How important was Germany in the development of the Cold War?

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Tom Allott

Michelmas Essay

How important was Germany in the development of the Cold War?

The issue of Germany thorough out the Cold War was one of great importance to the development of the conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union, yet despite the critical issue of Germany in the great power relations after the Second World War, factors other than Germany were also important in the initial development of the Cold War. The issue of Germany, and more particularly, how Germany was to be administered, what political system would be put into place, and to what extent Germany would be obliged to pay reparations to the victors in the Second World War were all significant issues which lead to the development of the Cold War. The importance of Germany as an issue in superpower relations remains throughout the duration of the Cold War, as the ebb and flow of relations between the United States and the Soviet Union, as caused by Germany can be seen in the effects of Stalin’s decision to put a blockade Berlin in 1948 and also to erect the Berlin Wall in 1956.

The importance of Germany was great thorough out the Cold War because it was the it represented to both the Soviet Union on the one hand, and Great Britain and the United States on the other the casus belli for the Second World War, and therefore the course taken by Germany after the Second World War was of critical importance for both sides. Both of the superpowers sought to impose their own political and economic sets of beliefs on the subdued Germany, in order to both make sure that Germany would be weakened and reprimanded sufficiently to punish it for it’s crimes during the Second World War, and also so that a resurgent Germany might align itself with the other power in alliance. Although both of the sides who would later contest the Cold War obviously had a great deal of concern over the path that Germany would take after the Nazi regime had been overthrown, the Cold War was not an issue focused solely on a dispute over how Germany would be after the Second World War. The role of Germany in propagating the Cold War provides a means through which to understand the later conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union. The concerns and necessities of both sides, and more importantly the disparity between those of the two superpowers provide the most important explanation of how the Cold War developed.

The Cold War, although undoubtedly caused by, and contributed to by the importance of Germany to both sides, had its roots in an issue more fundamental than the issue of Germany. The United States and the Soviet Union were diametrically opposed in their political systems and their approaches to government, and this most basic difference, between democracy on the one hand, and the autocratic regime of Stalin on the other meant that a conflict was likely after the wartime Allies had defeated their common adversary. This fundamental difference between the two former allies was the root cause behind the subsequent half century of hostility following the Second World War. Although it is possible to read to much into de Tocqueville’s oft-quoted predictions that Russia and the United States would one day engage in hostilities, the origins of the Cold War can be seen the incompatibility of the United States and the Soviet Union before the Second World War.

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The Cold War developed from, at the most basic level, disputes and mutually incompatible aims of the two superpowers over whose sphere of influence the countries that had been occupied by the United States and the Soviet Union during the Second World War. This contest of influence centred most prominently on Germany, whose role as the formerly most powerful of the occupied countries meant that there was most to lose by not exerting one’s influence in Germany. However, these territorial and diplomatic concerns were not the most influential feature in the development of the Cold War; instead the differences between ...

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