The term comes from the title of a 1947 book by influential American essayist and editor Walter Lippmann (1889–1974). Lippmann supposedly heard the term uttered by a presidential advisor during a congressional debate that same year.
Unlike standard wars, the Cold War did not begin on a precise date. Nor was it a shooting war, at least not directly between the two superpowers. Consequently, historians debate when the Cold War began. It is agreed that various political events between 1945 and 1947 were crucial to the rise of the Cold War. The European powers at the end of World War II—France, Germany, Great Britain—had collapsed. Meanwhile, the U.S. and Soviet empires were thriving. The two country's foreign policies, domestic priorities, economic decisions, and military strategies were all formulated in response to the war. It created an atmosphere of hostility and fear that would last for almost half a century.
The Bolsheviks and a Revolution
For the first true sign of hostility between the United States and the Soviet Union, historians rightfully look back to 1917. In November of that year, members of a rising political party known as the Bolsheviks ("those of the majority") gained control of Russia through what historians now call the Russian Revolution.
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