Instead, it was ended by the Soviet Union. If it had been up to the U.S. national-security establishment, the Cold War would have gone on forever because it is the best racket in U.S. history, one that continually expanded the tax-funded largess, power, and influence of the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA.

In a sense, the U.S. national-security establishment considered the Soviet Union's unilateral decision to end the Cold War a betrayal. The Soviets weren't supposed to do that. The supposed international communist conspiracy to conquer the United States that was supposedly based in Moscow was serving as a fantastic boogeyman that was used to frighten the American people into supporting the continuation of the Cold War racket. 

There is something else to recognize about the Cold War: For the U.S. government, it really never ended. They weren't about to let the Reds dictate the end of their racket. They were bound and determined to figure out some way to keep the racket going.

That's what keeping NATO around was all about, along with the gradual absorption of former Warsaw Pact countries (without the express approval of Congress), which enabled NATO forces to get closer and closer to Russia's borders. 

We should keep in mind that the reason that NATO, which is controlled by U.S. officials, was called into existence after World War II was to protect Western Europe from a Soviet attack. Never mind that the possibility of such an attack was virtually non-existent. Let's not forget the massive death and destruction suffered by the Soviet Union at the hands of the Nazi army. The Soviets had lost more than 20 million people. That's 20 million! Moreover, the German invasion of the Soviet Union had left the entire country in ruins. By the end of the war, Russia's industrial capacity was decimated.