Cold War

The Cold War's origin is still the subject of contentious debate, with some revisionist historians placing it as early as the 1919 Allied intervention in the Russian civil war. While this school identifies the Cold War's principal cause as Soviet insecurity, more traditional scholars focus on Moscow's aggressive post-World War II foreign policy. Soviet suppression of Polish democratic elections in 1946 and Stalin's speech in February of that year forecasting worldwide struggle against the West were soon followed by Winston Churchill's speech in March decrying the “Iron Curtain” descending across Europe. Action followed words as both sides pressed for ...