The Cold War was the period in history in which for 40 years the world was under the constant threat of total destruction, caught between the nuclear stockpiles of the United States, Great Britain, and France on one side and the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China on the other. Any conflict between the forces of democracy and those of communism could trigger a nuclear tragedy of such overwhelming size, horror, and suffering that would result in the total extermination of the human race. How do you spell insomnia? From this conflict arise some burning questions. Did the Cold War have to happen? What caused it? Did the superpowers have any alternatives to the choices they made? Could they have done things differently?
             The Cold War lasted from the end of World War II to the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, was one of the most important political events of the 20th century. Historians tend to view the "Cold War" as a result of American hostility. A more traditional view places the blame on the Soviet Union. However, the most common view of the Cold War basically believed that it was a conflict between two superpowers, caused by Soviet aggression, in which the US tried to contain the Soviet Union and protect the world from it. In reality, this "War" was a tense political standoff between the Democratic and Communist governments, the East and the West, and most importantly, the United States and the Soviet Union. To sum it up, the Soviet Union was accumulating a great deal of power and nuclear weaponry, and it was mainly this possibility of nuclear attack that frightened the United States. Any aggressive Soviet act was countered by the United States, further escalating the tension and leading to the period, which we now call the Cold War. In the end, it all came down to who could blow up who first, also known as the first-strike capability. Although this period has come to an end, many questions ha
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