support around initiatives that would keep the enemy at bay, and in the process, allow their own sense of stature and control to increase.  This ended up impacting American Culture to a great extent in that it perceived consciousness that was not American as potentially hostile or foreign, needing to be subdued or made "friendly."  It seems to be a very provincial attitude given the massive globalization and free exchange of ideas in which the United States and most other nations are now immersed.  In the end, I think that this reality ended up having a profound impact on American Culture.

The fear of a communist takeover was rampant and we allowed that fear to sometimes get the best of us.  Senator Joseph McCarthy made a name for himself by making accusations that various people were communists or spies for the Soviet Union; most of the claims were unsubstantiated.  The American people were willing to buy into McCarthyism out of fear.

In addition to the movies that have been mentioned, many of the space movies of the 50s were using aliens to symbolize the communists.

If you're interested in how the cold war affected popular culture, you can take a look at theatrical movies.  The paranoia concerning communism and nuclear holocaust certainly surfaced in movies.  Soviet Russia and its satellites made for great villains.

Movies like The Manchurian Candidate demonized communism, and the James Bond franchise certainly produced its share of Soviet villains, although it also created the criminal franchise, S.P.E.C.T.R.E (I'm not sure about the spelling) so all of the villains didn't have to be communists. 

Growing up during the cold war, I think most of us, possibly naively, assumed not even government leaders would be stupid enough to actually start a nuclear war, but the thought was always present in the backs of our minds. 

For males, a related thought also nagged at us--the draft. 

I would say that the main effect of the Cold War on US culture was to make us a lot more nervous.  There was a great fear of communist takeover and of nuclear war.

In the early days of the Cold War, Americans were taught how to "protect" themselves in case of nuclear attack (by getting under their desks at school, for example).  There were fallout shelters in cities and some people had their own shelters at home.

In movies, you saw a lot of things that showed a fear of communist takeover.  Examples of this can be seen in movies like "The Manchurian Candidate" with its emphasis on communists brainwashing people.

The Cold War refers to the era between 1945 and 1989, when the United States and its allies were engaged in a contest for the “hearts and minds” of the world, in opposition to the efforts of the USSR and its satellites in the Soviet bloc. Among the key elements of the “war” were an emphasis on consumerism, which promoted American products as necessary and superior; the Space Race; and extensive propaganda portraying all elements of post-Revolutionary Russia as bad.

Television played a key role in disseminating pro-American and anti-Soviet propaganda. Situation comedies routinely touted the peaceful, orderly life of happy, American, suburban nuclear families, while commercials showcased the products that Americans could gain happiness by purchasing. Social problems at home were downplayed, while Soviet Russia was shown to be severely afflicted with shortages.

After the Soviets successfully launched a satellite, Sputnik, in 1957, and then placed a cosmonaut into orbit, the United States accelerated its efforts to surpass the achievement. Once the US space program had developed enough to catch up, President Kennedy declared the goal of reaching the moon, which the nation accomplished in 1969.

Anti-Communism at home and anti-Soviet information were promoted in films as well. Espionage became a standard subject of popular culture, both in light-hearted treatments such as James Bond movies and in severe indictments such as I Was a Communist for the FBI. The risk that Soviet methods of “brainwashing” could turn loyal Americans into traitors was emphasized in The Manchurian Candidate, which built on the anti-Red hysteria of McCarthyism and the House Committee hearings.

The Cold War played a key role in the popular culture of the 1950s. Even after Americans witnessed the destructive nature of the atomic bomb against Japan, nuclear also gained a connotation of being "good," as television began to push the "nuclear family" through sitcoms such as Leave it to Beaver and I Love Lucy.

This was important as the United States began to increase its nuclear arsenal in preparation for a possible nuclear war with Russia. McCarthyism made anything even remotely leftist a taboo subject, and it destroyed the reputation of many Hollywood actors and screenwriters. The United States also placed a greater emphasis on physical education for school-age children; it was important to have healthy men who would be eligible for a draft if necessary. To combat the atheism of the Soviet Union, "One Nation Under God" was added to the Pledge of Allegiance under the Eisenhower administration in order to further demonstrate how life was "better" in the United States than it was in the Soviet Union. Church membership also increased during this period as clinging to one's religion and family values was seen as one way to fight communism at home. In popular movies from the period depicting World War II, the Soviet role was largely diminished; one would almost believe that the United States won World War II by itself with minimal British help. By proving American exceptionalism and touting the benefits of American culture, the popular culture during the Cold War proved to be an effective tool in suppressing thoughts of Communism at home.

During the Cold War, Communism was considered an insiduous threat which stood to invade American culture; it's only face, of course was the Soviet Union. Aside from its military power, most Americans were influenced by the athiestic nature of Communism. It was in direct response to the percieved threat of Communism that Americans began attending Church in droves. The words "In God We Trust" were added to our currency and the words "Under God" added to the Pledge of Allegiance. Movies such as "My Son John" and books such as Herbert Hoover's "None Dare Call it Treason"  played heavily on the idea that Communism would not take the country militarily, but by subterfuge. To be a communist or even a socialist was considered the worst form of treason. This in addition to the construction of bomb shelters, duck and cover drills, etc. in response to the percieved threat of a nuclear attack.

The Cold War facilitated the concept of demonizing "the other."  When we examine how the Cold War influenced popular culture, it did so through the belief that the Communists were "wrong," or were "unholy."  There was little in way of understanding "the other," the dialectical opposite of American culture.  Rather, there was a wholesale condemnation of it being wrong and anything associated it as being wrong.  The rise of Joe McCarthy was but a small reflection of this attitude.  Another cultural reflection of the Cold War was to create a sense of binary dualism where one side was "correct" and another was "incorrect."  It fostered a simplification of global and internal affairs.  Such a dualism benefits those in the position of power because it removes complexity and critical thought in the equation, forcing individuals to simply embrace what is being told in terms of who or what defines the enemy.  In this light, the cultural effect of the Cold War was to not embrace a spirit of questioning or intricacy, but rather exist with an end product that is reflective of the attitude and demeanor associated with "winning."

The Cold War made Americans very paranoid, fearing communist enemies from within and from without. To some degree, this paranoid sentiment caused Americans to seek comfort in their houses and neighborhoods. During the 1950s, there was an explosion of home building and of the construction of highways, as returning servicemen started families and moved to the suburbs in large numbers. The explosion of suburbia during this time was in part an outgrowth of the Baby Boom (which refers to the population explosion that occurred as war vets had children), and it was also an outgrowth of the American desire for comfort and reassurance in their homes and towns during a time of international and national turmoil.

The culture at the time was also fascinated with science fiction movies, such as The Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and The Incredible Shrinking Man (1957). The national interest in these movies was in part an outgrowth of the psychological tensions and fears that Americans had in a world that was marked by the threat of mutually assured destruction during the Cold War.

We cannot know for sure why countries come to have the cultures that they have.  However, historians do try to explain cultural change.  In the case of the Cold War, it is typically said that the Cold War helped to bring about conformity in the United States in the 1950s.

The basic argument here is that the Cold War made people not want to seem different.  During the 1950s, there was an intense fear of communist subversion in the United States.  This was the time of the Hollywood blacklists.  It was the time of Joseph McCarthy.  During this time, Americans who did not act in the proper ways might, it was feared, be seen as communists.

At least in part because of this, people came to be more conformist during this time.  In order to avoid looking as if they might be communist, they tended to try to act in the same ways that other people acted.  In this way, the fear of communism is believed to have helped to make the United States have a more conformist culture in the 1950s.

The term "Cold War" describes a conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union following World War II that did not erupt into direct armed confrontation between the two major powers. Although the Soviet Union and United States did not fight each other directly, they were involved in a series of "proxy wars" around the world, supporting opposing sides in conflicts between smaller nations or opposing groups in civil wars. Millions of American military personnel were involved in fighting in such conflicts in Vietnam, Korea, and around the world. The Cold War led to high defense budgets and spending on military research, helping the United States develop many of the advanced technologies that now are part of civilian life such as the internet (developed at DARPA), advanced computers, and the GPS system.

The war in Vietnam, in particular, led to mass protests in the United States that were central to the social changes and youth rebellion of the 1960s.

One important element of the Cold War was the "Sputnik Moment." On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1 and became the first nation in the world to reach outside earth's orbit. This galvanized the United States in major funding for science and space research, eventually culminating in the Apollo moon landing.

The Cold War had a profound impact on life on the United States. It impacted education: in the 1950s, the United States increased its focus on the teaching of science, concerned with the specter of Sputnik, and fears that the USSR would eclipse the United States in the technological race. Probably the most famous legacy of the Cold War, however, was the sense of hysteria, anxiety, and paranoia which it fostered in the US population.

Consider the Arms Race. Atomic weapons were first developed during World War II. In 1949, the Soviet Union would test its own atomic bomb, signaling the end to the short-lived United States monopoly on atomic power. However, this was just the beginning. Later, in 1952, the United States would test its first hydrogen bomb, while the Soviet Union would do so in 1955. By the late 1950s, the Soviet Union would be testing intercontinental ballistic missiles.

This arms race between the two super-powers created a great deal of uncertainty within the culture of the time period. You can see this in the proliferation of nuclear drills, most famously in schools, where students were taught to retreat beneath their desks in the case of an atomic explosion. If you look at the pop culture of the time period, you'll likewise see a recurring theme (particularly in science fiction), concerning the dangers of nuclear weapons, and the threat of nuclear annihilation.

As one final note on this sense of anxiety and hysteria, there was also the Red Scare, with its rabid fears concerning Soviet collaborators and spies working to subvert the United States, and undermine it from within. McCarthyism left deep scars within the United States, and created an era of suspicion and denunciation, which left many lives ruined and careers destroyed.

The Cold War affected life in the United States in many ways. One way was that it led to immense and unprecedented levels of military spending. The US military was relatively small in times of peace before World War II, but after the war, the defense budget rose dramatically, sometimes to the detriment of other spending priorities. Another affect was that the Cold War raised questions about injustices in American society. The United States was positioning itself as a protector and promoter of freedom around the the world (as opposed to the Soviet Union) and civil rights leaders, including Martin Luther King, were very astute in taking advantage of this fact. They pointed out the hypocrisies present in American rhetoric, and helped create momentum for federal action on civil rights. Another way that the Cold War affected life in America was that it involved the nation's military in a number of "hot wars." The two biggest were the Korean War and the war in Vietnam. These wars killed tens of thousands of American soldiers, and the Vietnam war contributed to major social strife. Finally, one other domestic effect of the Cold War could be seen in the 1950s, in what is sometimes known as the "Second Red Scare." The House Un-American Activities Committee, Joseph McCarthy, and others stoked fears of communism and potential espionage to limit civil liberties amid an overall atmosphere of hysteria.