AP World History Cold War Vocab

Mao Zedong (1893-1976)

Communist leader in revolutionary China; advocated rural reform ad role of peasantry in Nationalist movement; influenced by Li Dazhao; led Communist reaction against Guomindang purges in 1920s, culminating in Long March of 1934; seized control of all mainland China by 1949; initiated Great Leap Forward in 1958.

Guomindang

Chinese Nationalist party founded by Sun Yat-sen in 1919; drew support from local war lords and Chinese criminal underworld; initially forged alliance with Communists in 1924; dominated by Chiang Kai-shek after 1925.

Chiang Kai-shek

A military officer who succeeded Sun Yat-sen as the leader of the Guomindang or Nationalists party in China in the mid-1920s; became the most powerful leader in China in the early 1930s, but his Nationalist forces were defeated and driven from China by the Communists after World War II.

Long March

Communist escaped from Hunan province during civil war with Guomindang in 1934; center of Communist power moved to Shaanxi province; firmly established Mao Zedong as head of the Communist party in China.

Cold War

The state of relations between the United States and its allies and the Soviet Union and its allies between the end of World War II and 1990; based on creation of political spheres of influence and a nuclear arms race rather than actual warfare.

Iron Curtain

Phrased coined by Winston Churchill to describe the division between free and communist societies taking shape in Europe after 1946.

Marshall Plan

Program of substantial loans initiated by the United States in 1947; designed to aid Western Nations in rebuilding from the war's devastation; vehicle for American economic dominance.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

Created in 1949 under United States leadership to group most of the Western European powers plus Canada in a defensive alliance against possible Soviet aggression.

Warsaw Pact

Alliance organized by Soviet Union with its Eastern European satellites to balance formation of NATO by Western powers in 1949.

Berlin Wall

Built in 1961 to halt the flow of immigration form East Berlin to West Berlin; immigration was in response to lack of consumer goods and close Soviet control of economy and politics; torn down at end of cold war in 1991.

Nikita Khrushchev

Stalin's successor as head of U.S.S.R. from 1953 to 1964; attacked Stalinism in 1956 for concentration of power and arbitrary dictatorship; failure of Siberian development program and antagonism of Stalinism led to downfall.

Republic of Korea

Southern half of Korea sponsored by United States following World War II; headed by nationalist Syngman Rhee; developed parliamentary institutions but maintained authoritarian government; defended by UN forces during Korean War; underwent industrialization and economic emergence after 1950s.

People's Democratic Republic of Korea

Northern half of Korea dominated by U.S.S.R.; long headed by Kim Il-Sung; attacked south in 1950 and initiated Korean War; retained independence as a communist state after the war.

Korean War

Fought from 1950 to 1953; North supported by U.S.S.R. and later People's Republic of China; South supported by United States and small international United Nations force; ended in stalemate and continued division of Korea.

People's Republic of China

Communist government of mainland China; proclaimed in 1949 following military success of Mao Zedong over forces of Chiang Kai-shek and the Guomindang.

Great Leap Forward

Economic policy of Mao Zedong introduced in 1958; proposed industrialization of small-scale projects integrated into peasant communes; led to economic disaster; ended in 1960.

Deng Xiaoping

One of the more pragmatic, least ideological of the Communist leaders of China; joined the party as a young man in the 1920s, survived the legendary Long March and persecution during the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, and emerged as China's most influential leader in the early 1980s.

Cultural Revolution

Movement initiated in 1965 by Mao Zedong to restore his dominance over pragmatists; used mobs to ridicule Mao's political rivals; campaign was called off in 1968.

Communist Party of Vietnam

Originally a wing of nationalist movement; became primary nationalist party after decline of VNQDD in 1929; led in late 1920s by Nguyen Ai Quoc, alias Ho Chi Minh.

Ho Chi Minh (Nguyen Ai Quoc)

Led Vietnamese Communist party in struggle for liberation from French and U.S. dominance and to unify north and south Vietnam.

Viet Minh

Communist-dominated Vietnamese Nationalist Movement; operated out of base in southern China during World War II; employed guerrilla tactics similar to the Maoists in China.

Ngo Dinh Diem

Political leader of South Vietnam; established as president with United States support in the 1950s; opposed Communist government of North Vietnam; overthrown by military coup approved by United States.

Viet Cong

Name given by Diem regime to communist Guerrilla Movement in southern Vietnam; reorganized with northern Vietnamese assistance as the National Liberation Front in 1958.