what was the cold war about?

It is about ideology.

The contending ideologies were Capitalism (their protagonists called 'free-world' as they are adept at advertisement gimmicks) and Communism (Marxism as State craft in practice, degenerated into snatching the rights of people). The world was riven into two armed camps. Many millions taking it as a kind of 'World Soccer (football) Final' were fully participating or egging on each of the camps and thus generated an Ocean of hatred that engulfed the world. All streams of negative tenets of group behaviour like Racism, Jingoism, Chauvinism poured forth into this River called Cold War politics. The two super power(one was steeped in abject agrarian poverty till two generations before) with humungous nuclear arsenals that would destroy the world totally, many times over, were pitted against each other with their combined, massed armies, navies and airforces on either side of an imagined curtain cutting across countries (Germany prominently).

Cold War (1945-1990) is a non-war and is a preperation for the oncoming, expected 'tripping' that would set off WW III, going to be a total nuclear holocaust and appropriately temed MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction). WW III didn't happen when one adversary dismantled its ideological structure and inadevrtatly into self-destruct mode. The full credit (for avoiding the setting for WW III & nothing else) should go to Michael Gorbachev, the CPSU General Secretary.

The weaponisation and continuous upgrading of its technologies is enormous, unprecedented and never would be attempted in the future though the generals and admirals were gleefully rubbing their hands (though politicians among them were mouthing platitudes of 'peace'). Since the super powers never confronted each other (due to MAD), yet wanted to be 'one-up' on the other, they carried it on, by a series of wars (big, small and mini) all over the globe. I'd call them 'proxy wars'. My guess is there was a fresh war every six months, while the earlier ones were going through their motions to logical culmination, sledge-hammer finish, lingering-on or stalemate. Like a deluge the end of WW II initiated the emergence of several dozens of newly independent countries, set free from European (British, French, Dutch, Belgian, Portuguese, Spanish, Italian and Japanese who played the role for a while in WW II) Empires. Most proxy wars were the civil wars in these.It is as if a couple of dozen chess matches were going on apiece at a common venue called 'Globe', played by the same pair of super powers with these newly enmerged independent countries serving as pawns. 'Non-aligned' group (from both camps) and the movement is worthy of mention here. Most Cold War Hot Spots were in one of the member-countries (but not in Europe, mind that) of this hapless group, whose 'block' in the UN has exceeded the 100 mark. For the super powers this group is the happy hunting ground.

The Cold War was an ideological struggle, between the Liberal Democratic,Capitalist,free market economy West (led by USA), and the totalitarian,Communist,command economy East (led by the Soviet Union). Each side sought to impose its political and economic model as the dominant one globally.

Stalin Did not trust FDR or the American Military

remember what Paton Said we have 3 million German POW's

why don't we rearm them and Fight the Bolsheviks we are going to one day

would you trust the Western Alliance

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hU_8OLBK0ic this should answer your question.