Tensions: arms race

As tensions raised, America and the USSR were competing to outdo each other in just about everything. After the Atomic Bomb was dropped on Japan to end WW2, it did not take long for the Soviets to create one of their own. Feeling pressured to outdo their opponents, the US felt compelled to make a bigger, better, and more destructive bomb. The US turned to J Robert Oppenheimer, the creature of the atomic bomb, to create the hydrogen bomb. On January 31, 1950, Truman authorizes the H-bomb. On November 1, 1952, the first test of the H-bomb follows through. Soon after, in August 1953, less than a year later, the Soviets have created their own H-bomb.

Tensions: space race

The space race started when the USSR created a successful satellite, and launched it into space. The satellites name was Sputnik. It was launched on October 9th 1957. Sputnik could circle the earth in a matter of hours. Scared, the US started creating satellites of their own.
Each attempt ended in a failure. The Soviets became a bigger threat to the US. Finally, on January 9, 1958, the United states launched their first successful satellite into space; the Explorer 1.

Complete overveiw

The Cold War was fought between two former allies, Russia (USSR) and The United States. Throughout the WWII, the two allies supported and helped each other. After the war, they were still close but when threats of communism and nuclear power were heard, the two allies quickly became enemies. The Soviet Union supported communism as a government and the United States strongly disagreed. We were scared of the "domino" effect, or that everyone would see communism as a better government and turn against us. Containment was the only other option the United States could think of. Soon, China turned communist and all hope for that country was lost. General MacArthur, the nations "hero", believed we should drop atomic bombs on China and show everyone that we were serious about exterminating communism. Korea was our next attack. Kim Il Sung, the communist leader, was fighting for communism. South Korea was all for nationalism, but North Korea had other plans. North Koreans only wanted communism. North Koreans stormed down on South Korea and drove them to the small part of Korea called Pusan. With the help of MacArthur, the South Koreans got there land back. Although MacArthur was a good military leader he was speaking out of term in office and was soon fired by Truman. The US didn't take this well but got over it.