Download THE COLD WAR

Terms to define:
Communism, capitalism, democracy, containment, Joseph Stalin, Iron Curtain, superpowers, U.S.S.R., Cold
War, Berlin Wall, Berlin Airlift, a divided Germany and Berlin, N.A.T. O, Warsaw Pact, reunification of
Germnay
A DIVIDED EUROPE
At the end of World War II in 1945, the Soviet Union (led by Joseph Stalin) and the United
States did not trust each other. The Soviet Union was a communist country where the government
controlled the ways to make money and the goal was that everyone was treated equally. The United
States and Great Britain were free democracies where the citizens elected the leaders. Great Britain
and the U.S. believed that the Soviets wanted to spread communism to all of Europe, especially
Germany, which had just lost the war.
After the war, the Allies/ winners (U.S., Great Britain, France, and the Soviet Union) agreed to
divide Germany. Great Britain, the U.S., and France controlled the western portion of the country. The
Soviet Union controlled the eastern portion and most of Eastern Europe. The Allies also divided the
German capital of Berlin into West Berlin and East Berlin. (see map)
The western Allies saw this arrangement as temporary. They wanted Germany and all of Europe
to be independent, free democracies. The Soviets saw things differently. After suffering from two world
wars, the USSR was determined not to be invaded again. The best way to make sure of that was to take
the land around it. It kept Eastern Europe. It put communist governments in power that would be loyal
to the USSR.
Europe became divided between Western and Eastern Europe. Western European nations
remained or became free democracies. The countries in Eastern Europe became communist states.
Germany eventually divided into two countries. West Germany became a free democracy. It allied itself
with other Western European nations and the United States. East Germany became a communist nation
allied with the USSR.
THE “IRON CURTAIN”
By the late 1940s, Europe was divided between Western free nations and Eastern Communist
nations. During a famous speech, former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said that an “iron
curtain” had descended (come down) on Europe. The term iron curtain came to symbolize the
dividing line that separated Western Europe and Eastern Europe. The “Iron Curtain” was NOT a real
curtain- it was imaginary, sort of like the equator, but west of the iron curtain were free countries
and east were countries controlled by the Soviet Union, often called Soviet satellites or puppet
countries.
THE COLD WAR
During World War II, the United States developed an atomic bomb and used it on two Japanese
cities. It was the world’s first nuclear weapon. A nuclear weapon can destroy an entire city and kill
hundreds of thousands of people in one strike. Soon, the USSR had nuclear weapons too.
After World War II, the United States and the USSR became the world’s two great
superpowers. Both had nuclear weapons and neither one trusted the other. Great tension existed
between the two. People in both countries and around the world feared this tension would one day
result in a nuclear war. The tension between the United States and USSR that many feared would lead
to war became known as the COLD WAR. It divided most of the world into two camps. On one side
were the countries that supported free democracy and capitalism. On the other were countries
supporting the USSR and communism. The Cold War especially affected Europe. Since Europe included
communist and free states, many feared that any war between the superpowers would begin in
Europe. Beginning in 1945, the Cold War was a period of distrust and misunderstanding between the
Soviet Union and its former allies in the West, particularly the United States. As the Cold War
continued, the United States and the Soviet Union increased their area of influence (how much they
controlled). The United States and the Soviet Union had the ability to influence world events and
project worldwide power. The countries were evenly matched. The world took sides, communism or
democracy, socialist or free market. For over forty years, the U.S. and the Soviet Union competed in
everything from who could get into space first (the Soviets won) to nuclear missiles to athletic games in
the Olympics.
Another problem of the Cold War was the division of Germany. At the end of the war, the Allies
divided Germany into four sections to keep it from regaining power. The United States, Great Britain,
France, and the Soviet Union each controlled a section. In 1948, the Western Allies wanted to reunite
Germany, but the Soviets disagreed. The Soviet declared their section of the country “East Germany,”
the reunited sections became West Germany. Even the capital of Berlin in East Germany was divided
into East and West. Tensions grew. In June 1948, the Russians–who wanted Berlin all for themselves–
closed all highways, railroads and canals from western-occupied Germany into western-occupied Berlin.
This, they believed, would make it impossible for the people who lived there to get food or any other
supplies and would eventually drive Britain, France and the U.S. out of the city for good. Instead of
retreating from West Berlin, however, the U.S. and its allies decided to supply their sectors of the city
from the air. This effort, known as the “Berlin Airlift,” lasted for a year and carried more than 2.3 million
tons of cargo into West Berlin.
In 1961, communist leaders built the Berlin Wall. It separated the communist part of the city
from the free sections. The Berlin Wall was meant to keep people from escaping East Berlin. The Berlin
Wall stood until November 9, 1989, when the head of the East German Communist Party announced
that citizens of the GDR could cross the border whenever they pleased. That night, ecstatic crowds
swarmed the wall. Some crossed freely into West Berlin, while others brought hammers and picks and
began to chip away at the wall itself. To this day, the Berlin Wall remains one of the most powerful and
enduring symbols of the Cold War and the tearing down of the wall is considered the beginning of the
end of the Cold War.
Each side in this Cold War thought the other was trying to rule the world. Neither side gave up,
and people lived in fear that another world war might erupt. People worried that if such a war
happened, it would be a nuclear war. Such a war would be a disaster for everyone on earth. Countries
formed new alliances to protect themselves. In 1949, the western European countries plus the United
States and Canada formed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). The eastern countries signed
the Warsaw Pact. This pact was an agreement between countries controlled by the Soviet Union to stick
together if they were attacked.
United States had powerful military support from NATO, the largest navy in the world, and bases all over
the world, even bordering the Warsaw Pact countries. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) spent
money to spy on the Soviet Union. The United States had a large reserve of nuclear weapons.