Start of the Cold War: The Iron Curtain

Michael Streich

In 1946 Winston Churchill gave his “”Iron Curtain” speech in Fulton, Missouri and the Republican Party, in the mid-term election, staged a come-back. It was the beginning of the first decade of the Cold War and would see Democrats battling Republicans over which party could best contain the global advances of atheistic Communism. Mainland China was already lost as the Nationalist forces retreated to Formosa (Taiwan) in the face of Mao’s successes. Korea was divided and Vietnam was about to explode into a civil war pitting French colonial interests against a Communist insurgency led by Ho Chi Minh. The decade that began with the Truman Doctrine and ended with Sputnik defined the early years of Cold War anxiety.

 

Europe and the Threat of Russian Expansion

 

At the end of World War II, Soviet troops occupied most of central Europe. Each of these countries would become Soviet “satellite” countries, a buffer against any future invasions of Russia. Churchill’s 1946 speech referred to the ancient European capitals under the hegemony of Communism. Soviet occupation was an “iron curtain” from “Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic.” Additionally, Soviet-sponsored insurgencies sought to establish Communist regimes in fledgling democracies such as Greece, Turkey, and Iran.

 

In 1947 the Truman administration responded with the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan. The Truman Doctrine committed a U.S. response to Communist threats against Greece and Turkey. A strategic area that served the interests of the U.S. and its allies, notably Britain, Soviet domination of Greece or Turkey – especially Istanbul, ran counter to U.S. security interests. The Marshall Plan allocated billions of dollars for Europe’s rebuilding efforts. The goal was to help non-occupied Soviet areas develop competitive economies by rebuilding infrastructure in order to avoid the lure of Communist propaganda. Russian “satellite” countries declined the aid, as did the USSR.

 

The 1948 Berlin Airlift demonstrated the extent of U.S. efforts to thwart Communist policies. Berlin remained a divided city. “Free” Berlin was growing economically. But the USSR wanted to stifle that freedom and incorporate all of Berlin into its sphere. The Soviets initiated a blockade, hoping to stop supplies from the west entering Berlin. The airlift, however, supplied West Berlin with needed food stuffs and other necessities, forcing the Soviets to back down. West Berlin would grow as a beacon of hope, an object lesson of western capitalism in the midst of Soviet sterility.

 

The First Years of Cold War Confrontation

 

In 1949, the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb, sending tremors of fear in western chancelleries and promoting the NATO alliance.  By 1950 President Truman committed Americans to defend South Korean sovereignty and the junior senator of Wisconsin, Joseph McCarthy, began a witch-hunt of alleged Communists working in the federal government.

 

Under Truman and Eisenhower, the United States practiced containment throughout the world, eliminating threats in the Middle East, Southeast Asia, and Latin America. Pro western regimes received heavy U.S. assistance. But the Cold War took a new turn in 1957 when the Soviets launched Sputnik into space. The advent of the “space race,” Americans felt a greater degree of vulnerability. Sputnik also spurred efforts to reform American education, particularly under the Kennedy administration.

 

The first years of the Cold War saw the U.S. and Soviet Russia stake out spheres of influence while competing in an arms race that became deadlier as each nation sought to outdo the other in the production of nuclear arsenals. Winston Churchill’s warnings in 1946 proved prophetic: the world was less safe and the Soviet threat continued to grow.

 

Sources:

 

Stephen E. Ambrose and Douglas G. Brinkley, Rise to Globalism: American Foreign Policy Since 1938 8^th ed. (Penguin Books, 1997).

Major Problems in American Foreign Policy, Volume II: Since 1914, Thomas G. Paterson, Editor. (D.C. Heath and Company, 1984).