Both the USA and USSR kept producing more nuclear weapons, in hope to become more powerful than the other
The arms race was supposed to act as a deterrent to eachother through nuclear weapons to prevent a war
By the mid 1950s the development of nuclear weapons to include bigger warheads and missile delivery systems meant that any nuclear war would destroy both sides resulting in Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD)
The formation of the Warsaw Pact meant there were now two opposing alliances in Europe separated by the Iron Curtain
The Warsaw Pact gave the Soviet Union direct control over the armed forces of its satellite states, thus strengthening its grip on Eastern Europe
