Between 1945 and 1991, tension between the USA, its allies, and a group of nations led by the USSR, dominated world politics. This period was called the Cold War - a conflict that stopped short to a full-blown war. Benefiting from the recent research of newly open archives, the Encyclopedia of the Cold War discusses how this state of perpetual tensions arose, developed, and was resolved. This work examines the military, economic, diplomatic, and political evolution of the conflict as well as its impact on the different regions and cultures of the world. Using a unique geopolitical approach that will present Russian perspectives and others, the work covers all aspects of the Cold War, from communism to nuclear escalation and from UFOs to red diaper babies, highlighting its vast-ranging and lasting impact on international relations as well as on daily life. Although the work will focus on the 1945-1991 period, it will explore the roots of the conflict, starting with the formation of the Soviet state, and its legacy to the present day.

Trading Power traces the successes and failures of a generation of German political leaders as the Bonn Republic emerged as a substantial force in European, Atlantic, and world affairs. Over the course of the 1960s and 1970s, West Germans relinquished many trappings of hard power, most notably nuclear weapons, and learned to leverage their economic power instead. Obsessed with stability and growth, Bonn governments battled inflation in ways that enhanced the international position of the Deutsche Mark while upending the international monetary system. Germany's remarkable export achievements exerted a strong hold on the Soviet bloc, forming the basis for a new Ostpolitik under Willy Brandt. Through much trial and error, the Federal Republic learned how to find a balance among key Western allies, and in the mid-1970s Helmut Schmidt ensured Germany's centrality to institutions such as the European Council and the G-7 - the newly emergent leadership structures of the West.

Using newly available material from both sides of the Iron Curtain, William Glenn Gray explores West Germany's efforts to prevent international acceptance of East Germany as a legitimate state following World War II. Unwilling to accept the division of their country, West German leaders regarded the German Democratic Republic (GDR) as an illegitimate upstart--a puppet of the occupying Soviet forces. Together with France, Britain, and the United States, West Germany applied political and financial pressure around the globe to ensure that the GDR remain unrecognized by all countries outside the communist camp. Proclamations of ideological solidarity and narrowly targeted bursts of aid gave the GDR momentary leverage in such diverse countries as Egypt, Iraq, Ghana, and Indonesia; yet West Germany's intimidation tactics, coupled with its vastly superior economic resources, blocked any decisive East German breakthrough. Gray argues that Bonn's isolation campaign was dropped not for want of success, but as a result of changes in West German priorities as the struggle against East Germany came to hamper efforts at reconciliation with Israel, Poland, and Yugoslavia--all countries of special relevance to Germany's recent past. Interest in a morally grounded diplomacy, together with the growing conviction that the GDR could no longer be ignored, led to the abandonment of Bonn's effective but outdated efforts to hinder worldwide recognition of the East German regime.