The Origins Of The Cold War

DISARMAMENT

4 min read

A Short-lived Alliance

The alliance between the USSR, the United States and the United Kingdom during the Second World War was clearly the product of a shared objective: preventing Nazi Germany from dominating Europe. As Stalin himself stated on the eve of the 1945 Yalta Conference, where the three powers would decide the fate of postwar Europe, the Communist and Western blocs would eventually find themselves in conflict.

At the Potsdam Conference, defeated Germany was dismantled and divided into four occupation zones—Soviet, American, British and French. The German economy was supposed to be administered as a single unit, according to policies agreed upon jointly. In practice, however, the different objectives, particular interests and mutual distrust of the occupying powers brought cooperation to an end.

The Soviets relied on war reparations imposed on Germany and, in the meantime, transferred much of the industrial equipment in their occupation zone back to the USSR. The Americans and British, by contrast, declared that they wanted to promote Germany's economic recovery and that reparations should be paid only from production surpluses. Thus, while the Western powers denied the USSR reparations from the Ruhr—a heavily industrialized region within the British occupation zone—the Soviets blocked the joint use of resources.

The Soviets feared that a revived Germany under American economic domination would, within a few years, lead to an Anglo-German-American war against the USSR. The Americans and British, meanwhile, had to prevent Germany from remaining economically weak and politically unstable, as this could provide fertile ground for German nationalist or even Communist opposition, with the risk that the Soviets would bring Germany into their sphere of influence. They therefore moved toward unilateral administration of their respective zones, merging the British and American zones into a Bizone in September 1946.

The Soviet-American Rivalry Takes Shape

On the Asian front in 1945, Stalin had announced that the USSR would enter the war against Japan. The move was intended to secure strategically important territories in the Far East while also providing a diplomatic concession welcomed by the Americans. After Hiroshima, however, Stalin realized that the United States might be able to end the war without Soviet assistance—and that is what happened. The Americans occupied Japan on their own, disappointing Soviet expectations.

This, and above all the American possession of the atomic bomb, placed the United States in a dominant position and altered the international balance of power. Stalin immediately ordered the launch of a Soviet nuclear program and instructed Foreign Minister Molotov to adopt a firm diplomatic posture, which contributed, among other things, to the Soviet refusal to join the Bretton Woods institutions. These were the first signs of the arms race.

On February 9, 1946, Stalin announced to Soviet citizens the beginning of a period of forced development, justified by the need to strengthen national security. Ninety percent of investment would be directed toward heavy industry. This marked the beginning of a period of repression and stricter discipline, justified by the Leninist doctrine of an inevitable conflict between capitalism and communism.

Less than a month later, Churchill accused the Soviets of pursuing unlimited expansion of their power and ideology, declaring that an “iron curtain” had descended between East and West.

The Truman Doctrine and the Beginning of the Cold War

In March 1947, the United Kingdom announced that it could no longer provide aid to the conservative Greek government, which was fighting a civil war against Communist armed groups. For the Americans, this was an opportunity to assume leadership of the Western world's resistance to totalitarianism.

On March 12, Truman asked Congress to finance aid to Greece. In a historic speech, he declared that the United States had a duty to assist nations whose freedom was threatened and to prevent the spread of totalitarianism. His words established the new international framework: a global American commitment and an explicit confrontation with the Soviet world. The Cold War had begun.

The strategy Washington would adopt, then and in the years that followed, to counter the USSR and its territorial and ideological expansion was known as containment. In the words of its architect, diplomat George Kennan, it consisted of an “able and vigilant application of counterforce along a constantly shifting series of geographical and political points” corresponding to changes and maneuvers in Soviet policy.

In practice, this meant continuously “encircling” the Soviet Union geographically or politically, depending on circumstances, in response to each Soviet move, without necessarily launching a direct attack.

The Marshall Plan and the Division of Europe

In June of the same year, the United States announced the Marshall Plan, a program of aid intended to promote Europe's economic recovery. It also had a strategic purpose: participating countries would be subject to economic coordination, allowing the United States to prevent them from falling under Soviet influence.

Stalin denounced the initiative as an attempt at interference designed to subordinate the economies of the recipient countries to American interests. He therefore ordered Poland and Czechoslovakia to reject the proposal.

In September 1947, the Communist parties of Italy, France and the Eastern European countries were summoned to a meeting in Poland and instructed to resist American plans. In Eastern Europe, totalitarian regimes were established under local Communist parties subordinate to Moscow.

Meanwhile, the United States reorganized its national security system, creating a new Department of Defense, a National Security Council and an intelligence agency: the CIA.

Berlin and the Division of Germany

In June 1948, the USSR imposed the so-called “Berlin Blockade”. The city was occupied by all four victorious powers but was completely surrounded by the Soviet occupation zone. The Soviets blocked all land access and restricted electricity supplies to only a few hours a day.

The United States and the United Kingdom decided not to withdraw. Instead, they established an airlift to keep Berlin supplied, winning the support of the city's population.

On April 4, 1949, the treaty establishing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was signed. It created a collective defense alliance in the event of an attack on any member state, initially comprising Canada, the United States and ten European countries, with several others joining later.

In May 1949, the Soviets lifted the blockade. That same month, the Western occupation zones of Germany were united to form the Federal Republic of Germany, sovereign in its internal affairs but demilitarized. In October, the German Democratic Republic was established in the Soviet zone, governed by a Communist regime under Moscow's supervision.