| This study closely examines the brief period between the end of the Second World War and the beginning of the Cold War. How did the Grand Alliance of World War II become the Cold War conflict of the postwar period? The project examines this question from an international perspective, focusing on the perceptions of the United States, Britain, France, and the Soviet Union. It makes four main arguments: that the Cold War was inseparable from the World War that preceded it; that the Cold War resulted from a combination of Great Power competition, ideological conflict, and domestic political pressures; that Washington had an agency unmatched by the other Great Powers; and that the ways in which the United States exercised its new-found power ensured that the postwar settlement would be a Cold War. The two years between the end of the Second World War in 1945 and the end of meaningful great power diplomacy in 1947 are the focus of this study. Of all the possible outcomes, how did the principle consequence of World War II turn out to be a Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union? Were there any other possible outcomes? And finally, what missed opportunities might have existed to create a more amicable postwar settlement? The availability of new sources from all sides of the conflict---and for the first time from the former Soviet Union---only adds to the promise of taking a new look at an old question. |
