THE COLD WAR

BEGINNING

• when the repeated delays in opening a second front in Europe made the Russians suspicious of the Western Allies' motives.
• The Cold War had its roots in World War II
• Those concerns were heightened when the United States discontinued lend‐lease aid to the Soviet Union soon after the war ended.
• The Cold War got its name because there were no bullets fired.
• It was a standoff between the USSR and the USA. It was a nuclear standoff where if one side fired a nuclear weapon, both sides agreed to M.A.D.

Economic Systems

• Capitalism generally refers to an economic system in which the means of production are all or mostly privately owned and operated for profit, and in which investments, distribution, income, production and pricing of goods and services are determined through the operation of a market economy
• Communism is an ideology that seeks to establish a classless, stateless social organization based on common ownership of the means of production. It is usually considered a branch of the broader socialist movement that draws on the various political and intellectual movements that trace their origins back to the work of Karl Marx.

U.S. Foreign Policy

• If America didn't have a policy of containment, the cold war would not have been as intense as it was. It greatly affected the cold war and American foreign policy because America would not have been as involved in events such as the Vietnam or Korean war. Many viewed America's involvement in such events as unnecessary and interfering, but it was all to prevent the spread of communism. As a result, relations between Russia and the US were strained and very hostile, there was little trust, and this was all down to Containment.

Kitchen Debate

• The exchange escalated with Nikita telling the Vice-President that the only thing he knew was fear of Communism. From that point, they headed into the kitchen of a model home and the debate got even more testy. The exchange became known as the “Kitchen Debate” and is one of the more entertaining but insignificant events of the cold war. However, it does perhaps illustrate the tensions between the two super powers when two of their political leaders turned up the heat in the kitchen.