The Arms and Space Race

When on the 6th day of August 1945 the world's first atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, some 66,000 people died almost instantly after the explosion and the subsequent firestorm. The power of nuclear weapons was instantly apparent and it would bring about an entirely new era in worldwide arms. It brought around a bitter Cold War of words and competition that would last some 45 years between the two former wartime allies: the United States of America and the Soviet Union. This rivalry brought about the feverish development of arms and space exploration equipment so technologically advanced that it would change the world forever. The key objective for the development of these weapons was to prevent the enemy from declaring war. These weapons acted as the symbols of each nation's technological prowess which did, with the evolution of time, encourage and propel an attitude of rivalry between the two countries.…