The significance of Winston Churchill's Iron Curtain speech, delivered in 1946 at Westminster College in Fulton, Missouri, lay in its stark depiction of the growing divide between the Western democracies and Eastern communist nations after World War II. Churchill famously described an "Iron Curtain" that descended across Europe, symbolizing the ideological and political barrier separating the Soviet-controlled countries from the West. The speech underscored the emerging geopolitical tensions of the Cold War and called for unity among Western Allies to counter Soviet influence. It also foreshadowed future conflicts and the bifurcation of Europe into opposing spheres of influence.