The cold war, despite the name, was not actually a war, but a tension between the United
States and the Soviet Union. The tension between these two large countries with different ideals and powerful weapons affected American society and domestic policy in more ways than one, including society’s fear of communism, a fear of war, and the a change in the education system..
The main cause of the rise of tension between America and the Soviets was due to their different ideas about government. America was capitalist, and the Soviets were communist, and each country wanted to spread their own type of government and stop the spread of the other.
Because of this, Americans developed a hatred and fear of communists, and the fact that each country was powerful and both sides had nuclear technology only made the tension and hatred stronger. This fear of communism got so bad that it prompted the red scare. Senator Joseph
McCarthy went on a communist hunt, pursuing immigrants and anyone that there was even an inkling of evidence for being a communist. This harmed many people, as is shown in Document
2, which is a comic showing Joseph McCarthy driving through a crowd of people saying “It’s okay­ we’re hunting communists”. This document shows how McCarthy’s actions hurt many people for a cause that was not worth it.
Another effect of this fear of communism was the fear of impending war. This is clearly shown in Document 3 and Document 5. Document 3 is a poll showing what Americans thought the most dominant problem in the United