Introduction

The Second World War ended and the conflict weary society believed that peace was achieved and would remain for a long time. However, this wasn’t to be. The Soviet Union became the only country to profess Socialism. The economic policy of socialism became popular amongst countries that were under imperial powers for a long time like China, India, Indo – China. The growing influence of communism was seen as a threat to Capitalist countries like the USA, Europe, etc.

Containing communism was one major policy on the basis of which military and economic alliances were made. The Capitalist countries sanctioned colonialism with the hope that communism would be stopped but such measures failed in the long term. Europe too after the Second World War saw the emergence of communist governments. The Soviet Union provided full support to the governments of these new nations. The Communist governments became intolerant and other political parties weren’t allowed to exist and dissent within the party too wasn’t allowed. These nations were referred to as satellite states of the USSR. Yugoslavia was the only European nation that refused to be dominated by USSR.

The countries of the World became divided into two major blocs one led by Capitalist countries like the US, and Britain and the other by Communist nations like USSR. The third bloc of Non Aligned nations was created due to the efforts of India, Indonesia, Egypt, and Yugoslavia called the Non-Aligned Movement.

The fall of communist regimes in the 1980s ended the Cold War between capitalism and communism and the US emerged as the dominant force in the World.

Birth of the United Nations

The United Nations Organization was created to follow the ineffective League of Nations in the USA in 1945. The purpose of the U.N.O was to maintain International Peace, Harmony amongst nations and achieve mutual cooperation, and friendly relations, and solve international problems of an economic, social, cultural, and humanitarian character.

Six principle organs of the U.N.O were created:

1. the General Assembly is composed of all the members of the UN;
2. the Security Council is composed of five permanent members
3. the Economic and Social Council
4. the Trusteeship Council
5. the International Court of Justice
6. the Secretariat with a Secretary-General appointed by the General Assembly as its head.

The UN also later had other specialized agencies to help in its work. The Security Council is the most important arm of the UN with 5 permanent members and 10 non-permanent members elected by the General Assembly for 2-year term.

Since the major decisions of the world can’t be taken without the support of all the biggest powers the U.N.S.C permanent members [US, UK, France, China, and Russia] had veto powers.

India too was offered a permanent member position but declined it in favor of China.

Germany After the Second World War

Germany was captured by four nations namely USSR, the US, the UK, and France. US, UK, and France joined their captured parts and formed the democratic republic of West Germany and the USSR created a communist republic of East Germany. The Governments decided to build a Berlin wall to prevent occupants of east Germany from going to the West.

The wall was a source of tension during the Cold War. In 1989 the wall was broken and both the Parts of Germany were united into a country following democracy.

The era of the Cold War 1945 -1990

The Soviet Union and the UK, and USA had fought together during WWII against Fascist aggression and this show of strength was what created the victory for the Allied forces. However, after the war tensions began to emerge between these two sides. Although there was no active aggression but policies practiced were against each other and this situation was called Cold War.

The Soviet Union had lost many citizens in the war and in absolute terms, it had the most losses. During the First World War, it had joined the Allies with imperial desires but had to withdraw after heavy losses and its ambitions were wasted. However, in later years under the Communist Party, the policies followed created development and it rapidly became a superpower. It remained unaffected during the Great Depression and so the Socialist pattern of development emerged as a good alternative.

After WWII its isolation from the West had ended. It found new allies in East European and Asian countries. The Soviet Army was used to crush protests against communism in these countries. In response to the NATO – A military pact signed by the US and West European countries a Warsaw Pact was signed between USSR and its Communist allies.

In some nations, these Cold War situations became hot, and localized clashes were seen. The West’s fear of communism and the growing influence of the USSR was a reason behind this. The US openly announced Grants to countries for fighting communism. It also backed policies of Nations seeking to reimpose colonialism under the pretext of containing communism. The War of Vietnam and Korea were good examples of this.

Setting up military blocs escalated the tensions.