The Cold War
Cold War: Defined
The Cold War was the state of political hostility that existed between the Soviet bloc countries and the U.S.-led Western powers from 1945 to 1990. It started due to tense relations between Communist Soviet Union and Democratic United States. The United States feared communism and was concerned about the Soviet Union's leader, Joseph Stalin, whose rule was tyrannical and blood-thirsty. America also refused to recognize the Soviet Union as a legitimate part of the international community, which angered the Soviets. These conflicts built up during years of distrust and eventually led to mutual enmity.
Events:
- Containment- the policy adopted by the United States and its allies to prevent the spread of communism abroad.
- "Iron Curtain"- was the ideological conflict and physical boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991.
- Truman Doctrine- established when President Harry S. Truman declared that the United States would provide political, military, and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces.
- Marshall Plan- also known as the European Recovery Program, this plan was an American initiative to aid Europe, in which the United States gave $13 billion dollars in economic support to help rebuild European economies after the end of World War II.
- Berlin Airlift- the Russians wanted Berlin all for themselves and decided to close all highways, railroads, and canals from western-occupied Germany into western-occupied Berlin. They thought that this would make it impossible for people to get food and supplies, and would lead to the allies eventually pulling out of Berlin. The U.S. and its allies decided to airlift supplies to their individual sectors of Berlin, and this became known as the "Berlin Airlift".
- NATO- an acronym for North Atlantic Treaty Organization, NATO is an intergovernmental military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty. It was formed for the purpose of collective defense against communism.
- Korean War- fought in the early 1950s, the Korean War was between the United Nations/United States and the communist Democratic People's Republic of Korea. The war began in 1950, when North Korea invaded South Korea. The war had the purpose of defeating communist North Korea and supporting democratic South Korea.
- McCarthyism- the practice of making accusations of subversion or treason without proper regard for evidence. It started when Senator McCarthy began to accuse other government officials of being communist without proper evidence.
- Space Race- the competition between nations regarding achievements in the field of space exploration. Specifically, it occurred between the Soviet Union and the United States for supremacy in spaceflight capability.
- U-2 Incident- an international diplomatic crisis began in May 1960 when the Soviet Union shot down an American U-2 spy plane in Soviet air space and captured its pilot, Francis Gary Powers. This increased tensions as it became known that the United States had been spying on the USSR for years.
- Eisenhower Doctrine- a speech made by President Dwight David Eisenhower on January 5, 1957, within a "Special Message to the Congress on the Situation in the Middle East". Under this doctrine, a country has the ability to ask for American economic assistance and/or aid from the U.S. military forces if it was being threatened by armed aggression from another state.
- Brinkmanship- the practice of pushing dangerous events to the brink of disaster in order to achieve the most advantageous outcome. It was used during the Cold War to try and approach the verge of war in order to persuade the opposition to retreat.
- Cuban Missile Crisis- a conflict between the USSR and the United States that occurred when the Soviet Union placed missile sites in Cuba in order to protect against invasions from the United States. The United States blockaded Cuba in a successful attempt to get the Soviets to remove their missiles. In exchange, however, the United States had to remove their missile sites from Turkey.
- Bay of Pigs Invasion- an unsuccessful invasion of Cuba by Cuban exiles supported by the United States government. The Cuban exiles were captured by Cuba and the United States was forced to give $53 million dollars worth of food and supplies for the release of the captives.