The Cold War

A Brief Summary
Following the second World War, the U.S. and Western Europe engaged in a Cold War with the Soviet Union. This conflict between the two nuclear powers was fought mostly in the emerging countries of the 3rd world.

What is the cold war?

The power struggle and state of hostility between the U.S. and the Soviet Union (and their allies) after WWII

Why the Cold War?

The U.S. and Soviets had conflicting political and economic views The Soviet Union and the U.S. had different goals as they emerged from WWII The Soviets and U.S. emerged from WWII as Super Powers

U.S. Goals Allow for selfdetermination in all nations Gain access to raw material and markets Rebuild European gov. to create stability and new markets for U.S. goods Reunite Germany

Soviet Goals Encourage communism in other countries Rebuild Eastern Europe using soviet labor and raw materials Control Eastern Europe to create a buffer zone between Germany and balance U.S. Western European influence Keep Germany weak and divided

Yalta Conference (1945)

Churchill,Stalin and FDR meet They agree to self-determination after the war Divide Germany into four military zones After Yalta (and FDRs death) Truman confronts the Soviet Union at Potsdam
Harry Truman challenges the Soviet Union for violating the agreements made at Yalta Soviets had installed a communist regime in Poland, and not allowed for self determination Truman could not take action to stop them as Soviets were in a strong place in Europe

Soviets take control

Set up communist gov. in countries they liberate from the Germans Includes East Germany also includes Poland Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Albania Known as Soviet Block or Soviet Satellite countries Churchill coins term Iron Curtain to define the division that exists between Western and Eastern Europe

1970s map

UN is mostly ineffective
Set up in a San Francisco conference in April of 1945 The UN charter set the U.S., the Soviet Union, China, France and Britain as members of the Security Council

U.S. and Soviet Union block each other's actions UN is the 1st casualty of the cold war

Containment

CONTAINMENT: The U.S. plan to actively stop the spread of communism

Three Examples of Containment

# One- The Truman Doctrine: The U.S. promise to join or support any fight against Communism
Great Britain announces it can no longer protect western interest in the Mediterranean Soviets demand control of the Dardanelles from Turkey The U.S. approved $400 million in aid and military support to Turkey and Greece

# Two- The Marshall Plan Western Europe becomes vulnerable to Soviet influence by 1947 Marshall (sec. of state) draws up a plan to give financial aid and provide basic supplies to help rebuild these countries

# Three- NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization An alliance of democratic nations that agreed to assist each other if attacked by a communist nation An armed attack against one or more shall be considered an attack on all. President Truman Formed SEATO (Southeast Asian Treaty Organization) as a counter part in the Pacific Soviets form their own alliance called the Warsaw Pact in 1955

The Berlin Blockade and Airlift

Germany is divided into four zones after WWII The Soviet sector remains separate when the French, British and U.S. sectors join in 1947 to form West Germany Berlin is also divided into four sectors but it is 100 miles inside the Soviet Zone

Soviets begin a land blockade of Berlin on June 24, 1948 1st Truman plans a massive airlift of supplies to Berlin

Second he transfers 60 American b-52s to Britain supposedly carrying atomic bombs Blockade ends in early 1949 Later in 1961 Khrushchev built a wall to stop the flow of East Germans to West Berlin known as the Berlin Wall

The Soviets get the nuclear bomb

The Soviets Develop the Atomic Bomb (1949) The U.S. responds by building the H-bomb, or hydrogen bomb (1952) This is the beginning of an arms race between us and the USSR in which we compete to build bigger and more weapons than one another

Communism in China
China struggles with a communist rebellion from the end of WWI Jiang Jieshi is the Nationalist Chinese Leader

Mao Zedong is the Communist leader With the support of the Soviets and the peasants of the countryside the communist led by Mao win the war The National Chinese government moves to exile in Taiwan

Mao Zedong reforms China

Great Leap Forward
Mao Zedongs plan to expand the Chinese economy by moving peasants onto large communes with 25K people The great dislike of the plan and several years of famine made it a failure and great leap backwards

Cultural Revolution
Goals was to establish a society of equal peasants and workers Intellectualism and learning were considered useless and dangerous The Communist Red Guards shut down schools and lashed out at teachers, gov. officials and business managers. These individuals were purified through hard work in labor camps The chaos that resulted led Mao to stop the Cultural Rev. and disband the Red Guards

Communist Aggression in Korea

Korea is divided at the 38th parallel in 1945 U.S. controls the South, the Soviets the North Each country sets up governments before they withdrawal their troops in 1949
North Korea is communist South Korea is not

On June 25, 1950 North Korean troops cross the 38th parallel President Truman gets the UN to send troops to protect the south

Douglas MacArthur is labeled the commander of the UN troops (and most are U.S. troops) Fighting begins badly Tide begins to turn and Truman shifts his goals to unifying all of Korea instead of just protecting the south

China warns that if American troops were in North Korea they would respond with force U.S./UN forces cross the 38th parallel in October and advance to the Yalu river The Chinese fulfill their promise and attack the U.S./UN forces

Korean war continues with each side gaining small advances back and forth from 1951-1953 On July 27, 1953 a truce ends the war dividing Korea close to the 38th parallel

Cuban Missile Crisis

The U.S. had a troubled relationship with its southern Communist neighbor
i.e. supported a failed attempt to overthrow Castro known as the Bay of Pigs invasion (April 1961)

October 1962 American reconnaissance planes discover the Soviets installing missiles in Cuba, 90 miles off the Florida coast

Kennedy and his advisors debated how to respond Decide on a naval blockade of Cuba and takes concern to UN to explain actions

For several tense days U.S. waits to hear from the prime minister of the USSR, Nikita Khrushchev Meanwhile several Soviet ships steamed towards Cuba and our blockade line

Working through back channels Khrushchev sent Kennedy a message

Agreed to remove missiles if U.S. promised not to invade Cuba

Ships stopped outside of blockade line and crisis was averted Is the closest the U.S and Soviets ever came to nuclear war

The Cold War in Vietnam

After WWII Ho Chi Minh, a Vietnamese nationalist, turns to communist for help in struggle against French Ho chi Minh forms the Vietminh, a communist group French no longer want colony in Vietnam after defeat at Dien Bien Phu Vietnam is divided (17 N Latitude) Ngo Dinh Diem leads an anti communist gov. in the south

U.S. is concerned with Vietnam becoming communist because of domino theory Domino theory: fall of Vietnam to communist, would lead to the fall of its neighbors U.S. sends military advisors to the south Ngo Dinh Diems harsh policies lead to the rise of the Vietcong, a southern communist group After Gulf of Tonkin, more U.S. troops are sent and join the fight under President Johnson

Under Nixon U.S. withdraws, Vietnamization Shortly after US leaves, communist take over Vietnam Domino theory proves correct in Cambodia

The Soviets face new challenges

In the USSR
Nikita Khrushchev (1953): destalinization

For the Soviet satellites

Hungary (Led by Imre Nagy) tries to revolt and revolt is put down by the Soviet military (1956) Czechoslovakias Communist leader (Alexander Dubcek) loosens censorship rules in the Prague Spring, Warsaw Pact troops invade (1968)

U.S. policy evolves

John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson use the policy of brinkmanship
Brinkmanship is the willingness to go the brink or edge of war

Nixon: Dtente
Dtente is the policy of relaxing or lessening Cold War tensions SALT I Treaty limits number of arms each country could have (1972)

Gorbachev moves towards democracy(1982)

New, younger leader Began changing Soviet society with new policies
Glasnost-openness, people in Soviet Union could now openly criticize the government Perestroika-economic restructuring, tried to revive the Soviet economy Stressed diplomacy over the use of force

Soviets loose their grip on Eastern Europe

Poland Hungary, Czechoslovakia and Romania all reform or disband their communist gov. in the early 1990s Germany
Berlin Wall is torn down, November 1989 Germany is reunified and works to establish a combined country (1990)

Soviet Union collapses

Lithuania tries to succeed, and Gorbachev sends in army (1991) Boris Yeltsin criticizes Gorbachev August coup of hard line Communist (1991) attempts to overthrow Gorbachev
Yeltsin supports Gorbachev

The failed coup brings an end to the Communist party Gorbachev resigns Soviet Union is broken up
Estonia and Latvia declare their independence By December 1991, 15 republics of the USSR declared their independence

Yeltsin becomes president-faces challenges

The Economy
Shock therapy tries to reform the Russian economy by abruptly shifting to a free-market Created economic hardship initially

Chechnya Rebels
Declares their independence in 1991 Yeltsin does not let the region secede Yeltsin sends troops to Chechnya, many civilians killed Ongoing today

Yugoslavia Falls Apart

Country made up after World War I Contains six major ethnic groups Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, and Croatia declare their independence in the early 1990s A war erupts and Serbs in Bosnia oppose independence and use ethnic cleansing against Muslims and Croats