Now fading into history,the Cold war was a period of armed tension and profound mistrust between the Soviet Union and the United States. Both perceived the other side as a hostile enemy. The Cold War started shortly after and as a direct consequence of World War 2. Stalin's Red Army had fought the Nazis back through Eastern Europe, and Stalin was not about to give up what his country had lost some 20 million lives for. Stalin turned Eastern Europe into a protective barrier for the Soviet Union by setting up obedient Communist governments in each land and stationing Soviet troops there.