Why Was The Cold War Inevitable

The U.S and the Soviet Union had mistrusted each other from the beginning, which started the Cold War. when the U.S was attacked on December 1941, The Soviet Union had made an alliance with them along with Britain, which soon followed with the U.S supplying their allies with military supplies. During their alliance against the fascist powers, Stalin was suspicious which made “The Soviets believed that the Western Allies had

From the years of 1941 to 1949, there was an increase in suspicion and tension between the United States and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was a Communist country ruled by a dictator while America was a capitalist democracy that valued freedom. Their completely different beliefs and aims caused friction to form between them, which contributed to the creation of the Cold War.

Truman and Stalin expanded strains in Europe and East Asia in the years quickly taking after World War II, the Cold War itself was unavoidable. The relationship during the war amongst the United States and the USSR during World War II was still conserve to defeat the previous many years of intuition and unease amongst the two countries. In addition, as both astonishing groups looked to accomplish their after war security targets, They're intentions were to retaliate against Germany in 1945.

If one was to look at the world post WWII, it would be clear to see that the United States had the upper hand in comparison to the Soviet Union. While the USSR had mass casualties and destruction to deal with, the US only benefited from WWII, with an increased economy, and advantages from being pulled out of the Great Depression. The United States took action during the Cold War to try and restrict the USSR’s power. One of the major steps that the US took was to stop the spread of Communism. To prove this point, President Truman established the Truman Doctrine.

The Soviet ambassador to the United States was Novikov at the time. Novikov suggested that the United States wanted to form a Western European alliance directly against the Soviet Union. He felt that the Truman Doctrine was the first step towards this goal, but it had been too harsh to attract any European support. Then he said that the Marshall Plan represented a more appealing tactic to involve the Western Europeans in the creation of an anti-Soviet alliance. However apparently the United States was not just pressuring Western Europe, but Eastern Europe as well. This partially, made the Soviet Union very angry. Maybe if the Marshall Plan had been limited to just Western Europe, maybe it would have been less threatening to the Soviet

The alliances the USSR and the U.S. made with other countries changed their relationship. In 1947, the United States President Harry Truman created a foreign policy called the Truman doctrine. It explained the U.S. would help with economic, political, and military to all nations under threat from a communist force (Document 2). The U.S. had sent help to Greece and Turkey. The doctrine contain areas under the USSR’s control. The Marshall Plan was created to

Although, the Cold War was avoidable due to the fact that better negotiating efforts could have been made and we exasperated the tension with the Soviet Union as a result of our threats, it was inevitable though that the United States and the Soviet Union went to war in the Cold War. The Cold War was inevitable due to immense differences between the Soviet Union and the United Sates, the Soviet Union’s mistrust in the United States, and the Soviet Union’s unreasonable stance. Even though, the countries did not physically fight The Cold War was a foreseeable feud between the Soviet Union and The United States in response to the tension and conflicts that mounted after the end of World War II.

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

With the end of World War II (WWII) in 1945 began the Cold War, an international conflict that lasted from 1947–1991 and plagued nations across the globe. As the post-war negotiations were deliberated by three of the strongest world powers, the United States (US), Britain, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), disagreements arose that created tension between the US and the USSR and ultimately instigated the infamous “Fifty Years War” (Crockatt 64). But was this conflict avoidable, or was the Cold War simply inevitable? In order to effectively answer to this issue, the origins and conflicts leading to the Cold War must be evaluated with reference to the post-war territorial

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

This is because the USSR took these policies as a direct attack against communism. Stalin coined the term "dollar imperialism" for the US foreign policies because they offered economic aid to nations in Europe that were detrimentally affected by WWII in an attempt to make these nations economically dependent on and politically influenced by the US. It caused fear and paranoia in the USSR because the soviet communists believed that the US would gain political and economic control of the countries in need of aid. It also caused fear and paranoia because the Truman Doctrine and Marshall plan condemned communism as evil and it took action to prevent the spread of communism to any susceptible nation by providing military assistance. The USSR was upset that the US could do such a thing, thus they responded furiously to these policies by developing their own similar form of economic aid. These were called the Molotov Plan and Comecon which forcefully imposed economic aid on countries such as Czech (even if these nations wanted the aid of the US instead). These actions and reactions caused tensions to greatly rise in the Cold War (Todd, 2009). Thus, it can be argued that it was not only Truman's policies, but Stalin's policies that also played a major role in the Cold War.

President Truman believed the US needed more than a "get tough on the Russians" policy following the war. Russia's history was one of expansion and the Soviet Union was following that same idea. Because of the desire of the Soviets to expand westward, and the fact that Stalin had a pathological mistrust of the US, it would be impossible to come to a peaceful settlement with the Soviets. Thus, the policy of containment, developed by George F. Kennan of the State Department, was adopted by the Truman administration. The policy would allow communism where it already existed, but would use all force necessary to prevent any further expansion. In other words, communism would be "contained" where it presently existed. Because of Russian expansion to the west, a policy carried on by the Soviets, it would be impossible to come to a quick settlement with Stalin, following the Second World War. Since the Russians would test the US by a cautious expansion and not start a major war, Truman developed the Truman Doctrine, with the aid of George Kennan. This Doctrine provided military and financial aid to all the nations that agreed to resist any attempt by Russia to take them over. It was first applied in Greece and

The Communist revolution in Russia had caused a great deal of fear and distrust, particularly among the leadership of the US and many European nations, however WWII forced Russia and the Western Allies into an alliance of convenience. After WWII the distrust, which had always been there just below the surface, caused a breakdown in relations that was not helped by Stalin's territorial ambitions and belligerent nature. This breakdown in relations soon blossomed into what became known as the Cold War.

The relationship which existed during the cold war between North America and the Soviet Union was majorly based on the different ideologies of the different nations, the political grounds and the difference in the economic factors. Upto date the cooperation of the two great nations are guided with a lot of caution and also there exists a lot of bitter rivalry between the two nations too. The difference in the political systems which existed in the two countries led to the differences in most of the core policies implementation issues. During the cold war, the difference in the policies which existed between the two nations led to the creation of the Cuban missile crisis which made the two nations come to war.

To gain a full understanding of the Cold War, the knowledge of the why it started, an in depth analysis of what both sides contributed to make the Cold War what was and knowing whether the Cold War was inevitable or not is necessary. There were many different actions that both of the two major superpowers, the US and the USSR took that started the Cold War. I believe that the Cold War was inevitable because of the difference in ideologies between the US and the USSR, and the large threat the USSR posed to western society; such as joining the arms race, and expansion of communism. Even though the start of the Cold War is known, what would have happened if it was not initiated by the USSR and the US? Could the major events that happened later on in the Cold War have triggered the Cold War to start if it did not already? Was the Cold War we know of today inevitable?