The Cold War in Europe begins as the wartime alliance curdles into mutual suspicion. Within a few years a continent is split into two hostile camps. This is the foundational topic of the elective, and the exam reliably asks you to explain why — to analyse the origins and the early division of Europe. Get the chain Yalta → Truman Doctrine → Marshall Plan → Berlin → NATO firmly in place.
How this content is examined
- Essays. The origins of the Cold War; the role of communism/ideology in dividing Europe; the reasons for specific flashpoints.
- Source analysis (Section One, Unit 4). Cartoons on the Marshall Plan vs the "Molotov Plan," the Iron Curtain or containment recur — you need precise contextual knowledge.
1. The roots of conflict
- Ideological clash: Soviet communism (one-party state, command economy) vs Western liberal capitalism and democracy — fundamentally incompatible visions.
- Wartime distrust: the legacy of mutual suspicion, the delayed second front, and disagreements at the Yalta and Potsdam conferences (1945) over the future of Eastern Europe, especially Poland.
- The security dilemma: Stalin wanted a buffer zone of friendly states to protect the USSR after two devastating invasions; the West read this as aggressive expansion.
2. The division hardens (1946–47)
- The "Iron Curtain": Churchill's 1946 image of a Europe split in two captured the new reality.
- The Truman Doctrine (1947): the US pledge to support free peoples resisting communism — the policy of containment.
- The Marshall Plan (1947): massive US economic aid to rebuild Western Europe — containment through prosperity. Stalin forbade Eastern bloc participation and answered with Cominform/Comecon.
3. The first great crisis: Berlin (1948–49)
- Disagreement over Germany's future and the introduction of a new Western currency led Stalin to impose the Berlin Blockade, cutting off West Berlin (deep inside the Soviet zone).
- The Western Berlin Airlift supplied the city for nearly a year, forcing Stalin to back down — a major propaganda victory for the West.
4. Two camps (1949)
- NATO (1949) formalised the Western military alliance; Germany was split into the Federal Republic (West) and the German Democratic Republic (East).
- Europe was now clearly divided into two ideological and military blocs — the structure that would define the next four decades (the Warsaw Pact followed in 1955).
5. Historical perspectives (the classic Cold War debate)
- Orthodox: Soviet expansionism was the cause; the West reacted defensively.
- Revisionist: aggressive US economic and atomic policy (and the Marshall Plan as economic imperialism) drove Soviet defensiveness.
- Post-revisionist: a tragic spiral of mutual misperception and the security dilemma — neither side solely to blame.
6. Recurring exam question patterns & what high answers do
- "Examine the origins of the Cold War / the role of communism in dividing Europe." High answers: organise causes, trace the escalation Yalta → Truman Doctrine → Marshall Plan → Berlin → NATO, and engage the orthodox/revisionist debate.
- Source questions: use the Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan and Berlin Airlift to decode containment-era cartoons.