The Two Superpowers: The Cold War

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The Cold War was a battle for power and influence between the USA and the USSR –the two superpowers that emerged after World War II. There were various factors that contributed significantly to the Cold War origins such as ideological differences as well as conflicting national interests and some less important factors such as a clash of key leader’s personalities and attitudes. Historians who studied the Cold War origins came up with a wide range of views. Engerman solely blamed ideological differences between the two super powers, whereas Paterson emphasises shared responsibility. Michael MccGwire recognised Russia’s fear of attack and that their defensive techniques were simply to protect themselves.

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From 1917, the ideology …show more content…
Tensions that were originally created by differential national interests developed from the fact that both superpowers saw the other as a threat to the safety of their countries. The USSR believed that it was necessary to defend their national interests to ensure there were no further attacks, especially after a loss of 20 million Soviet soldiers and 40 million citizens because of World War II . To protect his country, Stalin used a process that the Hungarian
Communist party leader described as ‘slicing salami’. It was very clear that Stalin was not willing to share power and aimed to make sure all the countries he had conquered in Eastern Europe had a communist government. His way of purging anything that was not communist was to do it bit by bit. For example, communists executed the leaders of all of Bulgaria’s party leaders once the left-wing government were in power. Poland, a country with great importance to Stalin, was a big part of their national interest. He was convinced that having control of a country which essentially was an access point to invade Russia, would help protect from foreign invasions. Poland was referred to as Stalin’s buffer zone which played in favour of defending communism. Stalin also broke the promises from Yalta, which was done so because of the national interests of the USSR i.e. the expansion of the Polish government never actually happened. Although Stalin acted a lot on his national interest, it seems that his ideology played a role in the decisions he
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