Cold War: Confrontation and Coexistence

Posted on Mar 18, 2025 in History

Cold War and Peaceful Coexistence

The Cold War, a model of international relations that developed after World War II, was based on permanent antagonism between blocs led by the United States and the Soviet Union. It was a tense confrontation, without ever escalating to direct military conflict between the two superpowers, but it spurred a massive arms race.

Key Conflicts:

  • The Korean War (1950-1953): Following World War II, North Korea was occupied by Soviet troops, and the South by American troops, dividing Korea into two states. In 1950, North Korea invaded the South with Soviet support, prompting American intervention to defend South Korea. The war concluded with the Peace of Panmunjom in 1953.
  • The Vietnam War (1958-1975): A conflict between South Vietnam, supported by the United States, and communist North Vietnam. The war ended with the defeat of the United States and the unification of Vietnam.
  • The Missile Crisis: After Fidel Castro’s communist regime established itself in Cuba, the U.S. government imposed an economic boycott. Cuba soon received assistance from the USSR. In 1962, the threat of Soviet nuclear missiles installed in Cuba led the U.S. to declare a blockade of the island, marking a moment of maximum tension.

In the late 1950s, the climate of tension between the blocs gave way to a new era dominated by relaxation, known as “peaceful coexistence.” The new relationship between the blocs was linked to a new generation of leaders, Khrushchev in the USSR and Kennedy in the U.S., who displayed a more tolerant attitude. They established direct relations and initiated dialogue to curb the arms race.

However, in the late 1970s, new outbreaks of conflict led to renewed Cold War tensions. The Soviets invaded Afghanistan, while the Americans intervened in Grenada (Lesser Antilles) and supported Latin American dictatorships.

Key Terms

  • Neo-colonialism: A term designating the indirect control—cultural, political, and economic—that former colonial powers exert over their former colonies or, more broadly, that the rich countries of the “first world” exert over the poorer “third world” countries.
  • Non-Aligned Movement: A group of countries, mainly arising after decolonization, that sought to maintain a neutral position and not ally with any of the superpowers.
  • Soviet: A council of workers, peasants, and soldiers who demanded the Czar’s withdrawal from the war and the end of autocracy.
  • Bolsheviks: Those defending the need to promote a social revolution in Russia, led by Lenin.
  • Dictatorship of the Proletariat: A state, as postulated by Marxism, in which the working class establishes dominance and control over other social classes, especially the bourgeoisie.
  • Gulag: A Russian acronym meaning General Administration of Forced Labor Camps. In the Stalinist Soviet regime, these camps recruited dissidents.
  • New Deal: A program that advocated for state intervention to rescue the country from the crisis.
  • Irredentism: A political attitude that calls for the incorporation of a territory into another nation that believes it belongs to it.
  • Weimar Republic: The name given to Germany after losing the First World War, with its capital in Weimar.
  • Iron Curtain: An expression defining, after World War II, the symbolic border separating the USSR and its communist-allied states in the rest of Europe from those with capitalist economies and allied with the U.S.
  • Fordism: A production line system implemented by Henry Ford in his Detroit factory in the 1920s.
  • Marshall Plan: A reconstruction plan for the European economy driven by the U.S. after the Second World War, which provided aid and loans to countries wishing to benefit.
  • Cold War: A model of international relations that developed after World War II, based on permanent antagonism between the blocs led by the United States and the Soviet Union.
  • COMECON: An economic cooperation organization formed around the USSR and socialist countries, aimed at increasing trade relations between member states.
  • Apartheid: A social system based on racial segregation imposed by the governments of South Africa. The white minority dominated, relegating the black majority. It was abolished in 1993.