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Two Definitions

Cold War

• a state of political hostility between countries characterized by threats, propaganda, and other measures short of open warfare.

• the state of political hostility that existed between the Soviet bloc countries and the US-led Western powers from 1945 to 1990.

Two Sides

NATO & Warsaw Pact

• NATO – North Atlantic Treaty Organization an international organization established in 1949 by the North Atlantic Treaty for the purpose of collective security against aggressors.

• USA, France, Great Britain, West Germany and other European nations.

• Warsaw Pact –A military alliance of communist nations in eastern Europe. Organized in 1955 in answer to NATO.

• Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union.

The Cold War 1945-1991

The Iron Curtain

• A term used by Winston Churchill in 1946 to describe the line of demarcation between Western Europe and the Soviet zone of influence.

• The Iron Curtain is a term used in the West to refer to the boundary line which divided Europe into two separate areas of political influence from the end of World War II until the end of the Cold War.

• Truman Doctrine established that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces.

• The Marshall Plan (officially the European Recovery Program, ERP) The United States gave economic support to help rebuild European economies after the end of World War II in order to prevent the spread of Soviet Communism.

• Containment was a United States policy that stated the Soviet Union needed to be contained to prevent the spread of communism abroad. It was suggested, by George Kennan that the US needed to fight communism and promote democracy.

Review

Causes Cold War

Causes of the Cold War in 1945• American fear of communist attack• Truman’s dislike of Stalin• USSR’s fear of the American's atomic bomb• USSR’s dislike of capitalism• America’s refusal to share nuclear secrets• USSR’s expansion west into Eastern Europe • USSR’s fear of American attack• USSR’s need for a secure western border• USSR’s aim of spreading world communism