Many other countries have struggled to reconcile their differences after lesser conflicts, so what events and policies made peace among us something we most take for granted?
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Lots of good answers here, but the big thing I see everyone failing to mention is stopping Soviet influences as well as past alliances.
In the first World War, Japan and Italy were allied nations, and the United States was neutral to Germany (especially since the US had loads of people of German heritage) up until the US formally joined the war. Russia had itself a communist revolution, and that freaked out basically all the other powers. Their form of government made them a bit of a pariah in the inter-war years until Nazi Germany attacked them and the Soviets threw in their lot with the allies.
The only reason the Soviets were part of the allies was due to the common German enemy. They did not trust one another. And towards the wars end, the Japanese and several Germans had to make a calculus: do we surrender and allow the western powers or the Soviets occupy us? Loads of Germans defected to the US/British/French sides for fear of Soviet oppression (the land the Red Army crosses to get to Berlin remained Soviet possessions after all) and the Japanese surrendered to the US. It was crucial to western powers that the Soviet titan, which at the time bordered Japan and actively occupied half of Germany, did not expand and increase its influence. Hence aiding in reconstruction and establishing alliances with these powers was essential to maintain Soviet spread.
An important footnote: the government of the Soviet Union doesn’t matter too much. The same issues and subsequent Cold War would still occur regardless if the Soviets were capitalist, democratic, fascist, monarchists, etc. It was all about spheres of influence and power. After WWII, the largest powers in the world were the USA and USSR. And the only threats to their power was each other. It’s an international dynamic that has existed for as long as there have been nations and applies just the same to Macedonia and Persia, Rome and Carthage, Europe and the Arabic world during the Crusades, Mongols and China, France and England during the age of exploration, etc. In fact, General Patton was an advocate of continuing the war and fighting the Soviets for this very reason (“hey, we’re already mobilized. Our other enemies have surrendered or are close to surrender. All of our troops and equipment are already over here. We have superior air and naval strength. We have a monopoly on nukes: lets go get em!”)
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