>Cold War anti-communism was a paranoid delusion.
There were revolutions going on all over the world, anti-colonial rebellions, the threat of nationalist capitalisms seceding from the world market. While they weren't all literally part of an international communist conspiracy - though some were explicitly Marxist/socialist - to the American ruling class they were all a real threat. Sure it got nutty at times, but there was plenty for the class that deemed themselves the proper owners and rulers of the world to worry about.
Doug