REASONS FOR

THE COLD WAR

Unit 1.1
LONG TERM RIVALRY
BETWEEN THE SOVIET
UNION AND THE WEST
What you need to
know
◦ In this section you will learn about the reasons
why the Cold War started. This will include:
◦ Ideological differences between the Soviet Union
and the USA: communism and capitalism.
◦ Tensions between the Soviet Union and its allies
during the Second World War.
◦ The agreements made about post-war Europe in the
wartime conferences.
◦ The way the Soviet Union took control in Eastern
Europe.
◦ The clash between the post-war leaders of the USA
and the Soviet Union: Truman and Stalin.
EAST – WEST RELATIONS, 1943-45
The Grand Alliance
◦ The USA, USSR and Britain fought
together as allies during the Second
World War.
◦ However, it was a strategic wartime
alliance not a bond of brotherhood.
◦ The USSR had been a communist
country for more than 30 years.
The Grand Alliance
◦ Most politicians and business leaders in
Britain and the USA hated and feared
communist ideas.
◦ In the past they had helped the enemies of
the communists. This made the USSR wary
of Britain and the USA.
◦ So, in many ways the surprising thing is that
these old rivals managed a war-time alliance
at all. But they did and by 1945 they had
defeated Germany.
Deteriorating
Relations
◦ Joseph Stalin was the leader of the
Soviet Union during the Second World
War.
◦ In June 1941, after Hitler invaded the
Soviet Union, Stalin joined the Allies in
fighting against Nazi Germany: this put
the USA and the Soviet Union on the
same side.
Deteriorating
Relations
◦ The Soviet Union suffered terribly from the
German invasion.
◦ It is estimated that 27 million Soviet citizens
were killed in the Great Patriotic War (the
Soviet name for the Second World War).
◦ At the same time, over 4 million German
soldiers were killed fighting on the Eastern
Front against the Soviet Union.
◦ The Soviet Union eventually defeated the
Germans in Berlin in May 1945.
Deteriorating Relations

◦ The Allied invasion of German-occupied

France in 1944 meant Germany was now
fighting on two fronts.
◦ But Stalin had been demanding this invasion
go ahead since 1941. He was convinced the
Allies wanted to see the Soviet Union
weakened by fighting Germany.
Deteriorating Relations

◦ Stalin thought the Allies left the invasion of France

for as long as they could in order to achieve this –
possibly with the plan of attacking the Soviet Union
as soon as it had defeated Germany.
◦ There were also tensions between the Allies over
what should happen to Germany once it had been
defeated.
◦ The Soviet Union wanted to make sure Germany
could never be a threat to it again. The USA and
Britain, in particular, did not want to see Germany
destroyed.
Deteriorating Relations

◦ Churchill, the British leader, was suspicious about

Stalin’s plans for Eastern Europe after the war.
◦ As the Soviet Union’s Red Army advanced on
Germany, it took control in Eastern European
countries such as Poland which had been occupied
by the Germans.
◦ Churchill thought Stalin planned to keep hold of
these countries after the war.
A return to pre-war
positions
◦ The truth was that in 1945 relations simply
returned to where they had been before the war.
◦ At the start of the war, the relations between the
Soviet Union and the West had been poor and
there was little trust between them.
◦ That lack of trust can be explained by looking at
the different set of beliefs they had and the way
that they had treated each other since the dramatic
year 1917, when first the tsar was overthrown,
and then a communist government was set up in
Russia.
IDEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES
BETWEEN CAPITALISM AND
COMMUNISM
Communism and the
Soviet Union
◦ The Soviet Union was formed soon after a
revolution in the Russian Empire in 1917.
◦ The revolution was led by communists, who
wanted the Soviet Union to develop into the
world’s first communist state.
◦ In a communist state there would be no private
property or inequality: everyone would work for
the benefit of everyone else.
◦ The rights of individuals would be seen as less
important than the good of society as a whole.
Communism and the
Soviet Union
◦ The first step to communism was for the
state to take control of everything. Only one
party was allowed: the Communist Party.
This controlled the state.
◦ However, the Soviet Union needed other
countries to become communist too:
otherwise it did not have the industrial base
it required.
◦ Consequently, the Soviet Union worked to
encourage communist revolutions in other
countries.
Capitalism and the
USA
◦ The USA was built on the idea that every American
had the chance to make a great life for themselves
based on their own effort: the American Dream.
◦ The rights of individuals, and their individual
freedoms, were the most important thing.
◦ Freedom was an essential core belief for the USA:
this included the freedom to vote in democratic
elections, freedom of speech and freedom of
religion (to believe what you wanted).
Capitalism and the USA

◦ The USA was a capitalist state. This meant

individuals owned businesses and worked to
make them as profitable as possible because
the bigger the profits, the richer they became.
By doing this, these individuals created jobs
for others.
◦ However, capitalism also created inequalities:
poor people whose lives were not as good as
rich people’s.
WHEN IT BECAME CLEAR THAT NAZI GERMANY (AND
ITS ALLY, JAPAN) WOULD BE DEFEATED, THE TENSION
INCREASED AS THE DIFFERENT IDEOLOGIES LED TO
CONFLICT OVER HOW EUROPE SHOULD BE
GOVERNED AFTER THE WAR.
EARLY CONFLICT
Russia’s involvement in
WWI and subsequent civil
war
◦ Russia, having participated as a part of the
Triple Entente in WWI exited the war early
in 1917
◦ Britain, France and the USA were very
furious they had dropped out
◦ They were also particular disapproving of
their political beliefs, hence support the
Whites to defeat the Reds to coax the
Russians back into war
◦ They were unsuccessful of course on both
counts.
 DETERIORATING
RELATIONS IN THE 1920S
AND 30S
Soviet Union becomes
official in 1922
◦ Communism was despised in the West. This made relations
complicated, especially prior to WWII

◦ During the period of appeasement, the British, French and

Italians agreed to allow Hitler to take over parts of
Czechoslovakia, which was very close to the border of the
Soviet Union. Stalin was never asked for his opinion, and,
considering that the Soviets and the Nazis were enemies. It
gave Stalin the impression the West didn’t care.
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact or the
Nazi-Soviet Pact
◦ Both the Germans and the Soviets wanted Poland. Hitler would not try to invade,
as he knew Stalin would retaliate. So, a non-aggression pact was signed.

◦ Its clauses provided a written guarantee of peace by each party towards the other
and a commitment that declared that neither government would ally itself to or aid
an enemy of the other.

◦ But MUCH MORE importantly, in addition to the publicly-announced

stipulations of non-aggression, the treaty included the Secret Protocol, which
defined the borders of Soviet and German spheres of influence across Poland,
Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland.