? The Soviets or the United States? Both made

In this paper I will discuss what actions and thoughts added up to cause the cold war. The cold war lasted from September 1, 1945 to about December 25, 1991. That is about forty-five years, which is an extremely long time. The cold war was a global competition basically between two sides, the Free World, which was led by the United States of America, and the Communist World led by the Soviet Union. The struggle took place through indirect military conflict, and direct competition in the areas of economics, diplomacy, culture, space exploration, and political theory. It also involved nuclear stand offs, espionage, and global competition for other nations. The cold war has established the framework for most

During the World War II, the Soviet Union and Western Blocs were allies fighting against their enemies. As time went on, at the end of the World War II, they started to have disagreements and had many differences. The conflict between these two became huge and was known as the Cold War. The Soviet was the most responsible for the Cold War because they tried to expand the Sphere of Influence, won’t compromise with the Westerns, and they had new weapons that they kept as a secret.

For nearly fifty years, the world lived in fear as two super-power nations quietly battled for power, respect and popularity of their respective political views. The Cold War arose out of the ashes of the failed alliance between the United States and the Soviet Union in World War II. Many different factors could be linked to the actual cause of the Cold War, however many agree that the political future of Eastern Europe was the major spark that ignited the battle between Communist Russia and Capitalist America1. The American fear of the spread of communism and their ambition to penetrate the "Iron Curtain" only added fuel to the fire that had been burning for some time already. Although the

The Cold War is unique among war’s to be not a war between states, but a war between ideologies. The United States and other allies defend social democracy capitalism, as the pinnacle of freedom and equality; and the Soviet Union though communism was the pinnacle of equality. These ideologies manifested themselves through the superpowers, which caused the conflict between them. Both the United States, and the Soviet Union are to blame for the outbreak of the Cold War. The United State’s mission to contain communism with the Marshall Plan, personal remarks against Stalin, the creation of NATO, and the use of the atomic bomb in Japan without warning the Soviet’s, their ally in the war. On the other side, Stalin’s remarks on Churchill and Truman, the Berlin blockade, and the breaking of agreements in Poland, escalated the situation from tense to a Cold War.

From when World War II ended in 1945 to Soviet Union falling in 1991, the Cold War had a major influence in international affairs. It was a continuous competition between the United States and the Soviet Union. Arne Westad argues that “the Cold War was a continuation of colonialism through slightly different means” (Westad, 396). I believe this statement is a description of World War II’s colonialism ways transitioning onto another international conflict; the Cold War. The Cold War began as a disagreement between the Soviet Union and America when it came to communism. The Soviet Union was afraid of America’s atomic weapons, as America was afraid of the Soviet Union’s growing army. Soviet Union was pro communism and America was pro capitalism. Overshadowing all was the threat of nuclear war. The U.S. is to blame for the Cold War due to threatening the “communist Soviet Union” in support of our own political systems. I can conclude this with points made from Westad regarding the Soviet Union’s actions and America’s as well.

The traditional, orthodox interpretation places the responsibility of the Cold War on Stalin’s personality and on communist ideology. It claims that as long as Stalin and the authoritarian government were in power, a cold war was unavoidable. It argues that Stalin violated agreements that he had made at Yalta, imposed Soviet policy on Eastern European countries aiming at political domination and conspired to advocate communism throughout the world. As a result, United States officials were forced to respond to Soviet aggression with foreign policies such as the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan. Yet revisionists argue that there was “no proof of Stalin promoting communism outside Russia” and that Stalin’s decisions were first and foremost, pro-Soviet and not of communist intentions. Up until 1947, it is evident through Marshall Plan as well as statements and interviews made by Stalin that he was still thinking of cooperation with the United States, Britain and France. Despite post-war conflicts and instability of Soviet-American relations, the USSR’s initial embrace of the Marshall Plan at its announcement expressed

From any historical event, there is always different presentations of the same facts. In every subject, an author’s opinion or point of view can completely change the story. In this paper I will be focus on highlighting the most significant factors various authors have proposed led to the Cold War. There are three viewpoints on what on what were the significant factors that led to the Cold War. There is the Orthodox viewpoint, which blames Soviet expansion, the Revisionist view, stating that American imperialist capitalism led to conflict. I will pay particular attention to the eminent William A. Williams who is considered the father of Revisionist school of thinking. There is also the post Revisionist view which places the responsibility on a variety of factors both the Soviets and the United States of America. I will place emphasis on the writings of John Lewis Gaddis. All the statements have merit, but there is noticeable bias towards either the communist or capitalist factions. The key to determining truth about what were key factors that lead to the Cold War is to present information with as much balance and objectivity as possible.

There have been many attempts to explain the origins of the Cold War that developed between the capitalist West and the communist East after the Second World War. Indeed, there is great disagreement in explaining the source for the Cold War; some explanations draw on events pre-1945; some draw only on issues of ideology; others look to economics; security concerns dominate some arguments; personalities are seen as the root cause for some historians. So wide is the range of the historiography of the origins of the Cold War that is has been said "the Cold War has also spawned a war among historians, a controversy over how the Cold War got started, whether or not it was inevitable, and

Who is to blame for the Cold War? The Cold War began shortly after World War II ended in 1945 which was the beginning of a long period of geopolitical tension between the democracies of the Western World and the communist countries of Eastern Europe. (Ducksters) The United States led the west and Eastern Europe was led by the Soviet Union.

The Cold War was a state of political hostility and military rivalry between the United States of America and the Soviet Union. It was characterised by threats, propaganda, power blocs, espionage and intense competition. Schlesinger defines the Cold War as “a presumably mortal antagonism, arising in the wake of the Second World War, between two rigidly hostile blocs, one led by the Soviet Union, the other by the United States.” Despite the lack of direct open warfare, this antagonism still dominated the fears of global society and the international community. However, the question remains, was rivalry and tension between the USA and the Soviet Union inevitable after the conclusion of WWII in1945? It is no surprise that the answer to such a

George H. Quester, in his article, “Origins of the Cold War: Some Clues from Public Opinion,” never really blames the United States or the Soviet Union for being the instigators that started the Cold War. Instead, he concludes that the cold war “may have been a necessary result of a global situation that drove the powers to mutual confrontation” (p. 654). Essentially, the deep-seated mistrust and completely different postwar visions of the United States and the Soviet Union made the prospects of tension between them inevitable, and resulted in both sides making predictions, and ultimately decisions, that lead to political and military (although not large in scale) troubles between both superpowers following World War II.

The historian who wrote this extract kept a post revisionist approach to reach a judgement for who caused the Cold War in his beginning paragraph . Post revisionist historians blames neither side but instead blames the foundation of mutual misunderstanding which was always there. This idea was first introduced by the leading post revisionist historian John Lewis Gaddis during the late 1900s. There are few reasons why I concluded that the writer kept post revisionist approach.

The term “Cold War” refers to the second half of the 20th century, usually from the end of the World War II until 1990, when the Soviet Union collapsed. Since the 1940s and 1950s the scholars have disagreed on the topic of the origins of the Cold War. There are several groups of historians and their interpretations are very different, sometimes even contradictory. The three main schools are the orthodox, the revisionist and the realist. The classification is not completely accurate because we can find several differences in theories of scholars within the same group and often the authors reevaluated their ideas over time.