Cold War: Beginning (1945–1952)

MAD atmostphere and and insecure feelings must have plagued everyone during this time... That its the nature of a cold war. Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) is on the minds of many. So here is the beginning of the Cold War....

Cold War was a period of tense relations and suspicion that existed between the capitalist west and the communist east between 1945 and 1991. There was a breakdown of wartime alliance towards the end of World War 2. Stalin felt that Allies wanted USSR weakened at the end of the war. Lend-Lease Scheme in January 1945 refused a.... $6 billion loan and in May 1945, reduced shipment of supplies to USSR. USSR perceived US as being unwilling to help her and became defensive. Stalin also started efforts to develop atomic bomb when USA did not inform him about the use of it in WWII. The defeat of Germany then saw no common enemy to bond Allies and USSR. The Yalta Conference in February 1945 accumulated tensions and gradually exposed differences between the USSR and Western Allies. Stalin’s setting up a communist government in Poland and demand to fix Poland’s border at the Oder-Neisse River went against the wishes of the Western Allies. However, it was agreed that both USSR and Britain be granted partial predominance in Romania, Yugoslavia and Greece, on the accord that free elections would be held. At the July 1945 Potsdam conference, Stalin persisted and re-fixed Poland’s border, resulting in the expulsion of 5 million Germans. He further demanded reparations of $10 billion from Germany, in conflict with the Allies’ wishes and went against agreements by taking more industrial goods than stipulated, without returning the agreed items which were food, raw materials and coal. This was the case with Berlin. USA and Britain stopped sending industrial goods to Russia. Tensions increased. Tensions mounted with increasing aggressive moves by the USSR. The USSR carried out Sovietisation from 1944-49, the extension of Communist influence. Satellite states were established in Eastern Europe with use of Red Army. Soviet-style policies and measures were established through the Comecon and Cominform. The Cominform was formed for all satellite states to join and ensured that their governments followed USSR’s. The Comecon was formed in 1949 to plan the economies of satellite states. Hostile political maneuvers like replacing the satellite states’ leaders with communists and purging all other parties to establish one-party states were made. The competition for territory and control increased tensions. In March 1946, Churchill made the Iron Curtain Speech, stating that Sovietisation process was a move for indefinite expansion of control. Stalin retaliated by accusing Churchill of propagating a racial theory. Churchill’s call for Western Allies to stand against the communist ‘threat’ had formed two opposing camps, the West and USSR. Stalin then became more hostile at meetings and placed extra pressure on Greece and Turkey to be satellite states. On the March of 1947, USA implemented the Truman Doctrine, stating that pro-capitalist nations would receive monetary and military aid from USA. It aimed to contain the spread of communism by winning countries over like Greece and Turkey. In July 1947, the Marshall plan was introduced. It aimed to undermine Soviet influence and revive the European economy. Its success angered the Russians and they accused US of dollar imperialism. USSR then responded to US’s move with the Molotov plan, which aimed to boost trade of Eastern Europe and refused satellite states to accept Marshall Aid. Rift between the two blocs widened. Berlin was divided into 4 zones, each controlled by the US, Britain, France and USSR. The West merged their zones by 1948. The exclusion of Russia left Stalin with mistrust and suspicion. The USSR imposed the Berlin Blockade to separate West Berlin from Allied zones. It blocked all communication lines to West Berlin, aiming to drive the Western Allies out. However, the West airlifted supplies and food into West Berlin ever since. In response, the West imposed a counter-blockade which impacted East Berlin more adversely, as West Berlin’s economy was almost stagnant. The blockade was eventually lifted in May 1949. Tensions increased even more. In March 1948, Britain, France, Holland, Luxembourg, USA, Canada, Norway, Iceland, Denmark, Italy and Portugal formed the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) which expanded with Greece and West Germany’s inclusion in 1952 and 1955 respectively. This treaty was to protect the West against USSR aggression through mutual aid. Russia, fearful of Germany’s rearmament, created the Warsaw Pact, which included all communist states of Eastern Europe except Yugoslavia, under control of one Russian commander. The NATO and Warsaw Pact have now divided the whole of Europe into two warring camps.