1. 'How far do you agree that the actions of the USSR were primarily responsible for the division of Germany in 1949?' There are many different views on the debate of who is responsible for Germany division in 1949, however revisionist historians have suggested that the USSR was primarily reacting to the initiatives of the Western Allies, the Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan and the currency reform in their zones. Further, the extent to which Stalin actually wanted the GDR as a part of Soviet control of Eastern European is debated, because usually Soviet leaders themselves had opinions that ranged from regarding the GDR as part of a vital part of Western bloc, containing valuable raw materials such as uranium etc. In my opinion, USSR actions were not primarily responsible for the division of Germany, despite that most of Stalins actions were very influent in terms of the division in Germany.
However, you shouldn't make the assumption that devotion to ideology was all that was behind Cold War animosity; countries tend to be more complaint trading partners with countries that share their political systems and both Stalin and the Cold War Era presidents in the US knew this. The tension eventually built, but no one wanted to go to actual war again after the colossal massacre of WWII, hence the term Cold War. 2. Describe and explain the ideological differences between the United Stated and the Soviet Union. In 1917, Russia became a communist country with an agenda of converting the world to communism.
Soviet and US relations changed dramatically between 1945 and 1947, there were many reasons to explain why and how this happened. Firstly, one reason was the end of WW2. During the Second World War, America and the USSR were members of the Grand Alliance in order to oppose Hitler, but when this war finished there was nothing to bring the Communists and Capitalists together. Therefore, the two countries went from allies to progressing enemies after Germany was defeated. This developed until a confrontation, from Western and Eastern Europe, in a nuclear arms race.
After the second world war, the Soviet Union occupied several countries in eastern Europe by not allowing them to have free elections. By doing that they created a buffer zone in order to protect their ideology. The government of America saw it as a violation of their pledge and the possible spread of the disliked ideology all over the world. This motivated the States to put their energy into an arms race and to be ready for a Soviet invasion, which actually never happened because this might not even have been the goal of the Soviet Union. In his work, Fleming explained that if the Soviets wanted to attack the united states of America they had done it because they had all the necessary equipment but at that period the nation was more interested in its inner politics than conquering the world.
How far do you agree with the view that the developments of the cold war in the year 1945-8 owed more to soviet expansionism than to USAs economic interests? The developments of the conflict within the cold war (1945-48) are something of intense debate for many years. Historians such as Wolfson and Laver (S7) accredit the influence that Russian expansionism contributed to the conflict between the USA and the Soviet Union. In contrast this prospective is contrasted by Terry Morris and Derek Murphy’s prospective (S8) which places emphasis on how US economic interests were seen as a threat to the USSR and thus contributed to East-West tensions. Source 9 written by Michael Lynch adopts both prospective of USSR expansionism and also US economic interests, however Lynch also emphasises misjudgement and misperceptions which contribute to the conflict conceived at Cold War.
The blame for the Cold War cannot be placed on one person -- it developed as a series of chain reactions as a struggle for power. It can be argued that the Cold War was inevitable, and therefore no one's fault, due to the differences in the capitalist and communist ideologies. It was only the need for protection that had caused the two countries to sink their differences temporarily during the Second World War. Yet many of the tensions that existed in the Cold War can be attributed to Stalin's policy of Soviet expansion. Stalin's foreign policies contributed an enormous amount to the tensions of the Cold War.
That would make Germany weaker and put a buffer zone between Germany and the Soviet Union, Germany had invaded the Soviet Union twice in 30 years and Stalin wanted to ensure that it would not happen again. He also wanted to guarantee that Poland had a pro-Soviet government. Stalin already had a government who were in exile: the Lublin Poles. But Roosevelt and Churchill supported another group, the strongly anti-Communist ‘London Poles’. These Poles had helped organize the Warsaw Uprising in August 1944, aiming to gain part of Poland before Stalin’s Red Army took full control of the country.
Stalin and the US created a brief alliance because they were both concerned with stopping Hitler. When the war ended, the U.S., Britain, France, and Russia each controlled a portion of Germany. Soviet Russia did not want to allow their portion to be unified into a post-War Germany for fear that the Germans would again be an aggressive and powerful invader. In 1948 the Soviets blockaded East Berlin and the Germans in the West side of the city were starved of food. The Allies (us) started a massive airlift to feed the trapped Germans so they would not starve.
Many would question how a country like Afghanistan could have had any impact on the strongest communist nation of all time, the United of Soviet Socialist Republics, and most people would answer by saying that U.S.S.R was already on the verge of falling apart and Afghanistan was the final conflict that pushed it. I believe that Afghanistan was a strong role in the fall of the Soviet Union. The outcome of the invasion of Afghanistan had proved that the Red Army was in fact not untouchable. Thus, this had caused many Russian republics to demand independence and challenge the Red Army. And most importantly, the economy of the Soviet Union was in ruins after the U.S.S.R had chose to spend massive amounts of money on wars and the arms race.
There were a combination of reasons as to why relations between the USA and the USSR grew worse by 1948, but the underlying cause were the ideological differences between the two superpowers; USA (capitalism) and the USSR (communism). Once Germany was defeated, the joint aim of the allies was achieved and they were no longer forced to cooperate in an, “Marriage of Convenience”. From then on, the relationship between the USA and the USSR worsened. One main reason as to how the relationship between the Soviet Union and the USA grew worse was because of the Yalta and Potsdam conferences. At the Yalta conference, Roosevelt’s death in 1945 brought an end to any superficial unity that still existed at the end of 1943 and Stalin had promised free elections in the countries of Eastern Europe.