![]() He predicted that Soviet communism would eventually collapse from internal factors.įor one moment in the Cold War, the eyes of the world focused on Iowa when Iowa corn seed salesman Roswell Garst hosted the premier of the Soviet Union, Nikita Khrushchev, on a visit his farm near Coon Rapids. George Kennan, an American diplomat, developed the “containment” theory that advocated for policies that prevented Soviets from expanding but did not initiate military moves to roll back communist control. Some politicians, most often Republicans, favored a more aggressive stance toward the Soviet Union and a build-up of American military forces. Finally, Russian ships turned around and the immediate crisis was over. For 13 days, the world anxiously awaited the outcome. discovered that the Soviets were sending missiles to Cuba capable of attacking American cities. A very real threat came in October 1962, when the U.S. There was always the danger that a conflict anywhere could touch off a conflict that might escalate into the use of nuclear weapons. Politicsįor the next 40 years, the Cold War was the focus of American foreign policy. Cold War Tensions Reign Supreme Over U.S. In another shock to Americans, communist China military forces won a bloody civil war while forces loyal to the west fled to the island of Taiwan. Until then, the United States had been the only atomic power, and the only nation that had ever used the atomic bomb in the attack on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which rapidly led to a Japanese surrender. This effectively ended his national political career of nearly two decades from his appointment as Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Secretary of Agriculture in 1933, his election as vice president in 1940 and next in line to the presidency through World War II, and a term as Secretary of Commerce under President Truman.Ĭold War tensions became even stronger when the Soviet Union exploded its first atomic bomb in 1949. He was soundly defeated and tagged as sympathetic to communism. Wallace ran for president on a platform that sought to reduce tensions and find ways to cooperate with the Soviet Union. Russia responded with a similar military alliance in eastern Europe. The member nations declared that an attack on any one would be considered an attack on all. and the nations of western Europe created the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). When Russia shut off land routes to the city from the west, President Harry Truman ordered a massive air lift of supplies to send the message that the west would not abandon its European allies. Control of Berlin, the capital city of a defeated Germany, was shared by Russian, British and U.S. began rebuilding western Europe with economic aid through the Marshall Plan while eastern Europe struggled. Post-WWII Relationship Crumbles Between U.S. Britain’s Prime Minister Winston Churchill declared that Russia had erected an “iron curtain” in Eastern Europe to force communism upon the countries it had occupied at the end of the war. In the years that followed, however, the partnership broke down into a struggle between the west, led by the United States, and the communist bloc backed by the Soviets. In World War II, the United States and Great Britain teamed up with the Soviet Union to defeat Adolf Hitler’s Germany. How do you win a war of ideals at home and abroad?
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