The term was first used in 1947 to explain US- Soviet relations. Both countries employed ideological, military, and political instruments against each other w/o actually waging a real war. Delay of Second Front End of Lend-Lease Aid Soviet fears about a United Nations dominated by capitalist/democratic countries US resentment of late Soviet entry into Pacific war Churchill, FDR, Stalin August 6: Hiroshima August 8: Soviet entry in Pacific August 9: Nagasaki Yalta Conference The sharing of Atomic technology 1946 Soviets reject Baruch Plan Atom bomb dome in Hiroshimas Peace Memorial Park, maintained as a reminder of the power of atomic weapons Division of Germany Free elections not held in Poland Soviet armies remain Ideological competition Capitalism v. Communism Personalities of Stalin and American policy makers Joseph Stalin Harry S Truman Dean Acheson American global economic expansion Absence of a common enemy US must have access to Middle East oil and global markets Soviet Union needs security belt on its frontiersa buffer zone in Eastern Europe Policy of containmentUS gives aide to Greece, Turkey (Truman Doctrine) and Western Europe (Marshall Plan) George C. Marshall McCarthyism (Second Red Scare) Delay of Civil Rights Movement The growth of the military-industrial complex We must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. D. Eisenhower, 1961 Reagans evil empire and the US decision to deploy Pershing II nuclear missiles to Europe ( March 8,1983) Ronald Reagan Mikhail Gorbachev From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Winston Churchill at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri March 5, 1946 President Harry Truman Berlin airlift ends Soviet blockade 1948 NATO 1949 Warsaw Pact 1955 American and Soviet arms race Nikita Khrushchev Korean War ( ) Cuban Missile Crisis (October 1962) Vietnam War ( )