The Origins of the Cold War

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The Origins of the Cold War

The Cold War was a state of extreme hostility and confrontation but

without direct militant action between the two world powers, the USSR

and the USA. The USSR and the USA were originally wartime Allies

during the Second World War; however a string of events and issues

caused a built up of suspicion and distrust which finally escalated to

what was known as the Cold War. The start of Cold War can be simply

defined as the period of time whereby both powers were simultaneously

hostile to each other and the idea of peaceful cooperation could not

exist anymore.

Churchill’s Iron Curtain Speech was a warning of Soviet influence

beyond Eastern Europe. Churchill believed that the idea of a balance

in power did not appeal to the Soviets and he encouraged Western

democracies to stand together in prevention of further spreading of

Communist influence. However, the Soviet Union was not completely seen

as the enemy as Churchill acknowledges the fact that the USSR was not

inclined to a war. He also does not challenge the idea of

collaboration between the Soviets and the Western powers, thus

peaceful coexistence was still possible at this period in time.

Further more, there was no concrete policy against the USSR yet then.

The USSR at that point in time still wanted peaceful co-existence with

the Western powers as they had not recovered from the large scale

destruction of their country during the war. Their response to

Churchill’s Speech was that they felt it was meant to ‘sow seeds of

dissension among the Allied states’. This shows that the Soviets still

considered the Western powers as their allies, thus proving th...

... middle of paper ...

...nes. This was highly

successful and was considered as a first major victory for the

Americans in the Cold War when the Soviets found that the blockade was

not effective in starving the West Berliners into submission and ended

the blockade.

The Iron Curtain Speech made in 1946 only served to build up suspicion

and distrust between the two powers; at this point both powers were

still Allies. The event that triggered off the Cold War was the Truman

Doctrine whereby both parties were mutually hostile and did not

believe in a possible peaceful coexistence anymore. The Americans and

Soviets’ hostility to each other as well as the belief that they could

no longer cooperate after the start of the Cold War resulted in the

Berlin Blockade. Thus I can conclude that the Truman Doctrine marked

the start of the Cold War.

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