After the Potsdam conference in 1946 it had become increasingly clear that Europe had been divided between capitalism in the west lead by Churchill and communism in the east lead by Stalin. President Truman supported Churchill and it was clear that both sides saw Stalin as an opponent. This then lead to the secret telegrams. Stalin and Truman were concerned about the breakdown of the Grand Alliance and asked for secret reports from their embassies to help them understand their opponents. The Long Telegram informed Truman that Stalin wanted to destroy capitalism and that there could be no peace while the USSR was opposed to Capitalism. Similarly Novikov’s Telegram informed Stalin that America desired to dominate the world and that the US public were prepared for war. Along with the Potsdam Conference this was also a very important significant event in showing a change in relation as, the telegrams caused the complete breakdown of the Grand Alliance as America and Russia now saw each other as opponents. Both countries thought that the other was trying to plan world domination. However is still believed that the Potsdam Conference was more important as it was the catalyst of these events.
To weaken the attraction of communism, Truman introduced the Marshall Plan which would lend $13 billion of America’s money to rebuild the shattered economies of Europe after World War II. In an attempt to contain communism. However, in order to qualify for American money, European countries had to agree to trade freely with America. The Marshall Plan had fatal consequences. During the Paris Conference of 1948 to discuss the American offer, USSR representatives walked out stating that it was the first steps to set up a military alliance that would wage war on the Soviet Union. The Marshall Plan therefore turned the two spheres of influence into economic alliances. In this way , the relationship between the Soviet Union and the USA got worse as disagreement turned into suspicion, which then lead to Truman offering economic aid to win allies against communism in case Russia declared war. This was a highly important factors but I still do not think that it is the most important compared to the Potsdam Conference as like I said before, it started of the initial tension between the two superpowers.
Another significant event that tested how far each country would go to defend their form of government is shown during the Berlin Blockade that took place during 1948-49. In order to prevent the establishment of a separate state in Western Germany, Stalin setup up a military blockade around West Berlin in June 1948. His plan was to cut western Germany from its capital proving that a divided Germany could not work in practice. President Truman responded with the Berlin airlift, which involved allied planes transporting supplies to West Berlin around the clock, which at its height provided 170,000 tonnes of supplies during January 1947. The airlift prevented the blockade from succeeding but made relations between the two powers a lot worse as Truman’s response was peaceful and made Stalin’s military blockade appear highly aggressive which greatly angered Stalin and resulted in the end of the blockade in September 1949. This was a key turning point as it showed Stalin that America would not hesitate to retaliate is the USSR did something they didn’t agree with, which resulted in a further breakdown of relationships.
Overall I can conlude that although all of the events I have mentioned did cause tension between the Soviet Union and America which therefore resulted in the crumbling of a relationship between them. However, I believe that the Potsdam Conference was the most important factor compared to the others as it was the catalyst and if signs of tension had not shown during the conference and America and the USSR stayed allies then none of the other events that I have mentioned would have ever taken place.