Pros and Cons of the Cold War

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Have you ever wondered how we live in the world that we live in today? What made it become what it is now. Sadly war played a large effect on how America is today and the Cold War is one of them. It had many causes and also many long and short-term effects. Let's start with what the Cold War was and then move on to the causes and effects. Well, the Cold War is the result of the end of World War II. It’s all the emergence of two superpowers that the US and the USSR had been locked in a struggle that lasted a total of 45 years. The term Cold War was first used in 1947 to explain and describe the conflict. It was a war that consisted of words of propaganda and the threats that occurred between the United States and the USSR but at the same time, it did not involve superpowers in confrontations. So the Cold War began due to a mixture of long-term and short-term causes, the long term being the differing ideologies, Stalin's suspicion of the west which was the US and the United Kingdom, the United States changes of policies. And the short term causes were the Yalta conference, the Potsdam conference, Personality clashes, and the A-bomb.

Long term causes number one was the differing ideologies which were that in 1917 Russia became the first communist country in the world both the United States and the USSR believed that their systems were the best way of organizing a country and that other countries should follow their example. The USSR just permitted the socialist coalition, permitted no free decisions, the administration claimed all shops, plants, and ranches, and farming. The United States' vote based system and impetus, free political decision, shops, production lines, and ranches were exclusive and run for benefit. Lots of freedoms but big gaps between the rich people and the poor people. Both of us sides feared that the other was out to destroy it.

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The Soviets believed that the west was out to destroy communism. The west believed the Soviets wanted to spread communism around the globe. Long-term cause number two was Stalin's suspicion of the west which was the United States and the United Kingdom. So the USSR had been attacked previously so Germany had invaded Russia in World War I and Hitler invaded in 1941. Stalin believed it was essential to have friendly countries on his borders to prevent this from occurring again. He did not trust the west since the west had appeased Hitler in the 1930s so Stalin's believed they had wanted Hitler to destroy communism.The west was likewise delayed to open the second front during the subsequent universal battle to enable the Russians to battle Hitler. The final long-term calls which was the United States change of the policy which was determined not to repeat its isolationist policies of the inter-war years and believed a present meant did not work and that dictators had to be confronted and democracy had to be supported.

The richest in the most successful country in the world, which was the United States, was expected to have a say in the way that the world was going to be run. It was very confident that no other power had nuclear weapons. The United States did not want to return into a depression phase and wanted to secure markets for its goods and it did not believe that the communist countries would purchase American products as was resolved to forestall the spread of socialism.It was not in the United States' economic interest to allow the spread of communism. The first short term causes out of three was the Yalta conference which was held in February in the year of 1945 basically the leaders present where acetylene from the USSR and Roosevelt from the United States and Churchill from Britain so they agreed that Stalin agreed to join the war against Japan once Germany was defeated and that all three agreed to join the United Nations. Germany was going to be divided into four zones of occupation and Berlin to be divided into four zones as Germany. Stellan to have a sphere of influence in Eastern Europe. Free elections to be held to the side governments countries liberated from Nazi occupations. The USSR to join the war against Japan once Hitler had been defeated.

In The Origins of the Free Elections Dispute in the Cold War “ However, there was a dispute over Poland, and Stalin's insisted on a friendly government in Poland and the west demanded free elections in Poland.” Short-term number two was the Potsdam conference which was held in July of the year 1945 so the agreement was that the USSR was to gain eastern Poland and Poland was to be compensated with some German land. The Nazi party to be banned and Nazi war criminals were to be put on trial. The disagreement that happened was that Stallon demanded a harsh report from Tatian from Germany for the USSR and they demanded $20 billion in compensation. This figure was dearly rejected by Truman and Attlee because they did not want to make the same mistake as at Versailles. The A-bomb which was a short-term cause of the Cold War took place on August 15 during the post dam conference which was where the United States successfully tested their first A-bomb. Show informed Stallon about it but was not willing to share the technology with him.

This made Stalin even more suspicious of the west and encouraged him to begin an arms race to make the USSR as weapons equal to the force to those of the United States. The arms race was pushed along by fear until 1949 the USSR could not risk a war against the US. When the USSR exploded its own nuclear weapon in 1949 the United States no longer had a monopoly and needed to rethink its strategy. So the United States started to develop the H bomb. Which took place in 1952 the USSR exploded its own H bomb in the United States began to build bomber aircraft to deliver the H bomb in the mistaken belief that the USSR had more bomber aircraft in the United States.

The long and short-term effects of the Cold War we’re not that much so the short-term effects were that 15 new countries had come into existence as a result of the Cold War and it also blew to global communism. And soon after the disintegration of Russia‘s whole political map of central Asia and Europe had changed. Also, the unification of Germany occurred. The long-term effects were that during the Cold War there was a competition going among countries in terms of the firepower, nuclear arsenal, missiles, and satellites but soon after the Cold War the defense budget of Russia had dropped dearly. Earlier whenever one country promoted democracy which was the United States others were being promoted as communism. An economic crisis occurred and it started in Russia and it was way worse than the great depression since it made millions of Soviets unemployed. The living conditions of people went really low until the 90s when the economy started to stand on its feet again and earlier there was a numerous proxy war which now had been completely quiet down.

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Pros and Cons of the Cold War. (2022, November 25). Edubirdie. Retrieved December 22, 2024, from https://edubirdie.com/examples/pros-and-cons-of-the-cold-war/
“Pros and Cons of the Cold War.” Edubirdie, 25 Nov. 2022, edubirdie.com/examples/pros-and-cons-of-the-cold-war/
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Pros and Cons of the Cold War [Internet]. Edubirdie. 2022 Nov 25 [cited 2024 Dec 22]. Available from: https://edubirdie.com/examples/pros-and-cons-of-the-cold-war/
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