Title: Cold War Influences on American Culture, Politics, and Economics | Shad's Blog
Headings: Cold War Influences on American Culture, Politics, and Economics
Cold War Influences on American Culture, Politics, and Economics
Content: The United States was unwilling to commit military forces to remove the Soviets so Eastern Europe fell under control of the Soviets for the next 45 years. At the same time, the Soviets were devastated after WWII and did not want to risk war with the U.S. so they left Western Europe to fall under U.S. influence. In turn, the U.S. formed formal alliances with Western Europe with the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and in response the Soviets formed the Warsaw Pact with its Eastern European allies. While tensions between the two sides were high, these tensions coupled with mutual fear have prevented large scale war in Europe since WWII. Political battles between the U.S. and Soviet Union were not limited to Europe. The U.S. adopted a policy called “containment, according to which the United States committed itself to preventing any further expansion of Soviet power” (Foner 842). While a political doctrine, containment resulted in American military intervention all over the world. Most notably, the Korean and Vietnam Wars were fought to stop the spread of communism in Asia and each led to the deaths of thousands of American soldiers. The U.S. was so dedicated to its containment policy that it occasionally abandoned its ideals of self-determination and backed brutal dictators, such as General Augusto Pinochet in Chile, as long as they were not communists (Foner 965). Domestically speaking the Cold War led to the election of anti-communist presidents such as Truman, Kennedy, Nixon, and Reagan.