Hitler

During World War II, the Soviet Union repelled Hitler's army. After the war, it installed puppet governments in Eastern European nations captured from Germany, leading former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to say that an "iron curtain" had descended across Europe. Soviet leaders declared themselves devoted to the West's destruction. Thus began the Cold War--a standoff between Communism and capitalist Western nations led by the United States of America that threatened global annihilation.

After the Soviet Union exploded an atomic bomb in 1949, the two sides began a frantic arms race, eventually building 70,000 nuclear bombs. American schools taught students to "duck and cover" under their desks if they ...