dbq on ww2

During the Cold War, the competition between the United States and Soviet Union to become the most powerful nation affected other countries as well. The USSR spread communism to assert their power in other countries, both the US and the USSR fought each other indirectly when they got involved in other countries’ revolutions, and as a result of the Cold War, the world was divided between the Americans and the Soviets. In order to prove itself as being more powerful than the United States, the Soviet Union spread its form of government to other countries around the world—whether by using force or by aiding the creation of communist governments. The maps in Doc 1 and Doc 7 illustrate the Soviets’ desire to spread communism, not just to their satellite nations around them, but even farther to Vietnam. It would have been helpful to add a map of the communist and non-communist countries in Europe before WWII to compare to Doc 1 in order to highlight the amount of control the USSR gained trying to beat the US in the Cold War. Documents 3 and 9 suggest that, aside from a few rebels, Hungary and Nicaragua welcomed the Soviets’ help in switching to communism and training communist soldiers. However, docs 2 and 9 offer contradictory viewpoints which suggest that Russian invaded their countries and unwillingly coerced a communist government on them, when the Hungarian radio station says, “Early this morning Soviet troops launched a general attack on Hungary,” (Doc 2) and when Violeta Chamorro in doc 10 calls for Nicaraguans to fight for freedom by, “burying Communism and proclaiming democracy.” Doc 3 was a broadcast on a Moscow radio station, so it portrays the USSR as being in control so that the citizens of the Soviet Union will support their government. Although it biased against the USSR, doc 2 probably more accurately describes how Hungary was affected by the Soviets’ goal of the Cold War to be more powerful than the US. Doc 9 is relatively neutral, but since doc 10 is a speech given by the assassinated president’s widow, it is biased against communism and the communist forces described in doc 9, but whether the USSR spread communism to willing nations or by force, one of their main goals was undoubtedly to gain control over those communist countries in order to use them to compete with the US in the Cold War. During the Cold War, the US and the USSR did not directly attack each other militarily. Rather, they fought indirectly by getting involved in revolutions in other countries and trying to instate their own form of government there. The revolutions in Vietnam, Korea, and Cuba might have turned out completely different if not for the Cold War or the US and USSR involvement. In their struggle to be the most powerful, both countries got involved in revolutions and caused much bigger wars that likely would have occurred if the Soviet and American militaries had not intervened. For example, doc 6 describes how the USSR joined the side of North Korea in the Korean War, and their troops shot any traitors, “with machine guns and, and the hanged [their bodies] in the square to serve as a lesson to others.” Additionally, Vietnam and Korea, as shown in doc 7, might have created their own governments, but because of the Cold War, the US and USSR pressured them to choose either democracy or communism instead of compromising for what was best for the country, which resulted in Vietnam and Korea being split in half. In Cuba, the Soviets helped overthrow the previous government to replace it with a communist one, but in return, Cuba allowed the USSR to build missiles to threaten the US as mentioned in Doc 8. The Soviets wanted to pose a threat to and have power over the US, so they used their influence in other communist nations to do so. As a result of the Cold War, the world became divided. The maps in documents 1, 4, and 7 illustrate that everywhere in the world was split between communism and democracy—the Soviets and the Americans. East and West Europe, North and South Korea and Vietnam, and even within a space as small as the city of Berlin, the world is divided. Document 6 displays the effects of this divide, as friends and family were split apart when Choi wonders, “if the sock girls or [her] friend Unhi… are still alive in the North.” The picture in doc 4 shows that people were prevented from crossing the border, impacting trade and relations within the country. The Indian Prime minister’s speech shows how the divide in the world was so bad that they recognized that it would tear apart their country if they got involved.