After World War II, the Soviet Union drew an "iron curtain" between Eastern Europe and the rest of Europe. An intense war of words, rivalry, and confrontation soon developed between the West and the Soviet Union.
Western fear that communism would spread led a policy of containment. The Marshall Plan also gave massive economic aid to war-torn Western Europe. The United States, Canada, and nations of Western Europe established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO); Eastern European communist countries responded with the Warsaw Pact.
Meanwhile, the Cold War spread to Asia. In 1949, Mao Zedong established a communist government in China, despite American efforts to prevent it. In Korea, Americans fought a "hot war" to stop a communist takeover of the peninsula.
At home, the Truman administration pushed for economic and social reform. As inflation increased, labor resorted to strikes to increase wages. Fear generated by the cold war led to a search for Communists in the federal government.
In the early 1950s, the country began a long period of economic prosperity. The growing economy created millions of new jobs. Encouraged by their new economic strength, African Americans began to demand their civil rights.
