As World War II (WW II) was coming to a close, it became clear that German policies were likely to be replaced by other emerging powers. This essay explains how the Cold War ideology that crystallized after WWII changed wartime alliances that had existed during the war and how American Cold War policies and practices influenced international relations from the late 1940s to the mid-1950s.
In 1939, the secret Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Nazi Germany and Russia aimed to secretly divide Europe into their two dominions centered on Poland (Neimanis, 1997, p. 53). However, when Hitler broke the pact and attacked Russia in 1941, an ideologically opposed Russia joined the Allied Forces out of convenience. So as the war came to a close, Russian expansion began almost immediately causing a US diplomat in Moscow in 1946 to send the ‘Long Telegram’ calling for an American response of containment (Gaddis, 2005, pp. 29-31).
America shaped its policies by announcing the Truman Doctrine in 1947 that essentially declared the U.S. intention to spread democracy worldwide and fight the spread of communism. In pursuance of the Truman Doctrine, the U.S. promulgated the National Security Act of 1947 which gave birth to the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) which was mandated to conduct covert operations aimed basically at containing communism. On the diplomatic and economic front, the Marshall Plan was initiated in 1948 to reconstruct war-torn Europe and bring West European countries within the American fold. On the military front, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) was created in 1949 specifically to combat the Soviet-led bloc. Globally, America fought wars either directly or through proxies to prevent the spread of Communism.
It can be thus concluded that differing ideologies of the U.S and the Soviet Union led to the Cold War. American policies in the 1940s and 50s revolved around the containment of communism and the spread of democracy that led to the promulgation of the Truman Doctrine, the creation of the CIA, the Marshall Plan, the NATO, overt and covert actions including proxy wars to counter Soviet expansion.
One of the benefits of WWII was that it removed the effects of the Great Depression (O’Sullivan & Keuchel, 1989, p. 191) as the government increased industrial production in America to meet the wartime demands of its allies and its own domestic demand. It also removed unemployment across America. After the war, returning GIs flush with money saved during the war fuelled the American housing boom as entrepreneurs utilized the wartime experience of constructing mass housing for private enterprises. The demobilization that resulted after the war was quickly harnessed by converting war industries into civil industries. Wartime rationing was removed as civil industries produced a surfeit of consumer products leading to a boom in consumerism. By 1956, over three-quarters of American homes had television sets (O’Sullivan & Keuchel, p. 205). WWII laid the foundation for America’s lead in Defense-industrial complex that only increased spending and creating jobs during the Cold War. The first commercial computer UNIVAC came into the American markets in 1950, laying groundwork for America’s lead in computer technology in the years to come. With Europe in shambles, it was American industry that provided the needed white goods to much of the world. General Motors, Ford and Chrysler became leaders of the global automobile industry. Cars required roads and thus were born extensive highway projects that added to the boom. Agricultural sector too flourished.
Works Cited
Gaddis, J. L. (2005). The Cold War; A New History. NY: Penguin.
Neimanis, G. J. (1997). The collapse of the Soviet Empire: a view from Riga. Santa Barbara: Greenwood Publishing Group.
O’Sullivan, J., & Keuchel, E. F. (1989). American Economic History: From Abundance to Constraint. NJ: Markus Wiener Publishers.