Department of English

National University of Modern Languages,

Islamabad

Subject: IR
Topic of assignment: The causes, effects and consequences of World
War II and Cold War
Submitted to: Ms. Aqsa
Submitted By: Khurshid Alam
Department: English UGS (Evening)
Semester: 5th
Section: “C”
WORLD WAR II AND ITS CAUSES, EFFECTS AND CONSEQUENCES
World War II was a global military conflict which started in 1939 after Germany
invaded Poland. Judging the scenario, Britain and France also declared war against
the Nazi Germany. For illustration, Hitler signed a non-aggressive Pact with Stalin
and threw his full army against France, occupying most of it quickly. Hitler then
doubled crossed Stalin and invaded Soviet Union in 1941. This offensive ultimately
bogged down and was turned back after several years. But the Soviet Union took
the brunt of the German attack and suffered by far the greatest share of the 60 million
deaths caused by World War II.
The United States joined World War II against Germany in 1942. The U.S.
economy produced critically important weapons and supplies for allied armies. The
United States produced an important weapons and supplies for allies armies. The
United States played an important role with Britain in strategic bombing of German
cities- including the firebombing of Dresden in February 1945, which caused
100,000 civilian deaths.
While the war in Europe was raging, Japan fought a war over control of
Southeast Asia with the United States and its allies. Japans expansionism was
intended to solve: the United States punished Japan by cutting off U.S. oil exports.
Japan then destroyed much of the U.S. navy in a surprise attack at Pearl Harbor in
1941 and seized desired territories. The United States , however, built vast new
military forces and retook a series of Pacific islands in subsequent years. The
strategic bombing of Japanese cities by the United States culminated in the only
historical use of nuclear weapons in war-the destruction of the cities of Hiroshima
and Nagasaki in August 1945- which triggered Japans quick surrender.
The first world war itself sowed the seeds for Second World War, primarily
because of the humiliating Treaty of Versailles, Growth of Fascism and Nazism,
imperialism, neglect of minority interests, military alliances and the immediate cause
was Germany’s invasion of Poland (1st September 1939)
On the other hand, the consequences of World War II were the end of colonialism
and imperialism and end of dictatorship in Germany and Italy and the strengthening
of nationalist movements in Africa and Asia. (From Britain – India, Myanmar,
Egypt, Sri Lanka; From America – Philippines; From France – Indo-China; From
Dutch – Indonesia) Furthermore, the tragic World War II resulted into 5 crore deaths
(2.2 crore soldiers and 2.8 crore civilians) Economics problems (Unemployment,
low growth) Emergence of two power blocks (USA and USSR) the Emergence of
third world Countries and the setup of UNO in 1945.
COLD WAR AND ITS CAUSES, EFFECTS AND CONSEQUENCES
The Cold War was the protracted ideological, geopolitical, and economic struggle
that emerged after World War II between the global superpowers of Soviet Union
and the United States, supported by their military alliance partners. It lasted from the
end of World War II until the period preceding the demise of Soviet Union on
December 25, 1991.
The global confrontation between the West and communism was popularly
termed as Cold War, as the matter of the fact, direct hostilities never occurred
between the United States and Soviet Union. Instead, the war took the form of an
arm race involving nuclear and conventional weapons, military alliances, economic
warfare and targeted trade embargos, propaganda and disinformation, espionage,
and counterespionage, proxy wars in the developing world that garnered superpower
support for opposing sides within civil wars. The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 was
the most important direct confrontation, together with a series of confrontations over
the Berlin Blockade and the Berlin Wall. The Major civil wars polarized along Cold
War lines were the Greek Civil War, Korean War, Vietnam War, Afghan War, as
well as the conflicts in Angola, El Salvador and Nicaragua.
The Cold War cycled through a series of high and low tension years. It ended
in the period between 1988 and 1991 with the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan,
the emergence of solidarity, the fall of Berlin wall, the dissolution of Warsaw Pact
and the demise of the Soviet Union itself. For illustration, the equal blame for Cold
War tensions is often attributed both to the United States and the Soviet Union, it is
also evident that the Soviet Union had an ideological focus that found the western
democratic and free market systems inherently oppressive and espoused their
overthrow, beginning with the Communist Manifesto of 1848.
Among the more specific consequences of the Cold was a huge fiscal
mortgage placed on many domestic economies. Moreover, Russia suffered a
financial crises and a recession more severe than the US and Germany had
experienced during the great depression. Furthermore, military expenditures by the
US during the Cold War years were estimated to have been $8 trillion, while nearly
100,000 Americans lost their lives in the Korean and Vietnam Wars.