welcome to this history revision timelines video today we'll look through an overview of the first part of the Cold War from 1941 to 1958 which basically takes you through the Journey of how the two superpowers went from being allies to enemies it's primarily focused on the Ed XL GCSE course but can be used for other courses or if you like me have an interest in all things history do remember to like And subscribe if you found this video useful here's the timeline of the first part of the Cold War story as this is a revision video you'll hopefully be familiar with many of the events on this timeline however as you can see there's just a lot going on and we're going to dissect the story piece by piece to get an accurate view of how tensions between the superpowers escalated feel free to download the accompanying worksheet which can be found in the comment section so to begin let's start in 1941 the USA and the USSR together with the United Kingdom formed the Grand Alliance this was in response to the threat caused by Nazi Germany now given their very very different ideologies remember the USA were capitalist and the USSR were communist this Alliance was seemingly built on Rocky foundations however it was the presence of a common enemy in Nazi Germany that glued this Alliance together this bit's really important because as soon as we've removed this common enemy we're going to see the superpowers turn their attentions against each other by 1943 the war was turning in the grand alliance's favor the three leaders of the Grand Alliance Roosevelt the US of the USA Stalin of the USS and Churchill of the United Kingdom decided to meet in tan the first of three conferences which set out to decide how to best gain victory in the war remember they are still allies at this stage glued by their common enemy so the meeting gets off to a good start the USA and the UK agreed to help the USSR by opening up a second front by launching an invasion through Western Europe when the Allies spoke about what they wanted for the world after Germany was defeated they kept things very loose and general and agreed to make Germany Weak by February 1945 the Allied victory over Nazi Germany was almost complete now that their common enemy isn't as strong anymore we're going to see the bonds of the Grand Alliance begin to break we see this in the yter conference as the Allies tried to find agreements on two questions the first focused on what should happen to Germany after the war not being able to find an agreement the Allies settled that Germany should be split into four zones by the USSR the USA the UK and France until a future decision could be made the second question focused on what should happen to the Eastern European countries that had been under the control of Nazi Germany on this they agreed that the future of Eastern European countries should be decided in free elections the sticking point for this was that Stalin very much expected the free elections to return Communist governments here we can see already that the USSR are planning for a future that is going to bring tension to their relationship with the USA in April 1945 Germany surrendered and in July 1945 the Allies meet for the last of three conferences at potam with the absence of a common enemy to unite them tensions really start to rise between the USA and the USSR this is accentuated by the fact that Roosevelt who had previously tried to be quite friendly towards Stalin had died and been replaced with a staunchly anti-communist Truman Truman objected to the fact that the USSR who claimed to be liberating countries from Nazi Germany had actually just occupied much of Eastern Europe without a hint of a free election the potam conference subsequently ended by reissuing agreements that had already been in place about Germany but with the added baggage of a general suspicion and doubt about how the two superpowers will continue to live in a world without a common enemy now if we return to the timeline tensions didn't just arise because of what happened in these conferences but because of what was going on in the wider world and for this we'll need to zoom into this section of the timeline in August 1945 the USA's decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan bed endless amounts of tension out to the superpower relations with the development of nuclear technology the USA's military power had just had a significant upgrade that left the USSR firmly behind but the USA refusing to share their nuclear secrets with their supposed allies this sent the USSR into a vulnerability spiral having just been invaded by Nazi Germany the USSR were obsessed with their own Security in an attempt to create a buffer zone between themselves and Western Europe Stalin ordered the Red Army to ensure that Communist governments would be elected in the supposedly free elections that had just been agreed in the conferences to the USA this seemed like the USSR were trying to spread communism around the world to the USSR they could not quite understand why the USA didn't appreciate their desire to improve their security so just as World War II had ended tensions in the Grand Alliance were truly surfacing this really plays out in a war of words that came out in 1946 the modern day equivalent of 1946 would be countries having an argument on social media let's see how this rolls out first came The Long Telegram this was made by an American ambassador living in the USSR who openly said that the USA should see the USSR as a rival not a partner this was followed up by a speech given by Churchill at an American University where he famously said that the world had been divided by an iron curtain suggesting there was no way friendly relations could continue between the two spheres to the USSR this speech confirmed their suspicions that the West rather than being allies were the new enemies much like Nazi Germany had been before them this was confirmed in the novikov telegram it meant that tensions between the two former allies were high and both started focusing their spending on building their military strength this is the point in the timeline where the two superpowers appear to be actively and openly working against each other indeed in 1947 the two superpowers put their money where their mouth is and really begin to invest in their own strength against each other to begin this cartoon shows the problem the USA was facing in Europe they could see the growing influence that the USSR was having as more and more countries turned towards communism to help their struggling economies the fact that Greece was on the verge of becoming a communist country sent alarm bells to the USA President Truman knew he had to act and change US foreign policy forever he declared that the USA would stop at nothing to prevent the spread of Communism this became known as the Truman Doctrine to the USSR this was seen as a threat to their interest of having friendly States near their border the USA knew that communism was likely to spread in areas where the economy was weak so they introduced the Marshall Plan this enabled countries to receive financial aid from the USA in order to boost their economy and stop the spread of Communism to capitalist this was seen as the Kickstart that European countries needed after World War II to the Soviets it was seen as an as a direct attempt to arm and mobilize European countries against the USSR indeed by 1947 Stalin had set up an organization called common form which ordered all satellite state countries to reject the Marshall Plan the tension that we have seen growing over these last few years came to a head in Germany in 1948 as you remember Germany had been divided into four occupying zones by the Grand Alliance it was a temporary measure until they could agree what was to be done with Germany the problem was that Stalin refused to contemplate any scenario where Germany did not have a pro-communist government this was obviously not something the USA was willing to agree to so 1948 the USA combined their area with that of United Kingdom and France to create a strong western style economy called trizonia this strong Western influence became a problem for Stalin particularly in Berlin which although situated in the heart of the Soviet zone was also divided amongst the Grand Alliance in order to force the USA Britain and France out of Berlin Stalin attempt to block a the west from accessing Berlin now the USA knew that they couldn't access Berlin by land without instigating a war with the USSR instead they decided to airlift food and supplies to Berlin the onus was now on the USSR to decide whether to shoot down the planes after an 11 month 11-month blockade the USSR finally gave up and called the blockade off this was a huge propaganda victory for the USA as they were able to show the world that they wen't able to respond to Stalin's aggression in a peaceful way indeed whilst War had been in avoided the Berlin blockade signaled a physical division of the world into two separate spheres Germany was divided into two separate countries one communist and one capitalist furthermore the USA and the USSR set up two different military alliances called NATO and the Warsaw Pact the importance of these military alliances to both superp passs can be seen in the final event of this timeline the Hungarian Uprising in 1956 hungarians angry at living under the conditions imposed on them by uh communism were beginning to Rebel kushev who had replaced Stalin as the leader of the USSR and who seemed to want to take a different direction to his predecessor appointed Naji as the leader of Hungary Naji made changes that calmed the calls for unrest but went one step further than kushev would have liked by calling for Hungary to leave the warsa packed this was seen as intolerable for the USSR as it compromised the security that the buffer States provided kev's response was to send an invasion Force to suppress Naji and Hungary the Hungarian people notably women stood up to this Invasion Force the USA who had promised to support the people of Hungary realized that they were powerless to stop the USSR much like what is happening in Ukraine the USA realized that if they were to get directly involved conflicts between the superpowers would escalate into an allout War subsequently the his the hungarians were defeated and a pro Soviet government was installed in Hungary this marks the final point in this timeline hopefully you've been able to note how tensions Rose year by year as developments escalated for the superpowers I hope this has helped in your revision thank you for watching