Following the end of World War II a deep diplomatic and political rift developed between the Soviet Union on the one hand and the USA plus western countries on the other. The rift became known as the Cold War. It lasted about fifty years. Political drama and defections, diplomatic intrigue, ambassadorial trickery, international spying and military tensions riddled the period, providing an abundance of material for writers of fiction or history. A writer who concentrates on this period is known as a Cold War author.
During the Second World War, the Soviets fought as allies with the west against Germany and Nazism. Despite that cooperation, the Soviet relationship with western countries was brittle, even at that time, corroded by ideological mistrust. Communism and capitalism are not easy companions.
Within the context of the Second World War, the Soviet Union did maintain a reasonably constant dialogue with its western allies in order to defeat Nazism. But once the war ended, the Soviet Union withdrew within itself. It almost totally cut-off dialogue with, and diplomatically distanced itself from the West.
Within a year of WWII ending, the Soviets had already begun to pull away from western countries. Sir Winston Churchill criticized this detente in a speech he presented at the Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, during March 1946. He described Soviet isolationism as having pulled a large Iron Curtain down upon Europe, dividing West from East.
Poland, Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia plus Romania were all under a high degree of Soviet influence if not control. They were puppets of the Soviet Union. Their communist parties were funded significantly by the Soviet Union.
The Soviets repeatedly rejected economic and diplomatic ties with the USA and other western nations. It remained deliberately distant and difficult to access politically, economically and culturally. Its economy was essentially closed to the much of the outside world. Its reluctance to engage in dialogue with the West created an information vacuum. Lacking data, the West filled that vacuum with uncertainty, doubt and suspicion regarding Soviet military ambitions.
Churchill titled that speech Sinews of Peace. It is now commonly referred to as the Iron Curtain speech. Many political analysts consider it to be one of the opening shots marking the start of the Cold War. The Churchillian term "Iron curtain" quickly entered into the official vocabulary.
Throughout that period of detente, limited data about its economic wealth and military capability was available to the West. Analysts such as the US Central Intelligence Agency badly over-estimated the power of the Soviet Union. That misunderstanding persisted for fifty years until Soviet President Gorbachev ushered in progressive policies known as Perestroika. Those policies dismantled many internal bureaucratic constraints, introduced market-driven mechanisms in the Soviet economy and opened it to the forces of international competition. Perestroika also ended the intense Soviet diplomatic detente with the West that for several decades provided rich literary fodder for a Cold War author.
During the Second World War, the Soviets fought as allies with the west against Germany and Nazism. Despite that cooperation, the Soviet relationship with western countries was brittle, even at that time, corroded by ideological mistrust. Communism and capitalism are not easy companions.
Within the context of the Second World War, the Soviet Union did maintain a reasonably constant dialogue with its western allies in order to defeat Nazism. But once the war ended, the Soviet Union withdrew within itself. It almost totally cut-off dialogue with, and diplomatically distanced itself from the West.
Within a year of WWII ending, the Soviets had already begun to pull away from western countries. Sir Winston Churchill criticized this detente in a speech he presented at the Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, during March 1946. He described Soviet isolationism as having pulled a large Iron Curtain down upon Europe, dividing West from East.
Poland, Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia plus Romania were all under a high degree of Soviet influence if not control. They were puppets of the Soviet Union. Their communist parties were funded significantly by the Soviet Union.
The Soviets repeatedly rejected economic and diplomatic ties with the USA and other western nations. It remained deliberately distant and difficult to access politically, economically and culturally. Its economy was essentially closed to the much of the outside world. Its reluctance to engage in dialogue with the West created an information vacuum. Lacking data, the West filled that vacuum with uncertainty, doubt and suspicion regarding Soviet military ambitions.
Churchill titled that speech Sinews of Peace. It is now commonly referred to as the Iron Curtain speech. Many political analysts consider it to be one of the opening shots marking the start of the Cold War. The Churchillian term "Iron curtain" quickly entered into the official vocabulary.
Throughout that period of detente, limited data about its economic wealth and military capability was available to the West. Analysts such as the US Central Intelligence Agency badly over-estimated the power of the Soviet Union. That misunderstanding persisted for fifty years until Soviet President Gorbachev ushered in progressive policies known as Perestroika. Those policies dismantled many internal bureaucratic constraints, introduced market-driven mechanisms in the Soviet economy and opened it to the forces of international competition. Perestroika also ended the intense Soviet diplomatic detente with the West that for several decades provided rich literary fodder for a Cold War author.
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