The Cold War was a very complex war. Many ideas, conflicts and emotions were going on. This was a major turning point for the word war. War became a much more powerful word. However, this war did bring the people together to work at solutions like none other. We have learned from this experience.

The Cold War could have been prevented. Franklin Roosevelt gave Eastern Europe to the Russians at Yalta. When Roosevelt negotiated at Yalta, he was not feeling the pain and needs of the people in Nazi concentration camps and the fire bombings. However the rest of Europe wanted revenge for this. They wanted reparations and a guarantee that this would never happen again. Roosevelt did not give them what they wanted.

It could have been prevented if Roosevelt had taken advantage of his negotiating position in Yalta, the Soviets would not havecreated the buffer zones. If these were not created Russia would be much more vulnerable. Also Russia would have been isolated from Europe by a distance. With its advancements in technology the SovietUnion was fast connecting with Europe. No more was it isolated, it

became the center of attention.

Had Russia not been invalid with the political struggles of Europe, its power and interest after WW2 would have declined. Even with its nuclear capabilities, Russia would have been far less likely to use such a devastating device, had the country s political involvement declined to pre-war levels. It was the Iron curtain which brought Russia to the limelight, and it was also Roosevelt who sold the land to Stalin for which he could build his buffer zone. Its somewhat ironic that a buffer zone brought Russia closer to the west.

The arms race could have been prevented, but not stopped. It can be explained like this: There are two obvious options to build weapons or to not build. If no power was building then there would be an incentive to build. Once this power starts to build the other powers have no choice but to build (or be completely powerless ). There are a way to solve this however. I suggest either there is some

policy to not start an arms race. Of course this is difficult to monitor but is better than nothing.

In conclusion we have learned a lot over the past 50 years. Of course there is no way to rid the world of nuclear power, but it must be controlled. Also that a lack of knowledge is better than knowledge. Knowledge is what got us into this mess. We shouldn t have even bothered with stuff we didn t understand. We must make sure there is to be no reason for another country to use the nuclear bomb on us and we we ll be safe. It is best to think as this as a learning experience.