Notes · HistoryUK · A-Levels

2R The Cold War, c1945-1991

This depth option examines the origins, escalation and easing of superpower rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union, and its eventual end. It teaches the period as a study of detailed causation and significance — why the Cold War began, escalated and ended — and of the evaluation of primary sources produced by rival propagandising powers.

5 sections~19 min reading time3 competenciesLevel Foundation 1 · Standard 3 · Advanced 1

T·151515 / 16

Exam profile

AO1 · Analyse the origins, course and end of the Cold War in detailAO1 · Assess the significance of crises such as the Cuban Missile Crisis and the fall of the Berlin WallAO2 · Evaluate primary sources within the context of rival propagandising superpowers

Operators:to what extenthow farhow significantassesshow valuableanalyse

basic level

AS-Level covers part of the period; the analytical and source demands are the same in kind.

higher level

The full A-Level requires detailed command of the whole period c1945-1991, essay argument and the primary-sources question.

Depth

Text

Contents · 5 sections

2R The Cold War, c1945-1991

Origins of the Cold War#

FoundationAQA 7042 2R - the origins of the Cold WarDfE GCE History subject content

The Cold War: a timeline

Fig. 1Landmarks of the Cold War: containment (the Truman Doctrine, 1947), the Cuban Missile Crisis (1962), detente (mid-1970s) and the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989).

The Cold War was the prolonged rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union and their allies, a conflict fought through political, economic, ideological and military means but stopping short of direct war between the two superpowers. Its origins lay in the breakdown of the wartime alliance that had defeated Nazi Germany, an alliance of convenience between powers whose systems and aims were fundamentally opposed. As the common enemy disappeared, the deep ideological gulf between American capitalism and democracy and Soviet communism reasserted itself, and mutual suspicion hardened into hostility.

The immediate disputes centred on the fate of Europe, and above all of Germany and Eastern Europe. As the wartime conferences at Yalta and Potsdam revealed and the following years confirmed, the two sides could not agree on the post-war order: the Soviet Union established dominance over the states of Eastern Europe, which the West saw as aggressive expansion, while the Soviets regarded Western actions as a threat to their security. The division of Europe into opposing blocs — famously described as an 'iron curtain' descending across the continent — became the physical shape of the emerging conflict.

The United States responded with a policy of containing the spread of communism, expressed in a doctrine of support for peoples resisting subjugation and in a great programme of economic aid to rebuild and stabilise Western Europe. The Soviet Union saw these as instruments of American power. The confrontation crystallised over Germany, where a Soviet blockade of the western sectors of Berlin in 1948-1949 was met by a sustained Western airlift, after which the formation of a Western military alliance and the division of Germany into two states set the pattern of a divided Europe.

For the depth student, the origins of the Cold War are a classic and contested causation problem. Who or what was chiefly responsible — Soviet expansionism, American assertiveness, the ideological incompatibility of the two systems, or the security dilemma in which each side's defensive moves appeared threatening to the other? These are exactly the questions historians have debated, and a strong answer weighs the competing explanations rather than simply blaming one side, recognising that the breakdown arose from the interaction of ideology, mutual fear and the vacuum left by the war.

Origins of the Cold War

Fig. 2The Cold War arose from ideological opposition and the end of the wartime alliance, disputes over Europe, and the containment response — a contested, multi-causal origin.

Worked example

Weighing the origins of the Cold War

How would you argue about responsibility for the origins of the Cold War?

The Soviet role
Set out the case that Soviet domination of Eastern Europe appeared aggressive and expansionist to the West, driving the confrontation.
The American role and the security dilemma
Set against this the argument that American containment and economic power appeared threatening to the Soviets, and that each side's defensive moves looked aggressive to the other — a security dilemma rooted in ideological opposition.
Judge
Conclude that the Cold War arose from the interaction of ideological incompatibility, mutual fear and the vacuum left by the war, so responsibility cannot be assigned to one side alone — the breakdown was mutual, though the balance of blame is exactly what historians debate.

Result: The origins are judged the product of ideological opposition, mutual fear and the post-war vacuum, resisting single-side blame — a weighed, historiographically aware judgement.

Typical mistakes

Blaming one superpower alone for the Cold War, rather than weighing the interaction of causes.
Narrating the conferences and crises without analysing their contribution to the breakdown.

Active revision

'The Cold War was caused chiefly by Soviet expansionism.' Assess the validity of this view. Plan a balanced answer.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA AS and A-level History (7041 / 7042) specification (AQA)

Escalation and crisis#

StandardAQA 7042 2R - escalation and confrontationDfE GCE History subject content

Flashpoints of the Cold War

Fig. 3The rivalry escalated through the arms race and a series of flashpoints — Korea, the Berlin Wall and the Cuban Missile Crisis — each stopping short of direct war.

Once the blocs had formed, the Cold War escalated through an arms race, the extension of the rivalry beyond Europe, and a series of dangerous crises. The development of ever more powerful nuclear weapons by both sides created a balance of terror in which each could destroy the other, lending every confrontation the potential for catastrophe. The rivalry also spread across the globe, most notably into a war in Korea in the early 1950s, where the superpowers and their allies confronted one another by proxy, establishing the pattern of a global conflict fought at the margins rather than at the centre.

Germany, and Berlin in particular, remained the most dangerous flashpoint in Europe. The division of the city left the Western-aligned sectors as an island within the communist east, and the flight of easterners to the west through Berlin was a standing embarrassment to the eastern regime. The building of the Berlin Wall in 1961 physically sealed the border, halting the exodus and becoming the enduring symbol of a divided Europe and of the wider Cold War. It was a defeat dressed as a solution, admitting that the eastern system could not hold its people without a wall.

The gravest crisis came in 1962, when the discovery of Soviet nuclear missiles being installed in Cuba, close to the United States, brought the superpowers to the brink of nuclear war. For a tense period the world faced the real possibility of catastrophe before a negotiated resolution defused the confrontation. The Cuban Missile Crisis is of the highest significance: it was the closest the Cold War came to a hot war, and the shock of it encouraged both sides to manage their rivalry more cautiously and to seek ways of reducing the risk of accidental catastrophe.

For the depth student, the escalation phase raises questions of causation and significance around the crises. Why did confrontation repeatedly stop short of direct war? The answer lies partly in the deterrent effect of nuclear weapons, which made all-out war unthinkable for both sides. And how significant was the Cuban crisis? It can be argued to be a turning point that, by staring into the abyss, pushed the superpowers towards the more managed rivalry and arms-control diplomacy of the following decade — a case of a crisis producing, through fear, a change of direction.

Worked example

The significance of the Cuban crisis

How would you judge the significance of the Cuban Missile Crisis?

Its immediate significance
Establish that it was the closest the Cold War came to nuclear war, a moment of maximum danger resolved by negotiation.
Its longer effects
Argue that the shock encouraged both sides to manage their rivalry more cautiously, to improve communication and to pursue arms control, pushing towards the later easing of tension.
Judge
Conclude that the crisis was highly significant both as the peak of danger and as a turning point that, through fear, moved the superpowers towards a more managed and cautious rivalry — significance in both the moment and its consequences.

Result: The Cuban crisis is judged highly significant as the peak of Cold War danger and as a turning point towards managed rivalry and arms control — significance weighed in moment and consequence.

Typical mistakes

Narrating the crises as a sequence of events without analysing their causes or significance.
Treating the Berlin Wall as a strength of the eastern regime rather than an admission of its failure to hold its people.

Active revision

How significant was the Cuban Missile Crisis in the development of the Cold War? Plan a balanced answer.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA AS and A-level History (7041 / 7042) specification (AQA)

Detente and its limits#

StandardAQA 7042 2R - detenteDfE GCE History subject content

Detente: easing and breakdown

Fig. 4Detente emerged from a shared interest in reducing risk and cost, but rested on unchanged underlying rivalry, so renewed shocks broke it down into a second Cold War.

The 1970s brought a partial easing of superpower tension known as detente, a French word for the relaxation of strained relations. Chastened by the dangers of confrontation and constrained by the costs of the rivalry, the superpowers sought to manage their competition more safely: they negotiated agreements to limit the growth of their nuclear arsenals, held summit meetings, expanded trade and contacts, and, in a wider European settlement, affirmed the existing borders and made commitments on human rights. Detente did not end the Cold War, but it lowered the temperature and institutionalised a degree of cooperation.

The motives for detente were mixed and pragmatic on both sides, which is important for understanding its limits. Each superpower had reasons of its own — the wish to reduce the risk and cost of the arms race, economic pressures, and the desire to concentrate resources elsewhere — rather than any real ideological reconciliation. Detente was a management of rivalry, not its abandonment, and beneath the summitry the fundamental competition and mutual suspicion continued. This built-in fragility meant that detente rested on a narrow and conditional basis.

By the end of the 1970s detente was breaking down, and the early 1980s saw a return to sharper confrontation, sometimes called a renewed or 'second' Cold War. Soviet military action in Afghanistan, continued rivalry in the wider world, and a harder line from a new American leadership combined to revive tension, an accelerated arms race and hostile rhetoric. The collapse of detente shows how shallow its foundations had been: because it had never resolved the underlying conflict, a few shocks were enough to overturn it and restore open hostility.

For the depth student, detente and its collapse are a study in the causation of both easing and renewed tension. Why did the superpowers move towards detente in the 1970s, and why did it break down? The answers lie in shifting calculations of interest and cost rather than in any change of fundamental aims, which is precisely why the easing proved reversible. Assessing detente means judging both what it achieved — a real, if limited, reduction of danger and a framework of arms control — and why it could not last, given that the underlying rivalry remained intact.

Worked example

Assessing detente

How would you judge the significance and limits of detente?

Its achievements
Set out what detente accomplished: real agreements limiting nuclear arsenals, summitry, expanded contacts and a lowering of the temperature that reduced the risk of catastrophe.
Its limits
Set against this its pragmatic, conditional basis: it managed but did not resolve the rivalry, rested on mixed motives, and left the underlying conflict intact, so it proved fragile.
Judge
Conclude that detente achieved a genuine but limited and reversible easing — valuable in reducing danger and building a framework of arms control, but never a resolution, which is why a few shocks could overturn it.

Result: Detente is judged a real but limited and reversible easing that managed rather than resolved the rivalry — significant yet fragile, as its breakdown showed.

Typical mistakes

Presenting detente as the beginning of the end of the Cold War, when it left the underlying rivalry intact.
Neglecting the mixed, pragmatic motives that made detente conditional and reversible.

Active revision

How far did detente reduce Cold War tensions in the 1970s? Plan a balanced answer weighing its achievements against its limits.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA AS and A-level History (7041 / 7042) specification (AQA)

The end of the Cold War#

StandardAQA 7042 2R - the end of the Cold WarDfE GCE History subject content

Causes of the end of the Cold War

Fig. 5The end of the Cold War had several causes — Soviet economic weakness, the reforming leadership's choices, popular movements, and Western pressure — whose balance historians debate.

The Cold War, which had seemed a permanent feature of the world, came to an end with remarkable speed at the close of the 1980s. The decisive change came from within the Soviet Union, where a new leadership, confronting deep economic stagnation and the unsustainable costs of the arms race and empire, embarked on far-reaching reforms — a policy of openness and a restructuring of the economy and politics — and adopted a 'new thinking' in foreign policy that renounced the use of force to hold the eastern bloc together. This willingness to let go removed the coercion on which Soviet control of Eastern Europe had rested.

The consequences unfolded rapidly. In 1989, freed from the threat of Soviet intervention, popular movements across Eastern Europe swept away the communist regimes, and the opening of the Berlin Wall in November of that year became the vivid symbol of the collapse of the divide that had defined the Cold War. Germany was reunited in 1990, and in 1991 the Soviet Union itself, weakened by economic failure and by nationalist and reformist pressures its own policies had unleashed, dissolved. The superpower rivalry ended not in war but in the collapse of one of the two contestants.

The causes of the end are debated, and a strong answer weighs several factors. The internal weakness of the Soviet economy and system was fundamental; the reforming leadership's decisions, especially the renunciation of force, were the immediate trigger; the popular movements in Eastern Europe supplied the pressure; and the sustained costs imposed by Western pressure and the arms race contributed to the strain. Historians differ over the balance between these — between long-term Soviet decline, the agency of individual leaders, and Western policy — making the end of the Cold War a rich causation question.

For the depth student, the end of the Cold War is both a study in causation and a moment of the highest significance. It brought to a close a conflict that had shaped world affairs for over four decades, ended the division of Europe and of Germany, and dissolved one of the two superpowers. Explaining why it ended when and as it did — ranking Soviet economic weakness, the reforming leadership's choices, popular pressure and Western policy — and assessing the significance of the collapse, is the culminating analytical task of the whole option.

Worked example

Ranking the causes of the end

How would you rank the causes of the end of the Cold War?

The fundamental cause
Rank Soviet economic weakness as fundamental: stagnation and the unsustainable costs of the arms race and empire made the existing course impossible to maintain.
The trigger and the pressure
Identify the reforming leadership's choices — especially the renunciation of force — as the immediate trigger, and the popular movements in Eastern Europe as the pressure that swept the regimes away once coercion was withdrawn; add Western pressure as a contributory strain.
Judge
Conclude that internal Soviet weakness was the fundamental cause, but that the leadership's decision not to use force was the decisive trigger that converted decline into collapse, so the end resulted from long-term weakness released by specific choices and popular action.

Result: The end of the Cold War is explained with Soviet weakness as fundamental and the leadership's renunciation of force as the decisive trigger, with popular movements and Western pressure contributing — a ranked judgement.

Typical mistakes

Attributing the end of the Cold War to a single cause (one leader, or Western policy) rather than weighing several.
Describing the events of 1989-1991 without analysing why the Soviet system collapsed.

Active revision

'The Cold War ended chiefly because of the internal weakness of the Soviet Union.' Assess the validity of this view. Plan a factor-by-factor answer.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA AS and A-level History (7041 / 7042) specification (AQA)

Evaluating Cold War sources#

AdvancedAQA 7042 2R - primary sources (AO2)DfE GCE History subject content

Two sides, one event

Fig. 6Reading a Western and a Soviet source on the same event together exposes the rival perspectives; both are valuable as evidence of how each side presented the conflict.

The depth study of the Cold War is examined partly through the evaluation of contemporary primary sources, and the defining feature of the period for AO2 is that the evidence was produced by two rival powers each waging a propaganda war. Statements, speeches, broadcasts and official documents from either side were shaped by the purpose of advancing that side's cause and discrediting the other, so provenance — which side a source speaks for, and to what end — is the first and most important thing to establish. A Western and a Soviet account of the same episode will differ, and the difference is itself evidence of the conflict.

As always, this makes the sources valuable for the right enquiries rather than untrustworthy. A propaganda broadcast or an official denunciation is poor evidence of the objective facts but excellent evidence of how one side presented the conflict, what it wanted its people and the world to believe, and how it viewed its opponent. Reading a Western and a Soviet source together on the same event can be especially illuminating, since the contrast reveals the rival perspectives and the propaganda purposes on each side. The task is to judge what each source is valuable for, not to decide which side was telling the truth.

Context does heavy work, and the moment in the Cold War matters: a source from the depths of confrontation carries a different charge from one produced during detente, and knowing where in the arc — origins, escalation, detente, ending — a source sits is essential to weighing it. A further feature of this period is that much material was later declassified, so historians can sometimes compare a government's public statements with its private records; where such contrast is available, it sharply exposes the gap between propaganda and internal assessment, a powerful tool for evaluation.

For the depth student, then, evaluating Cold War sources rewards the disciplined AO2 technique with a strong emphasis on the two-sided propaganda context. Identify what a source offers on the enquiry, analyse which side produced it and for what purpose, test its content against detailed knowledge and, where possible, against the other side's account, and judge its value with strengths and limitations weighed. The rival propaganda of the period is not an obstacle but the very thing that makes the sources rich evidence of how each side saw and fought the conflict — once each is evaluated for the standpoint it speaks from.

Worked example

Comparing two Cold War sources

Consider two described sources on the same Cold War crisis: an official statement from each side blaming the other. How would you evaluate them for an enquiry into responsibility for the crisis?

Provenance on each side
Note that each is an official statement by one side, produced to advance its own cause and blame the other, so neither can be taken at face value as an impartial account of responsibility.
What they are valuable for
Recognise that read together they are valuable evidence of how each side presented the crisis and viewed its opponent — the rival perspectives and propaganda purposes — even though they conflict on the facts.
Context and judgement
Test both against detailed knowledge of the crisis and, where available, against later-declassified records, then judge each of limited value as impartial fact but of real value as evidence of its side's standpoint and propaganda — value tied to the enquiry.

Result: The two opposed official sources are judged weak as impartial fact but valuable, read together, as evidence of each side's viewpoint and propaganda — the two-sided Cold War AO2 technique.

Typical mistakes

Taking a propaganda source at face value, or dismissing it as worthless rather than judging what it reveals about a side's viewpoint.
Ignoring which side produced a source and where in the Cold War it sits.

Active revision

For an enquiry into the causes of a Cold War crisis, take a Western and a Soviet source and, for each, judge its value using provenance, content and the moment of production.

Active recall

Recall the key points — then reveal.

Sources: AQA AS and A-level History (7041 / 7042) specification (AQA) · GCE AS and A level subject content for history (Department for Education)

References & sources

Sources

AQA

AQA AS and A-level History (7041 / 7042) specification

Department for Education

GCE AS and A level subject content for history

2R The Cold War, c1945-1991

5 sections~19 min reading time3 competenciesLevel Foundation 1 · Standard 3 · Advanced 1

2R The Cold War, c1945-1991

Key points

Weighing the origins of the Cold War

Key points

The significance of the Cuban crisis

Key points

Assessing detente

Key points

Ranking the causes of the end

Key points

Comparing two Cold War sources

Sources

2R The Cold War, c1945-1991

Key points

Weighing the origins of the Cold War

Key points

The significance of the Cuban crisis

Key points

Assessing detente

Key points

Ranking the causes of the end

Key points

Comparing two Cold War sources

Sources