ABSTRACT
World War II had been a stunning success of American combat arms and centralized federally controlled industrial mobilization. In the traditional postwar rush to demobilize, however, the United States faced a new and different enemy: the Soviet Union and its state ideology communism. World War II ended with a bipolar world system characterized by an ideological contest between the communist Soviet Union and its satellites and the capitalist and democratic United States and its allies. Postwar reform of the military included the integration of African Americans into the armed forces. As Japan collapsed under the horrific weight of the atomic bombs, the Soviet Union declared war against what remained of the Japanese Empire on August 8, 1945. The Korean War changed the way American policymakers approached the Cold War world. American containment policy originally formed around providing economic aid to countries threatened by Communism, but substantial military underwriting was now required to support allies and threatened nations alike.
