The Cold War: a divided world
History · Key Stage 3 · The School
From allies to rivals
The USA and USSR had fought side by side against Nazi Germany. But the alliance was one of convenience, between two deeply opposed systems: American capitalism and democracy against Soviet communism and one-party rule. At the Yalta and Potsdam meetings in 1945, the powers split defeated Germany and Europe into zones. Churchill named the result in a 1946 speech: an "iron curtain" had fallen across the continent. By the late 1940s, Soviet-backed communist governments ran most of Eastern Europe.
Berlin and the arms race
Berlin sat deep inside Soviet-run East Germany, but the city itself was split into Allied and Soviet zones. It became the flashpoint. In 1948 the USSR blocked all land routes into West Berlin, hoping to starve the Allies out. Instead, the Berlin Airlift flew in supplies for eleven months, until the blockade was lifted. NATO formed in 1949. The Warsaw Pact answered in 1955. Both sides built nuclear weapons that could destroy each other many times over. This strategy got a name: MUTUALLY ASSURED DESTRUCTION. Neither side could strike first without being destroyed in return.
The closest the world came
In October 1962, American spy planes found Soviet nuclear missiles being set up in Cuba, just ninety miles from Florida. For thirteen days the two superpowers stood at the edge of nuclear war. President Kennedy chose a naval blockade rather than an invasion. A secret deal ended the crisis: Soviet missiles left Cuba, and American missiles were quietly pulled out of Turkey. Most historians treat this as the single most dangerous moment of the whole Cold War. It led straight to a hotline between Washington and Moscow, built to stop a future crisis spinning out of control through delay or a simple mistake.
By 1961 so many East Germans were fleeing west through Berlin that East Germany built a wall overnight in August. It split the city in two. Guards had orders to shoot anyone trying to cross. It stood for twenty-eight years, and became the clearest symbol of the whole era. Its fall on 9 November 1989 was almost an accident. An East German official misspoke about new travel rules at a press conference. Crowds gathered at the checkpoints. Overwhelmed guards let them through rather than open fire. The Soviet Union itself broke apart in 1991. The Cold War did not end with a peace treaty. It ended because one side collapsed from within.