Cold War Ideology And Policies

Cold War Ideology And Policies

The Cold War of 1945-1991 was brought on by mistrust after WWII, between the two remaining superpowers of the world, Soviet Union (USSR) and the United States (US). During the war, both the USSR and the US had a mutual enemy in Adolph Hitler. This commonality made the USSR and US work together towards the same goal, which was to defeat Germany. After the war ended, the USSR had aspirations of becoming the one and only superpower, but in order to accomplish this they needed other countries to fall under a communist mentality. The US could not let this happen so a stand off between Democracy (US) versus Communism (USSR) in the name of The Cold War took place, for 46 years. During these years the several major things happened. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was developed by Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg, joined by the US and Canada, which united many counties to have the power to dissuade the USSR from bombing Western Europe.   After NATO was established a new situation arose in the cold war. The USSR was winning a civil war in Greece and at the same time applying pressure on Turkey. In order to protect itself, the US started up a policy of containment. This policy turned into the Truman Doctrine and it affirmed America’s intent to oppose communism by any means necessary. Days after the Truman Doctrine was proposed a Federal Employee Loyalty Program was put into place to guard against internal disloyalties. Although this plan had good intentions, it added to the fears and suspicions of Americans in regard to Communist activity in America. These policies and procedures increased mistrust both locally and internationally but eventually gave the US the power to end the Cold War.          

References

Davidson, J. (Ed.). (2006). Nation of nations: a concise narrative of the American republic (4th ed., Vol. 2). New York: McGraw-Hill. Chapter 27. Cold War America (1945-1954).