The Seven Phases Of The Cold War

Combined with the U.S. marshal plan of 1948, the rebuilding of war torn Europe had begun, and as the physical Europe took shape, so did his new political system. And in the attempt to assert its own influence in world affairs, the Soviet Union blocked land routes to the U.S., British, and French zones of Berlin in June of 1948. The move was directly seen as an attempt to limit any non Soviet influence in the former German capital. The responding Berlin airlift demonstrated the U.S. commitment to opposing the blockade. For ten months, the United States kept the people of western Berlin supplied with food and medicine. Although the Soviets ended the blockade of Berlin on May 11th, 1949, the division of Europe and the spheres of influence had already occurred. And would grow for the next 40 years. Phase two, the creation of NATO, 1949. The aggressive course of the Soviet blockade of Berlin in 1948 increased the perceived need of Western European countries to seek a mutual defense alliance that could withstand any future Soviet action. 

The result was the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO, between the United States, Great Britain, France, Italy, and 8 other democratic nations pledged to mutually protect each other. NATO was opposed by the Soviet influenced countries of Eastern Europe. When West Germany joined NATO in 1955, the Soviets responded by creating the Warsaw Pact. The Warsaw Pact was a military alliance between the governments of the Soviet Union, East Germany, Poland, and 5 other Eastern European countries, a line of demarcation in Europe had clearly been drawn by the Warsaw Pact's creation of an iron curtain. This division would dominate world politics as a new arms race began between western and eastern spheres of influence, the posed the horrible prospect of global annihilation. Phase three, Korean conflict begins 1950. Following the end of hostilities in the Pacific theater of World War II, the Peninsula of Korea was liberated from Japanese control. The 1948 division of the Peninsula into two halves reflects the overall division of the world's countries into the Cold War alliances. On June 25th, 1950, communist backed North Korea crossed the 38th parallel, dividing the Peninsula, and invaded non communist backed South Korea. 

President Truman committed American forces as the leading contingent of the United Nations troops sent the block the communist aggression. When communist forces from Mainland China entered the war on the side of the North Korean forces, prolonged series of land engagements resulted that destroyed much of the country and killed tens of thousands of people, including 53,000 American servicemen. Neither side could claim an ultimate victory, although a ceasefire was arranged in 1953, the 38th parallel remains to this day, one of the most heavily fortified borders on earth. Phase four, mccarthyism and the red scare, 1950 to 1954. In the U.S. House of Representatives, the House committee on un American activities have been investigating suspected communists since the late 1930s. It became a standing committee in 1945, and within a short period of time had succeeded in blacklisting 300 American artists, including screenwriters, directors, actors, and radio personalities. 

The emergence of senator Joseph McCarthy in 1950, and the subsequent tidings committee hearings in the U.S. Senate added fuel to the witch hunt hysteria, seeking out supposed Communist Party members within the United States. Capitalizing on world events and the prevalent fear of Americans regarding Soviet aggression. McCarthy used fear and intimidation to investigate possible subversive threats to the U.S. Constitution. Claiming to have a list of Communist Party members working within the U.S. State Department, McCarthy and flamed public fears. In reality, McCarthy had an outdated list from previous congressional investigations and proceeded to create a false image surrounding anyone whom in his judgment did not represent what a good American citizen should be. McCarthy tried to pressure several sections of America's society to purge themselves of any communist sympathizers. In 1954, McCarthy's abusive tactics ended up with the U.S. Army accusing the senator and his chief counsel, a pressuring the army into giving preferential treatment to a former McCarthy aide and friend. 

The televised congressional hearings should have indicted and petty McCarthy, and the eyes of much of the American public, and substantially weakened his national popularity. Phase 5 launched a Sputnik one, 1957. On October 4th, 1957, the Soviet Union's launch of the first artificial satellite into the earth's orbit ushered in the space race phase of the overall accelerated arms and technology race that had been on since the creation of the Cold War alliance system. The national aeronautics and space administration, NASA was the primary response of the U.S., and by the end of the next decade, the American successfully had landed men on the moon and returned them safely to the earth. An increased national academic focus on science and mathematics had resounding implications, not limited to the alliances, as the space race greatly increased the overall technological capabilities of both east and west. 

The Cuban missile crisis, 1962. On October 22nd, 1962, the Cold War threatened to turn hot. The Soviet Union had been caught by U.S. surveillance aircraft, building secret missile bases in Cuba that had the capability to launch nuclear weapons at the United States. Soviet Union had decided to build the missile sites largely in response to increased military cooperation between the United States and turkey, which the Soviets perceived as a threat to their sphere of influence. With Soviet nuclear missiles located approximately 90 miles off the American coast. President Kennedy ordered the United States Navy to blockade the island of Cuba and prevent any material for the missile sites from being delivered. Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev, in turn, ordered Soviet missile crews to launch their missiles at the United States if U.S. forces attempted an invasion of Cuba. For 6 days the world watched and prayed, as U.S. and Soviet forces sit on full alert. 

Finally, on October 28th, khrushchev ordered all Soviet ships carrying missiles out of Cuban waters, and agreed to dismantle the missile sites and withdraw all missiles from Cuba. Phase 7, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the iron curtain, 1989 to 1991. After the Cuban missile crisis, tensions between NATO countries and forces of the Warsaw Pact remained, as each side had a deeply ingrained distrust of the other side. The American experience in Vietnam and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan demonstrated just how quickly hotspots could break out in this tense international environment. Beginning in 1981, the United States began a massive modernization and enlargement of key strategic forces. For 8 long years the Soviet Union attempted to keep pace with the increased military preparation, resulting in disastrous consequences for the economies of both the Soviet Union and Warsaw Pact countries. As the economies of the Warsaw Pact countries faltered, the people of these various lands began to demand change. 

Unlike in previous years, when the Soviet Union cracked down brutally on any perceived subversive elements, the introduction of the policies of vastus, meaning openness and perestroika, which was an economical and political, social restructuring, by Soviet general secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, announced the beginning of the end of the iron curtain. The people of the world watched in amazement as a series of events unfolded. The citizens of Poland, largely guided by the solidarity movement, peacefully took control of the government from communist leaders. The iron curtain came down, Germany was reunited. The countries of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia declared their independence, and in a remarkably bloodless transition, the peoples of Russia and Eastern Europe ended the Soviet regime and entered a new era seeking democratic forms of government.