Europe ended World War II united in victory and within three years split in two. Understanding the Cold War means understanding how wartime allies became ideological enemies — and how that rupture hardened into the division of a continent.
The wartime settlements
At Yalta and Potsdam (1945) the Allies agreed in principle on a post-war order — free elections in liberated Europe, the occupation of Germany — but mutual suspicion ran deep, and the agreements were soon read very differently by each side.
Two explanations for the division
Historians debate why the USSR dominated Eastern Europe — and this is the focus of the sample exam question:
- Stalin's desire for security — Russia had been invaded repeatedly through Eastern Europe; Stalin sought a buffer zone of friendly states and reparations to prevent it happening again.
- Ideology — the inherent expansionism of communism, and the irreconcilable clash between communism and capitalism, drove Soviet behaviour.
The strongest answers weigh both, rather than choosing one mechanically.
The hardening of the divide
- The Iron Curtain — Churchill's 1946 image of a Europe split in two.
- The Truman Doctrine & Marshall Plan — US commitment to contain communism and rebuild Western Europe.
- The Berlin Blockade (1948–49) — Stalin's attempt to force the West out of Berlin, defeated by the airlift.
- NATO (1949) and the Warsaw Pact (1955) — the two armed camps were now formalised.
Let's build the two-column case for the Task 5 proposition.
| Stalin's desire for security | Ideology |
|---|---|
| History of invasion through Eastern Europe | Communism's expansionist logic |
| Buffer zone of friendly states; reparations | Irreconcilable clash with capitalism |
| Fear of US economic domination of the East | Goal of spreading the revolution |
Discuss: are these two motives really separable, or were security and ideology fused in Stalin's thinking? Reach a class position.
Q1. What was the "Iron Curtain", and who popularised the phrase?
Q2. Explain the purpose of the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan.
Q3. "Ideology was more important than Stalin's desire for security in shaping Europe after World War II." Debate this proposition. (Practice for Task 5.)