The Origins of the Cold War: Division, Conflict, and Crisis
The Maximum Tension: Early Cold War Conflicts
The Economic Division of Europe
The Marshall Plan
The U.S. government devised a strategy to revive the economies of European countries that were favorable, which was named the Marshall Plan. The Marshall Plan included almost all Western European countries except Spain, as the Franco dictatorship was considered anti-democratic. The United States scheme had two objectives:
- To improve living standards in Europe and thus ward off revolutionary movements.
- To maintain European demand to avoid an overproduction crisis in its own industry.
COMECON (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance)
U.S. aid did not reach the Eastern European states because Stalin refused its terms and pressured the governments in his area of influence to do likewise. In 1949, the Soviet Union created the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (COMECON), whose aim was to coordinate the economic policies of the countries of Eastern Europe and establish mechanisms for mutual assistance.
The Berlin Crisis
After the war, Germany was divided into four zones, each managed by an Allied country: the US, the UK, France, and the USSR. Berlin was located in the Soviet zone and, in turn, was divided into four areas administered by the same countries.
In 1948, the United States, Britain, and France agreed to German unification into one state, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). The USSR responded by creating an independent state in its sector of Germany: the German Democratic Republic (GDR).
Creation of Military Blocs
The Western bloc established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949. In 1955, the opposing bloc signed the Warsaw Pact.
The Triumph of Communism in China
In 1949, the Chinese Communist Party took power, and Mao Zedong proclaimed the People’s Republic of China.
The Korean War
Korea was part of the Japanese Empire before World War II. After the Japanese defeat in 1945, it was divided into two states by the 38th parallel:
- North Korea, linked to the Soviet Union.
- South Korea, dependent on the United States.
The Communist victory in China strengthened the idea of North Korean leader Kim Il Sung to unify the peninsula. In June 1950, troops from the North invaded the South and easily conquered almost the whole territory. The United States reacted immediately and obtained a resolution condemning the invasion from the United Nations Security Council (as the USSR was absent that year), along with permission to intervene militarily.
The inability of both sides to achieve victory without resorting to nuclear weapons led to the signing of the armistice in 1953, an agreement confirming the situation at the beginning of the conflict. Close to a million and a half people died for nothing.
Consequences of Cold War Tensions in the US
The rise of the communist bloc unleashed a tide of anti-communist sentiment in the United States, whose greatest exponent was the witch hunt sponsored by Senator McCarthy and his Un-American Activities Committee. Thousands of people, especially artists and intellectuals, were accused of sympathizing with communism, and many lost their jobs. Some even suffered imprisonment for their political beliefs.