Russia and America had competition over power which started the Cold War, both affecting the world socially, politically, and the economy. Both Russia’s and America’s society were affected from their competition of power and advancement in technology. Both nations tried to assert dominance over one another through political means, they showed it through bombs and new technology that was astounding. Most of their economy was now focused on them proving who was more powerful, Russia and America focused their resources and money to make powerful weapons and other useful technology. The Cold War was a race of power with Russia and America, fighting over who was stronger than the other with very dangerous weapons that could end the whole world.
Mother Russia’s and America’s fight for power affected both of their societies in negative ways, the people were forced to adapt to these harsh days of living. According to History.com, “the first H-bomb test, in the Eniwetok atoll in the Marshall Islands, showed just how fearsome the nuclear age could be”, when they were finished they would test it in the ocean and islands and the outcome was not pretty, “It created a 25-square-mile fireball that vaporized an island, blew a huge hole in the ocean floor and had the power to destroy half of Manhattan.” The explosion and impact of these bombs were so fearsome when being used, the bombs obliterated everything in their path and the aftermath was even worse, leaving residue of radiation. These bombings forced many people to build bomb shelters to protect their families, schools had drills just in case there was a bombing near or on them. The race for space forced american kids to do a ton of homework due to Russia reaching the moon, America's thinking was that Russia had better schools, so they implemented tons of homework to the kids which didn’t help at all, “How could it be that the Soviets had gotten there faster? They must have better schools that are training their kids to become scientists on a higher level. America now had to integrate schools into our thinking about national defense policy.”
After the U.S had bombed Hiroshima the USSR took it upon themselves to develop a stronger weapon to gain more political power. Russia wanted to create better weapons because in the Article from BBC News “Both sides feared falling behind in research and production,” so they kept competing against one another to develop more powerful weapons. They both went on to create the most destructive atomic bomb ever made, the Tsar bomb or mostly known as the Hydrogen bomb, the impact of this bomb was so great and research from the Army Technology says “equivalent to the explosive power from the simultaneous detonation of 3,800 Hiroshima bombs.” Another show to prove technological power was the Race to Space, it was a movement to be the first nation to reach the moon. According to Adam Mann, he stated that the Soviet Union reached the moon first saying “Soviet Union, which had been devastated during World War II, was able to achieve this milestone first.”
During the Cold War both the Russians and Americans spent most of their fundings into making new and better technology to be more advanced than any other nation. Projects to develop these nuclear weapons cost both nations a ton of funding around the billions, Adam Weinstein says that “During the Cold War, the United States spent, on average, $35 billion a year on its nuclear weapons complex.” Then during the space to war Mike Wall states that “By the end of Apollo in 1972, the U.S. had spent about $25 billion on the program,” even though the spent this much money to get to the moon the Russians still reached it first, “Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space, giving the Soviet Union a huge victory in its Cold War space race against the United States.” Even with all this spending on new developments of technology, in the end the benefits helped them gain knowledge and power and new economic resources. The Cold War helped bring the best of the 2 nations to become more technologically more advanced than other nations.
The Cold War all started with the demonstration of Nuclear power done by the US, convincing the USSR to catch up in technological skills in many ways. When the USSR had surpassed the US, the US forced more work onto children, thinking it would boost the intelligence of their country. Both of them developed one of the most powerful weapon ever known to mankind, the Tsar Bomb which could evaporate a nation in seconds. The funding to the Cold War was worth it in the end, boosting power in both nations. The Cold War changed the world drastically, bringing newer and better technology in the world that we could never even imagine was possible, like how pixels create our $1,000 phone.