Did Atomic Weapons Cause The Cold War?

A difficult question that surrounds the idea of the Cold War is what we all have heard since high school history class, did atomic weapons cause the cold war, or at the very least, accelerate it? According to many historians, the Cold War was a conflict of two main objectives; the development of nuclear weapons and the fear of communism and soviet expansion. With these two key characteristics, it is only logical to say that the Cold War was a spawn of both of them combined. It began as a struggle of competing ideologies and the Stalinist view of complete and utter domination in Europe while imposing the communist ways, the context of the war then changed with the Manhattan project by the United States, and it then ended with the fear and suspicion …show more content…
In America, and most other nations, the Communists were viewed as “Godless,” therefore the implementation of Communism into American society would inherently make us Godless as well. Of course, however, the United States, being Christians, viewed themselves as superiors to the Communists because of the sole fact that we were Christians and believers in Christ, but that still didn’t shake the fear of “what if.” What if they took us over and forced us to assimilate into this “Godless society?” Stalin also made some interesting decisions when it came to the United States and its Christianity. He sent his ambassadors to attend American churches while they were in the US for three main reasons; to first improve their English, to learn American idioms and lastly, and most importantly, to find out what makes American’s tick. So Stalin used our own religion and beliefs in Christianity against us for his own knowledge and strategic gain. The speech given by President Truman also played a key role in the fear of Communism. One of the points of emphasis made in his speech is the fear that Americans had for Communism, how he used that to feed support for the war. He knew that we were afraid of this ideology so he used that fear against us in getting our support and votes for the Cold War. Although some may look at this as a “trick tactic,” it is actually pure genius. What better way to unite a country, than through the use of a …show more content…
His first is the idea that both the US and USSR built empires after WWII, but not of the same kind. The Soviets, obviously built the Communist empire and began the expansion into eastern Europe. The Americans, Gaddis claims, added on to their empire by one of two ways. Either they were driven through market and investment opportunities abroad, or it was an accidental expansion as a by-product of having to fill the power vacuum in Europe, allowing us to meddle anywhere that we thought might be a Soviet threat. His second hypothesis is the “old” version portrayed the Cold War as a contest of good versus evil. The idea that Stalin and his Soviet army (Red Army) were always the evil. Even when it comes to a country like Germany that just came off from trying to annihilate a whole race, when they were matched up with the Soviets, they sided with the US and were the “good