The Cold War: Atom Bombs

Figure 1.--Here during the height of the Cold War in 1955 is pushing the idea of peace. Atom bombs becamevseen were seen as a threat to peace. In fact, atomic bombs guaranted that the Cold War would not turn into a hot war between America abd the Soviet Union. The vchildren aremembersof the Blue Army of Our Lady of Fátima, now mostly known as the World Apostolate of Fátima.

Stalin launched the Cold War a year before the Americans dropped the atomic bombs ending World War II, ving housnds of Ameican lives an millions of Japanese likves. The American public saw the bombs as ending World War II and had no idea the Cold War was even underway. President Truman was so criticized and so low in the polls that he dd no even dare announce it. He used the occasion of a visit by Winston Churchill speaking at Fulton, Missouri to announce it (March 1946). Churchill use the tern 'Iron Curtain' to refer to the political, military, and ideological barrier created by the Soviet Unpin to prevent free contact between itself and its puppet eastern and central European allies on the one hand and the West on the other. He warned the Americans of Soviet expansion, and explained that an "iron curtain” had descended from Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe…. All these famous cities and the populations around them lie in…the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and, in some cases, increasing measure of control from Moscow." At the time, the atomic bomb was not an issue. America had a nuclear monopoly, but after the Japanese surrender had stopped making atomic bombs. The bomb did not begin to become an issue until the Soviets detonated an atomic bomb (August 1949), by which time Americans were well aware that the Cold War had begun. The Soviet bomb changed attitudes about the bomb. For many nuclear weapons became a huge issue, if not not the major issue. We hear some saying 'Better Red than dead.' There is no doubt the atomic bomb made the Cold War dangerous, but less fully understood is the degree to which nuclear weapons led to the greatest period of peace in Europe since the Pax Romana. The Americans had no intention of attacking the Soviet Union. And the Soviets were deterred from attacking the West by the prospect of nuclear annihilation. The Soviets used fear of the atmmic bomb to separate America from its Europen allies, especially Britain and West Gerrmany. 'Ban the Bomb' became a central feature of Soviet propaganda.

Created: 1:32 AM 12/18/2025
Last updated: 1:32 AM 12/18/20255