who was more to blame for starting the cold war: the usa or the ussr?

why was the USA to blame?

• They established a new currency and trizonia

• Manhattan project

• Provocative action of Truman

Establishing a new currency

• Triggered Berlin Blockade

• Plans to create Bizonia went against Potsdam agreements with the Soviets

• Attempt to impose Capitalist system across whole of Germany

Marshall Aid

• Attempt to establish an economic empire in Western Europe by imposing Capitalism

• Create markets for US goods, preserved a Capitalist, free market system

Provocative action of Truman and the Truman Doctrine

• Believed that Marshall Aid and Truman Doctrine were designed to isolate USSR

• Truman believed US atomic monopoly would allow them to dictate terms at Potsdam

• Truman was aggressive when dealing with Motolov, Soviet Foreign Minister in 1945 April meetings

why was the USSR to blame?

• They established the Soviet empire and expanded their ideologies, unable to co-exist with Capitalism

• Agreements were broken at Yalta

• COMECON and CONIMFORM creation

• Berlin Blockade

Establishment of the Soviet empire and expansion of ideologies

• Soviet troops remained in Nazi liberated countries, imposing Communism

• Attitude to London poles showed his desire to break wartime agreements

• USSR also wanted to spread Communism further after WW2, encouraging in Greece and Turkey

• COMINFORM established to further the spread of Communism

Agreements broken at Yalta

• Stalin did not hold free elections in Eastern Europe as promised at Yalta

• Installed Communist governments in Poland and Romania

• Imposed Soviet systems throughout eastern Europe and political freedoms prohibited

COMECON and COMINFORM

• USSR encouraged economic differences between East and West by rejecting the Marshall Aid

• COMECON enforced Soviet economic policy onto all Eastern European countries, except Yugoslavia

• COMINFORM intended to undermine capitalist societies through national communist parties

Berlin Blockade

• The USSR stopped cooperation in running Berlin, establishing a blockade to starve the Western zone of supplies

• Creating further divide between Communist and Capitalist nations- can’t co-exist

How can USA be defended?

• Truman took 2 years to develop a response to Soviet policies in Eastern Europe

• Truman Doctrine was a defensive reaction to Communist threats in Europe

• Stalin’s attitude to Lublin Poles showed desire to break agreements

• Countries in Western Europe were free to decide their political and economic systems

How can USSR be defended?

• USA kept details secret about Manhattan project

• Britain refused to share details of enigma codes

It was Soviet expansion that caused the Cold War? (10)

• Containment was a result of Soviet expansion

• Czechoslovakia- heightened issues