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Cold War
After 1945 the two great victors, the United States and the Soviet Union, became rivals with opposing systems: liberal democracy and a market economy against one-party communism and a planned economy. For more than four decades they competed in arms, space, ideas and wars fought by others, without ever fighting each other directly - always under the threat of nuclear destruction.
The Iron Curtain
THEME ONE
In 1946 Winston Churchill spoke of an "iron curtain" falling across Europe. Communist governments took power in the countries of Eastern Europe occupied by the Red Army, while the Marshall Plan helped rebuild Western Europe. In 1948 – 1949 the Soviet Union blockaded West Berlin, and the Western Allies supplied the city by air for almost a year. Germany was split in two, NATO was founded in 1949 and the Warsaw Pact in 1955.
The nuclear balance
THEME TWO
The Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb in 1949, and both sides soon had hydrogen bombs and missiles that could reach the other within minutes. In October 1962 the discovery of Soviet missiles in Cuba brought the world closer to nuclear war than ever before or since. Afterwards a direct "hotline" linked Washington and Moscow, and treaties began to limit tests and weapons.
Hot wars and the space race
THEME THREE
The Cold War was hot elsewhere: in Korea (1950 – 1953), in Vietnam, where US combat troops fought from 1965 to 1973, and in Afghanistan, where Soviet troops fought from 1979 to 1989. Rivalry also drove a race into space. The Soviet Union launched the first satellite, Sputnik, in 1957 and sent Yuri Gagarin into orbit on 12 April 1961. On 20 July 1969 American astronauts of Apollo 11 landed on the Moon.
The end of the Cold War
THEME FOUR
Mikhail Gorbachev, Soviet leader from 1985, tried to rescue a stagnating economy with perestroika and glasnost - restructuring and openness - and signed new arms treaties with the United States. In 1989 peaceful revolutions ended communist rule in Eastern Europe, and on 9 November the Berlin Wall fell. Germany was reunited in October 1990, and in December 1991 the Soviet Union broke up into fifteen independent states.
Periods
Confrontation
1947 – 1962
Two blocs form in Europe, China becomes communist (1949), war breaks out in Korea, the arms race begins, the Berlin Wall is built and the Cuban crisis brings the world to the brink.
Détente and new tensions
1962 – 1985
The Vietnam War, the Moon landing, arms control treaties and the Helsinki Accords of 1975, then the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and a new arms race.
The end of the Cold War
1985 – 1991
Gorbachev's reforms, the revolutions of 1989, German reunification and the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
Key dates
- 1949NATO is founded, and the Soviet Union tests its first atomic bomb.
- 1957Sputnik, the first artificial satellite.
- 1961Gagarin's flight into space, and the building of the Berlin Wall.
- 1962The Cuban Missile Crisis.
- 1989The Berlin Wall falls on 9 November.
- 1991The Soviet Union is dissolved in December.
Questions and answers
Why was it called the Cold War?
Because the two superpowers never fought each other directly. George Orwell used the phrase in 1945, and the American journalist Walter Lippmann made it popular in 1947. The confrontation was waged through arms races, alliances, propaganda and espionage, and through "hot" wars fought by others in Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan.
How did the Cold War end?
Without a war between the superpowers. Gorbachev's reforms loosened Soviet control, peaceful revolutions in 1989 ended communist rule in Eastern Europe, Germany reunited in 1990, and in December 1991 the Soviet Union was dissolved into fifteen independent states.