This is probably a simple question, but it crossed my mind today, and I couldn't think of a good answer.
In simplistic terms, to my knowledge, the US/NATO's main motive during the Cold War was combating the spread of communism. Obviously, that's a elementary understanding, but, to my knowledge, useful as a general concept.
But what I couldn't effectively answer was the USSR's motivation. Were they simply trying to spread communism? Were they concerned about NATO's military presence?
What were the motivations behind each "side" of the Cold War? What was the US trying to achieve? More importantly, what was the USSR trying to achieve?
I always trouble understanding the US motivation. I would argue that the USSR's motivation was the combat the capitalistic system, and emerge as the singular superpower. I like to think of this conflict as a "culture war", because smaller 'third world' countries would look up to the most advanced country whose culture was the most present. So I would describe the US and The USSR's objectives to be similar, to just combat the other and halt the spread of each other's economic and political systems.
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