What was the Cold War?
After the close of World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union entered into a conflict known as the Cold War. While not a war in the traditional sense, the two countries were in a state of military and political tension that lasted nearly 50 years and were involved in proxy wars such as the war in Vietnam.
The democratically governed United States and the communist government of the Soviet Union were at odds with each other. Both countries sought to vie for supremacy across cultural, military, political, and technological fronts. There were periods of the Cold War that were considered significantly hot, such as the Cuban Missile Crisis. An important element of the Cold War was the Space Race, in which both countries raced to build new technologies to be used for space exploration—with President John F. Kennedy eventually setting his sights on the Moon.
What was the Soviet Union?
Some may be quick to equate the Soviet Union with contemporary Russia, however the two countries are not the same. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.), or Soviet Union, existed from 1922 to 1991. In 1922, after a revolution and a civil war, 15 socialist republics (constituting much of the former Russian Empire) formed the Soviet Union. For nearly 70 years, the USSR spanned across large parts of Europe and Asia. It was governed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
The largest and most powerful republic was the Russian republic, which now makes up modern day Russia. In the late 1980s, many republics in the Soviet Union began demanding independence, and in 1991 the Soviet Union came to an end. In its place, 15 separate countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. However, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania were not recognized in the West as being part of the USSR. They were considered occupied lands from 1940-1991.
