Essay On The Cold War: The Causes And Possibility Of Evasion

The years between 1945 and 1963 saw some of the world’s superpowers engage in what Historians have since termed the Cold War. As the strategies revolved around threats of using nuclear power and sabotaging societies, the feuding countries never took up arms. Thus emerges the term "cold" depicting the aforementioned sabotage attempts and threats to wipe each other out. The key players in the cold war include the United States of America and the Soviet Union. However, allies of the countries engaged in actual war, a good illustration being North and South Vietnam, the proprietors of the Vietnam War.
/> Evidently, the causes of the Cold War find a basis in the disagreements between the two countries stated above. First, there is the Tehran Conference of 1943 in which, the Britons and Americans advocated Poland’s self-governance while the Soviet Union called for full reign of the country. In the conference, President Franklin Roosevelt of America, General Secretary Josef Stalin of the Soviet Union and Winston Churchill of Britain were present. Next was the Yalta Conference of 1945, with the same key people that saw the formation of the United Nations and the Soviet Union gaining control over Poland. That same year, America’s president Roosevelt died and in his place; Truman rose to power. The new head of state inhibited any more action from the Soviet Union as he sought to prevent further expansion of the country’s power in the world. Thus began the Cold War. As aforementioned, allies of the United States and the Soviet Union engaged in actual battles because of the ongoing Cold War. However, with the constant threats of the use of nuclear power from both sides, citizens in each country lived in fear. On that note, the creation of nuclear weapons also finds a basis in the tension between the Americans and the Soviets. The countries doubted the motives of each other for so long that it affected their political, economic, and social spheres of life. For instance, the previously lucrative trade between the two and their allies was obviously impaired further deteriorating the relations.