What Was the Cold War About? 10 Things Everyone Should Know.

What Was the Cold War About?

The first thing that needs to be addressed in any discussion of the Cold War concerns the naming of the event itself. As neither side ever officially declared it, war is slightly a misleading term – though commentators skirt around the issue with the addendum that the Cold War was so because it never, thankfully, heated up. We may, in fact, do better to consider the Cold War as a long, drawn-out period lasting from roughly 1945 to 1990/1, characterized by an intense and irreconcilable ideological conflict between capitalism and communism and peppered with

military conflicts that played out across the globe from Korea and Vietnam to Cuba and Afghanistan.

 

Another thing that must be addressed is the unique nature of the conflict. The Cold War was not unique because it traversed the newly reformed borders of postwar Europe to encompass almost the entire world. Military campaigns from the First and Second World Wars had been waged outside the confines of Europe, most notably in the Pacific and the colonies of the British Empire. What made it unique was that it carried with it the very real threat of total world annihilation if either side were to deploy their nuclear arsenal (something which nearly happened on more than one occasion). This awareness effected profound changes in cultural attitudes, ideas of what it meant to be state or world citizens, and our very views on humanity.

 

Here at Listland, we’ve compiled 10 of the most important pieces of information to help you get to grips with the historical juggernaut that is the Cold War.