Taiga Koala

When the U.S. was first founded, the country was dedicated to staying out of foreign affairs. It kept relations with other countries only for trading purposes. This global isolation created the idea of American exceptionalism, the belief that America was uniquely great in its endeavors and customs. However, as America industrialized at the turn of the 20th century, it began increasing its role in the world, intervening in foreign wars and conquering territories. One such instance was the American intervention in the Second World War, which proved instrumental in the Allied victory, and solidified the American role in the world as a superpower. However, the USSR had also come out of the war as a superpower, and the already present belief in American exceptionalism prompted many Americans to disapprove of this new power. This exceptionalism contributed to the single greatest fear of Americans during the cold war: the spread of the opposing superpower, both to the American block and to the U.S. itself (Document B), and with it, the spread of devastating, possible nuclear, war. One fear of Americans during the Cold War was the spread of the Soviet ideology, communism, to America or American aligned countries. This fear was based on the belief that the U.S. was naturally right in all of its endeavors, and that its block was the morally righteous block. This was reflected in the rhetoric of the American government, with John Foster Dulles referring to Soviet expansion as a threat to the “free world” (Document B), and President Eisenhower stating that America fears “The men in the Kremlin [and] what they will do to our friends around them” (Document A). To counteract this fear, the primary measure of the American government was to prop up countries opposed to the USSR around the world. Following the Second World War, American money in the form of the Marshall Plan went to countries around Europe to coerce them into joining the American block. The U.S. also militarily propped up these countries throughout the Cold War, with President Kennedy stating the U.S. would “pay any price, bear any burden, support any friend [...] to assure the survival and success of liberty” (Document E). These documents were said from the point of view of individuals who were willing to use American influence to meet their goals, and made these statements to convince and galvanize the general public towards their goals. In this sense, the attempts were quite successful, and the American public was supportive of the efforts to contain communism throughout the Cold War, and especially at the beginning. Another fear the American public had during the Cold War was the threat of nuclear war, and with it, total annihilation. From the beginning, the U.S. did not like to involve itself in foreign conflicts, and by the time the Cold War started, this feeling had largely transformed to a fear of nuclear war. As seen in Document C, bunkers became commonplace during the Cold War, as families wanted a place to escape to in the event of war. With the advent of faster delivery methods, a nuclear strike could hit anywhere in the world in a short period of time, and the fear of this reality lead to what could be considered “hysterical reactions” (Document A), such as debating how the U.S. could potentially blow the first strike to hamper the USSR’s retaliation methods (Document F). Much of the thinking during the Cold War occurred under the context of responding to nuclear war, such as the development of a natio