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Unfortunately, the warmth of the handshakes did not last. The Soviet Union and the United States had serious differences. Their greatest difference was over a political and economic system called communism. In its pure form, communism is a belief that private property should be replaced by community ownership. In the Soviet Union this idea was not easily accepted by the people. Russian leaders Vladimir Lenin and Joseph Stalin were ruthless in their elimination of those who had different ideas about Russian’s future.
It is estimated that in the 1 sass, Stalin was responsible or killing more than 1 Soviet people who he believe were in his way. Soviet communists did not like capitalism. They opposed private ownership economies of the United States and its allies. Russian leaders believed that capitalism was doomed and that communism would spread throughout the world. This caused great tension and the emergence of a new kind of war, a Cold War. Mistrust ran deep. In the words of Winston Churchill, it was as if an “iron curtain” had been drawn between the Soviet-controlled countries in
Eastern Europe and the Western democracies. The Soviets had suffered terribly in World War II, losing more than soldiers and civilians. Stalin was determined that Germany would never be able to strike Russia again. To protect Russia, Stalin wanted a buffer zone in Eastern Europe. It was no secret that Stalin and his successors wanted to expand the Soviet Empire. If the Soviet policy was expansion, then the American policy was containment.