Timeline of the Cold War
Forty-five years of confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union that never became a direct war between them, told in nineteen dates.
Updated on October 7, 2026
1946 to 1991
March 5, 1946
Churchill’s speech at Fulton, Missouri, puts the phrase "iron curtain" into public use.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
March 12, 1947
The Truman Doctrine commits the United States to containing Soviet expansion.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
June 5, 1947
Marshall announces the European Recovery Program, which will send some US$ 13 billion to Western Europe.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
June 24, 1948
The Soviet Union blockades West Berlin; the Allied airlift keeps the city supplied for 11 months.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
April 4, 1949
Twelve countries sign the North Atlantic Treaty and create NATO.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
August 29, 1949
The Soviet Union tests its first atomic bomb, ending the American monopoly.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
June 25, 1950
North Korea invades the South; the Korean War runs until the armistice of 27 July 1953.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
May 14, 1955
The Warsaw Pact is signed, the Soviet answer to NATO.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
November 4, 1956
Soviet troops crush the Hungarian uprising in Budapest.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
October 4, 1957
Sputnik 1 is launched and the space race becomes part of the conflict.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
August 13, 1961
East Germany seals off West Berlin and begins building the Wall.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
October 16, 1962
The Cuban missile crisis opens; after 13 days the Soviet missiles are withdrawn.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
August 20, 1968
Warsaw Pact troops invade Czechoslovakia and end the Prague Spring.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
May 26, 1972
Nixon and Brezhnev sign SALT I and the ABM Treaty, the first nuclear arms limits.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
December 24, 1979
The Soviet Union invades Afghanistan; détente collapses.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
March 11, 1985
Mikhail Gorbachev takes over the Soviet leadership and starts perestroika and glasnost.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
December 8, 1987
The INF Treaty eliminates an entire class of intermediate-range nuclear missiles.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
November 9, 1989
The Berlin Wall is opened.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
December 26, 1991
The Soviet Union is formally dissolved; the Cold War ends.
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
Source: Wilson Center — Digital Archive (Cold War International History Project)
Why "cold", and where it was not
Cold meant that the two nuclear powers never fought each other directly. It did not mean peace. Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Angola, the Horn of Africa and much of Central America were fought with real armies and real casualties, usually with one superpower arming each side. Estimates of the dead across these conflicts run into many millions.
The closest call was October 1962, when American reconnaissance found Soviet missiles in Cuba. The resolution included a public American concession, not to invade Cuba, and a secret one, to remove missiles from Turkey. One direct result was a teleprinter link between Washington and Moscow, installed in 1963, because the two capitals had had no fast reliable way to talk during the crisis.
Source: U.S. National Archives — World War II e Cold War records
How to read this page
How to read the numbers here
Every value on "Timeline of the Cold War" comes from the source named beside its section, never from an estimate of our own with no origin.
Where the data comes from
Each section of "Timeline of the Cold War" names its official source; the verification date sits at the top of the page.
Linked to the rest of the module
"Timeline of the Cold War" is one of this module’s reference pages; the glossary below defines the technical terms used here.
More about “Timeline of the Cold War”
45 years in 19 dates
"Timeline of the Cold War" spans 45 years, from 1946 to 1991, in 19 chosen dates — averaging one marked event every 2.5 years. That spacing is our editorial choice, not a law of history: tenser periods had more events that could have made the list than quieter ones.
Words on this page
Standard uncertainty
The margin attached to a measured value, usually written in parentheses on the last digits. A constant that is "exact by definition" has zero standard uncertainty; a measured one, like the gravitational constant G, always carries some.
Standard definition by BIPM — Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (SI) · Standard uncertainty
Launch window
The span of time in which a rocket can lift off and still reach its planned orbit or destination. For a trip to another planet that window can last only a few weeks and only returns at the next favourable alignment, so missing it costs months or years of waiting.
Astronomical unit
The solar system’s reference distance, fixed at exactly 149,597,870,700 metres since 2012, close to the average Earth–Sun distance. It saves writing every planet’s orbit in kilometres with ten digits.
Standard definition by IAU — International Astronomical Union · Astronomical unit
Exoplanet
A planet orbiting a star other than the Sun. Most were found indirectly, by the star’s faint dimming as the planet crosses in front of it (transit) or by the gravitational wobble it causes in the star (radial velocity), not by direct image.
Standard definition by NASA Exoplanet Archive · Exoplanet
Mole
The SI counting unit for atoms, molecules or other entities: one mole is exactly 6.02214076 × 10²³ of them, by the definition fixed in 2019. It is what ties a mass in grams to a number of particles.
Standard definition by BIPM — Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (SI) · Mole