The Cold War

The Cold War

SS 211-The 1960’s Reshaping the American Dream

Unit 2 Project

Professor Pamella Robinson

Joetta Raymer

February 11, 2014

The Cold War was a time of insecurity, protest and war. People see this time in many different ways as I discovered during my interviews for this project. I interviewed three people during this process from three different generations. I felt this would give me a look at a variety of different perspectives about the Cold War from the eyes of three different generations.

The Cold War could be looked at like a bad marriage between the USA and the USSR. They dragged smaller countries into their fights and used them as pawns. They were allies but did not trust each other and like bad parents they involved the children. “Cold War: this term is used to describe the relationship between America and the Soviet Union 1945 to 1980. Neither side ever fought the other - the consequences would be too appalling - but they did ‘fight’ for their beliefs using client states who fought for their beliefs on their behalf” (Trueman, 2000-2013). The Cold War began in 1945 after WWII and lasted until some say the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and some say until the fall of USSR in 1991. It involved important events such as the Cuban Missile Crisis, Bay of Pigs, and Korean War, Vietnam War, fall of the Berlin Wall and eventually the fall of the USSR. A cold war is a conflict between nations but through manipulation of economic and political actions. There is not direct physical contact between the nations themselves but these nations use other nations to physically fight for them. In this case if the USA and the USSR had fought in a hot war directly it would have had horrible consequences for our world. The knowledge we learned from the Cold War helps us to prevent such events in the future. It can help us learn about American culture, politics and economics for our future.

The first young gentleman I interviewed was Lloyd....