L97 IAS 3680 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Western Bloc, Iron Curtain, Marshall Plan
21 Dec 2020
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Document Summary
Purpose: to explain and analyze the key security crises that arose between the us and soviet union in central europethe 1940s. Goal: show how the security crises, particularly over berlin, was the first. Cold war conflict, and the most key conflict, setting the stage for the rest of the cold war. Whoever would control germany and berlin would control europe. Thesis: the security dilemmas in czecheslovakia and yugoslavia, but especially in germany, demonstrated the us and the ussr"s respective commitments to fight one another in a cold war. If there was any doubt in 1947 that the cold war was on, these security crises secured the emergence of the cold war and the shift from allies to adversaries. Beginning of the cold war, fall 1947. Soviet action and reaction convinced the americans that they were expansionists, seeking to spread communism around the globe. Stalin"s actions in europe, middle east and asia showed this.
