Cold war

Essay by nickkiUniversity, Bachelor'sA+, May 2004

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The Cold War (c. 1945-1990) was the high tension that developed after World War II between groups of nations practicing different ideologies and political systems. On one side were the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) and its allies, often referred to as the Eastern bloc. On the other side were the United States and its allies, usually referred to as the Western bloc. The struggle was called the Cold War because it did not actually lead to fighting, or "hot" war, on a wide scale. The term was first used by the American financier and presidential adviser Bernard Baruch during a congressional debate in 1947.

World War II brought death and destruction in an enormous scale and it ended with the use of a powerful new weapon of mass destruction, the atomic bomb. We can say that consequences of the second world war determined the cold war. As it marked the end of the European Age, USA and Soviet Union became two superpowers and world entered into a nuclear age.

World could never predict another war after such a great source of loss and tension however a new friction between the victors of the second world war, USA-Great Britain and Soviet Union, didn't took so long. A new power struggle started and shook the peace that they had sacrificed a lot to attain. The post-war friction between them rapidly hardened into a political cold war that soon turned into a military confrontation between East and West marked by mutual mistrust, suspicion and hostility. After World War II,the cold war contunied for forty five years as a major determinant of internaional affairs. The two superpowers, United States and the Soviet Union aggressively tried to establish and maintain blocs of allies, thus dividing the world into two hostile camps. And since...