Hi folks, I've a history assignment that I'm currently researching and would like to hear some of your points (if you would care to share).
The title is ' Discuss how the US & Soviet Union moved from alliance to confrontation after WW2.
Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.
Thanks.
I think most posters here have an inclination to pass on helping with class assignments.
That said, I would start with Wikipedia, paying attention to their sourcing (don't cite WP directly). Look up the "Red Scare" circa 1920 and the Allied intervention in the Russian Civil War. The normal state of US--Soviet relations was pretty frosty before FDR. After recognition in 1933 relations improved (except for some strain because of the Molotov--Ribbentrop Pact in 1939 and the subsequent partition of Poland, the annexation of the Baltic Republics and the Winter War with Finland in 1940; all of which strained American and British relations with the Soviet Union almost to the point of military intervention against the Soviets), but only got dramatically better with Lend-Lease in 1941, especially after the June 1941 German invasion of the Soviet Union. The United States only considered the Soviets an ally after Pearl Harbor.
So the "alliance" was an artificial condition to begin with, a departure from the "normal" state of relations with the Soviets. I'd hit this pretty hard because it's pretty easy to document and argue, impresses history profs, and is usually overlooked by the rest of the class.
The alliance was showing strain by Yalta. Churchill distrusted Stalin over the future of Eastern Europe, but FDR was committed to first winning WWII and ultimately to the dismantling of the colonial system of France and Britain in the post-war world. Churchill famously remarked that he did not become prime minister to preside over the dissolution of the British Empire. He didn't have to; he lost the election and was out of office by Potsdam.
From the time Truman became President on FDR's death, his overriding concern was the Pacific War. It had no end in sight, was ruinously expensive for America, and (not knowing of the atomic program until in the Oval Office) Truman believed the only way to end the war with Japan was to convince the Soviets to enter the Pacific War. Timing here was everything. At Potsdam, Truman learned of Trinity and performed a remarkable pivot. While still wanting Stalin in the war, he also was concerned about what the Soviets might do in China and Manchuria. He tried to keep secret the atom bomb, but didn't know that Stalin knew the Trinity results within days. This is the turning point in American--Soviet relations you are asked about.
It takes about thirty months or so for the Soviets to declare war on Japan (which had been trying to get the Soviets to broker a surrender with the Americans conditioned on maintaining the position of the Emperor; a task Molotov stalled them on because such a peace would forestall the Soviet occupation of Manchuria and half of Korea over less than two weeks), for the unconditional surrender and joint American--Soviet occupation of Korea, followed by the eventual collapse of coalition governments in Eastern Europe and the division of Germany and Austria into occupation zones, and the insurrections in Greece and Turkey that resulted in the Truman Doctrine and the formation of NATO.
Throw in Churchill's "Iron Curtain" speech and the story is about complete by 1949. Be careful to avoid the implication that the Soviets were successful everywhere in a great Red Tide. They were rolled back militarily in Greece and Turkey, successfully marginalized in France and Italy where at one point Communist governments seemed likely, cajoled into evacuating the Soviet sector of Austria, forestalled from a complete takeover of Korea, and prevented from realizing a policy of permanent occupation of Germany. In fact their greatest defeat was probably the formation of West Germany, the reconstitution of its formidable military, and its integration into NATO. Couple that with the Warsaw Pact, where Poland, Hungary, East Germany, and Czechoslovakia were in turn dubious allies requiring Soviet tanks to keep Communist regimes in power and Yugoslavia which remained outside the Soviet sphere entirely. This gets me well ahead of the story, and in 1945--8 no one knew of all of these future developments; but I mention it to warn you to avoid the pitfall of portraying 1945--1950 as the always successful advance of Stalinism which Stalin and certain western successors of Red Scare politics found an interest in promoting.
Good luck on your assignment.
