How did the US attempt to stop the spread of communism?

The end of world War II was the end of an era for a couple of world powers and the rise of the United States and the Soviet Union as world super powers, with Europe completely destroy and facing hunger, instability, chaos, social and political division. Europe shifted its looks to this two nations for help, consequently Europe was divided into two; Western and Eastern Europe. But this was not the only division the two worlds super powers had different political, economic and social ideals, each side believed that the system was adequate for their model, the USA believed in capitalism and the USSR in communism. Over the next 45 years both nations developed a series of foreign policies to expand their ideals and values. First it started in Europe and eventually spread all around the world; it was the ideological fight between the USA and the USSR and between capitalism and communism, in the second half of the twentieth century countries around the world were allies either with the USA or the USSR, but neutrality was almost obsolete.

The policy of "containment“(stop the spread of communism) begun by President Harry Truman and continue with Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Nixon, Johnson, Ford, Carter and Reagan, in other words the USA was firm on stopping communism until the collapse of the Soviet Union. The first policies to stop the spread of communism were the Truman Doctrine and the Marshal Plan. The Truman Doctrine consisted in defending democracy and stated that USA would intervene to support any nation that was being threatened by a takeover by an armed minority; the first countries to receive this help were Greece and Turkey emerged in a civil war over the control of the government. On the other hand the Marshal Plan manly an economic policy to help rebuilt Western Europe and its economies in order to prevent the spread communism.

In just a few years the ideological fight spread all around the world, and in order to stop the influences of the USSR, the United States got involved in conflicts around the world (Korea, Vietnam and Grenada,) and the CIA help fight left-wing movements in Iran, Guatemala, Indonesia, the Tibet, Iraq, Congo, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Chile, and Nicaragua.

The United States throughout a series of foreign policies involving military interventions, economic help, secret operations and providing materials (fire arms, intelligence, information) around the world fought the spread of communism during the Cold War. Eventually with the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the USA became the only super world power and the hegemony its today.It was probably pay off with a millions of dollars spend and thousands of American lives lost specially in the Vietnam War, but this long time policy to stop communism inspire many cultural changes inside the USA and around the world, for example the hippie movement in the 1960’s and their legacy to make peace and not war. 

Bibliografía

Bodden, V. (2008). days of change; the cold war . Minnesota .