An introduction to the history of the end of the cold war in the united states

How did the cold war end

The first H-bomb test, in the Eniwetok atoll in the Marshall Islands, showed just how fearsome the nuclear age could be. Army under the direction of rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, and what came to be known as the Space Race was underway. Roosevelt used presidential authority to normalize relations in November President Dwight D. At no time, except perhaps during the Cuban Missile Crisis , did the Cold War bring the world so close to direct hostilities between the major powers. On December 8, , the Soviet Union ceased to exist. For the next decade, both nations continually produced more nuclear weapons and more sophisticated missiles to deliver them. In this period the Soviets unsuccessfully blockaded the Western-held sectors of West Berlin —49 ; the United States and its European allies formed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization NATO , a unified military command to resist the Soviet presence in Europe ; the Soviets exploded their first atomic warhead , thus ending the American monopoly on the atomic bomb; the Chinese communists came to power in mainland China ; and the Soviet-supported communist government of North Korea invaded U. From onwards, the two adversaries, employing all the resources at their disposal for intimidation and subversion, clashed in a lengthy strategic and ideological conflict punctuated by crises of varying intensity.

The Cold War began after the surrender of Nazi Germany inwhen the uneasy alliance between the United States and Great Britain on the one hand and the Soviet Union on the other started to fall apart. Top Questions What was the Cold War?

what factors led to the end of the cold war

The Cold War truly began to break down during the administration of Mikhail Gorbachevwho changed the more totalitarian aspects of the Soviet government and tried to democratize its political system. Allied troops in VladivostokAugustduring the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War While most historians trace the origins of the Cold War to the period immediately following World War II, others argue that it began with the October Revolution in Russia in when the Bolsheviks took power.

Army under the direction of rocket scientist Wernher von Braun, and what came to be known as the Space Race was underway. As the president made clear in a speech, the ultimate goal of the United States and its allies was not simply to manage the Cold War — it was to peacefully advance freedom and democracy, sweeping communism aside in the process Document Thus, the Soviet Union sent troops to preserve communist rule in East GermanyHungaryCzechoslovakiaand Afghanistan Although the two Great Powers never fought directly, they pushed the world to the brink of nuclear war on several occasions.

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cold war combatants

For full treatment, see international relations. Another intense stage of the Cold War was in — Inthe Soviet Union had crushed a democratic uprising in communist Hungary Document 17 ; thirty years later, Gorbachev announced that the Soviet Union would not use force to intervene in the domestic affairs of communist nations.

Nuclear deterrence was the only effective means of preventing a military confrontation. Inthe United States and the Soviet Union, along with other nations, drafted and signed a nuclear test ban treaty in hopes that the quest for more powerful nuclear arms could be slowed Document

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Cold War: Summary, Combatants & Timeline