The containment policy initiated by the united states of America, was a us foreign policy that lasted for over 40 years resulting to a cold war  between the west and the east. The notion of containment came about after the Second World War as result of expansion of communist ideology of the Soviet Union. The west believed that, Soviet Union was interested in transforming the rest of the world into communist states as opposed to democratic capitalistic ideologies championed by the west. The birth of containment policy and the beginning of the cold war started when the west started fighting back the spread of communi...

          It was believed that, when one country fell into communism it was more likely to influence the neighboring countries, hence the need to contain those states that had already fallen. That is what is called containment and cold war between the west and the east. There are different schools of thought as to what could have started the containment and cold war between the American and the soviets. There are those who argue that the Americans did not want anything to do with communism others argue it was started because of the soviet expansion policy, but the two points of view do not differ very much as mutual misinterpretation of intentions between the two opposing groups were the reasons containment and cold war was started