Cold War Origins

COLD WAR ORIGINS
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Introduction
Undoubtedly, the cold war was one of the most significant developments of the 20th century. It began immediately after the Second World War and lasted nearly five decades, ending in 1989. The conflict developed from longstanding political and diplomatic disagreements between the United States and the Soviet Union, dating back to the end of the Russian Revolution in 1917. During that period, the Soviet communist party viewed itself as the movement that would dominate political orders in the West, if not the entire world. On its side, the United States refused to recognize the Soviet Union until 1933. However, one interesting aspect of the relationship between the two heavyweights was that they fought as allies in the Second World War. As Gaddis puts it, the war was won by a coalition that was already at war ideologically and geopolitically. At the end of it, suspicions between the two resurfaced again. This, to a considerable extent, happened because they espoused two ideologies that contrasted sharply. On one hand, America rooted for democracy, equality, and liberty, especially in Europe, where dictatorships loomed large. In addition, the United States advocated open trade with the hope of reducing barriers to promote global economic growth. On the flip side, the Soviet Union favored a Marxist-Leninism ideology that supported communism. The interplay between the two contrasting ideologies led to the cold war as the two superpowers jostled to assert their power and dominance. It is crucial, for people, with an interest in history to understand the intricacies of the cold war, given the implications it had on the entire world. In addition, understanding its origins helps people understand what triggered the phenomenal conflict. The origins of the early cold war, 1945-1955, can be traced to a combination of political, economic, and ideological factors in post-World War 11 Europe.[John Lewis Gaddis. The Cold War. Penguin Books, 2006, 6.] [Burleigh Hendrickson. The Cold War — An Overview. n.d. /humanities/whp-1750/, par. 3]
Political Factors
Power Vacuum in Europe after WW11
One of the most fundamental outcomes of the Second World War was that it completely altered the old International System. That system placed such European countries as Britain, Germany, Italy, and France on the pedestal of world politics. They were the main political actors since they had immense influence. However, the war precipitated a paradigm shift because it left the principal European countries considerably weakened. For instance, major European cities lay in utter ruins, which, in turn, devastated the region’s economy. The desolation did not spare ordinary citizens as they engaged in the most extraordinary population movement in European history. Some were returning from Soviet exile, from forced labor in Germany, and concentration camps. They crammed railway stations and camped on dirty cement floors waiting for the next train to take them home or search for better lives. This happened while epidemics and starvation lurked on the horizon. In short, Europe was in shambles and could longer assert its political dominance in the world arena.[Anne Applebaum. Iron Curtain: The Crushing of Eastern Europe 1944-1956. Doubleday, 2012, 17.] [Emmanuel Comte. "Waging the Cold War: the origins and launch of Western cooperation to absorb migrants from Eastern Europe, 1948–57." Cold War History, 2020, 12.]
In light of the prevailing circumstances, the United States decided to use its economic and military superiority to fill the power vacuum that reigned supreme in Europe. It moved to such countries as Austria to help the citizens and rebuild economies. For instance, the Austrian occupation by America helped democratize the country and reconstruct its economy. In its endeavor to win over the democratic nations in Europe, the U.S. adopted the Marshall Plan. In addition, it formulated mechanisms to counter the spread of communism in Europe and parts of Asia. The Americans feared that Stalin’s foremost goal was to destabilize Western influence through the spread of communism. They contended that communism should be avoided because it presented a perfect breeding ground for dictatorships. This invariably placed it on a collision course with the Soviet Union, which had plans of extending and asserting its dominance in Europe, especially on the Eastern side. The adoption of communism by most of the East European countries and China gave the Soviet Union’s confidence a significant boost. As such, it adopted a policy of challenging the policies fronted by the United States. Subsequently, the two world heavyweights locked horns in a battle of wits as they used ideological, diplomatic, military, and propaganda to outdo each other. In essence, the tussle to fill the power vacuum in Europe played a prominent role in the emergence of the cold war.[University of Sargodha. International relations since 1945: Impact of World War II on global politics. 2002. https://lms.su.edu.pk/lesson/1352/week-1-impact-of-world-war-ii-on-global-politics, par. 5.] [Anne-Marie Scholz. "Preaching to the Unconverted: The Third Man (1949) as Historical Resource for Exploring the Topic of Americans in Vienna, 1945–1955." Resource for Exploring the Topic of Americans in Vienna, 1945– 5, no. 2 (2021): 157.] [Gunter Bischof. "The Post–World War II Allied Occupation of Austria: What Can We Learn about It for Iraq in Successful Nation Building?" Journal of Austrian-American History 4 (2020), 44.] [Jeffrey P. Stone. British and American News Maps in the Early Cold War Period, 1945-1955. Palgrave Macmillan, 2019: 181.] [George F. Kennan. "The Sources of Soviet Conduct." 1947, 1-24.]
Emergence of the U.S. and Soviet Union
As indicated above, the United States and the Soviet Union fought on the same side in the Second World War. What guaranteed their victory in the war was the pursuit of a compatible objective using incompatible systems. In short, the success required the victors to either discard their inherent identity or give up much of what they had hoped to obtain while fighting the war. By all accounts, the two superpowers bore striking resemblances, which probably enabled them to shelve their ideological and diplomatic differences to fight on the same side. For instance, the two espoused ideologies with global aspirations, and their leaders believed that what worked at home would do so for the entire world. At the beginning of the war, they were the first and third largest countries in the world and advanced across vast frontiers. Equally, both were born in revolution and were goaded to the war by the surprise attack on the Soviet Union by Germany.[Gaddis, 6.]
The United States Revolution, which happened a century and a half before the Second World War, ushered equality, justice, and liberty into the country. It reflected a profound distrust for concentrated power, and the founding fathers held that constraining power was critical to the development and progress of any nation. On account of an ingenious constitution, isolation from potential rivals, and massive natural resources, the United States emerged as an extraordinarily powerful state, which was evident during the war. After the war, basing its actions on the ideologies fronted by the founding fathers, America sought to extend democracy to Europe and other parts of the world. As any keen observer would expect, this ruffled the feathers of the Soviet Union, keen on advancing communism the wrong way, paving the way for a series of conflicts.
The Soviet Union, born out of the Bolshevik Revolution, disparaged capitalism, terming it a nefarious system that exploited the working class. According to the Soviets, the system was incapable of adequately developing the resources of society. In addition, they claimed it did not guarantee the fair distribution of goods produced by human labor. That said, they embraced concentrated authority as their preferred system of governance. It used the system to overcome class enemies and consolidate a base to spread proletarian revolution across the world. For instance, a crisis emerged in 1946 after the Soviet Union proposed to end the international supervision of the Dardanelles and establish bases in Turkey. In response, President Harry Truman launched an onslaught against the Soviets with the backing of Turkey and British diplomacy. While the Soviet Union relaxed its grip on Turkey, it tightened its screws on Greece, which prompted the latter to appeal for help from the United States. That set the ground for the cold war, which was to last for 45 years. The conflict adopted the term “cold” because the two heavyweights involved were nominally at peace with each other. They only jabbed occasionally to test the weaknesses of the other. In sum, the emergence of the two titans became necessary as they attempted to outmuscle each other in dominating world politics.[George F. Kennan. "The Sources of Soviet Conduct." 1947, 2.] [Gaddis, 8.] [National Archives. The Cold War. September 23, 2016. archives.gov/research/foreign-policy/cold-war/symposium/cleveland.html., par. 7.]
Division of Germany and the Berlin Blockade
At the end of the Second World War, the four allied powers, France, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union, divided Germany among themselves. The Soviet Union took control over the Eastern part of Germany, while the other three took over the Western part of Germany. The same fate befell Germany's capital, Berlin, and matters got more complicated when West Berlin became a part of the Soviet zone. Although the Soviet Union and the United States had been allies during the war, they began to clash philosophically on numerous issues almost immediately after the war ended. Concerning Germany, they disagreed on how to rebuild the desolated country, resulting in tensions that later became the cold war. Driven by the fear that the Soviet Union would succeed in extending communism throughout Europe and parts of Asia, the United States began rebuilding war-torn Europe through a policy known as "containment." Its foremost objective was to propagate democracy in Europe at the expense of communism, favored by the Soviets. In that regard, it combined its section of Germany with those of France and Britain to form a unified West Berlin. This inevitably provoked the Soviet Union to cut off ground traffic into and out of West Berlin. Precisely, it was a desperate attempt to force the Allies out of the city and marked the genesis of the Berlin blockade. The blockade created an unprecedented crisis since the residents of West Berlin faced an acute shortage of food and other supplies. The United States evaluated several options to unlock the deadlock, including negotiating with the Soviet Union with the help of the newly formed United Nations. Ultimately, while acknowledging how important it was for his country to remain in Berlin, President Truman and the other allies initiated the Berlin Airlift. The operation entailed transporting supplies, fuel, and food into West Berlin. Since they feared reprisals from the Soviet Union, the Allies exercised careful planning and invested heavily in the operation. Eventually, the airlift was instrumental in helping the United States to maintain a foothold in post-war Germany and other parts of Europe.[Harry S. Truman Library and Museum. The Blockade of Berlin. n.d. /education/presidential-inquiries/blockade-berlin, par. 2.]
Formation of NATO and the Warsaw Pact
The aftermath of the Second World War saw the founding of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) by the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations in 1949. Its overriding agenda was to counter any possible attacks from the Soviet Union by providing collective security. It was the first military alliance the United States entered into outside the confines of the Western Hemisphere. This became necessary because many European countries were still reeling from the destruction caused by the Second World War. They struggled considerably to rebuild their economies and ensure security. As such, they required a massive influx of aid to revive industries and produce food. On the other hand, the United States needed assurances from a resurgent Germany and possible incursions from the Soviet Union. Additionally, it held the view that a reenergized and unified Europe would effectively help clip the wings of communism across the continent. That drove the Secretary of State, George Marshall, to introduce a large-scale aid initiative in what was known as the Marshall Plan. The refusal by the Soviet Union to participate in the program heightened the growing divisions between East and West Europe.[Office of the Historian. North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), 1949. n.d. https://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/nato, par. 1.] [Office of the Historian, par.2.]
To counter the activities advanced by NATO, the Soviet Union and several Eastern European countries entered into a political and military alliance in 1955. They founded the Warsaw Treaty Organization, otherwise known as the Warsaw Treaty. One development that constrained the Soviet Union to engage in the treaty was the unexpected entry into NATO of the Federal Republic of Germany in May 1955. It feared the growing strength of NATO and a revitalized West Germany and hoped the Warsaw Treaty Organization could negotiate with NATO as an equal partner. Moreover, rampant civil unrest marked most parts of Eastern Europe, leaving it extensively fragmented. As such, the Soviet Union hoped that the treaty would unify and tie Eastern European capital more closely. Among the notable features of the pact was the pledge by member countries to defend each other in the face of attacks from outside. Similarly, the pact emphasized non-interference in the internal affairs of member countries. Ultimately, the Soviet Union controlled a huge chunk of the pact’s decision and used it to mitigate popular dissent. One of the notable architects of the treaty was the Soviet Union leader, Khrushchev. Unlike his predecessor Stalin, Khrushchev was charismatic and accommodating to a considerable degree. He was also easy-going, an attribute he most probably picked from his humble beginnings. As such, he did not have a difficult time convincing other Eastern Europe countries to sign up.[Office of the Historian.] [William Taubman. Khrushchev: The Man and his Era. Simon & Schuster UK Ltd, 2005.]
Economic Factors
The Marshall Plan and Soviet Response
One can never exhaustively ventilate the cold war without roping in the economic implications associated with the decades-long conflict, for they were...