Cold War Vocab 4-6

H-Bomb

The Hydrogen bomb- a thermonuclear weapon much more powerful than the atomic bomb.

Arms Race

Competition between nations to gain an advantages in weapons.

Massive Retaliation

A Cold War Strategy intended to discourage a nuclear attack by committing to launch a devastating counter strike to any attack

Massive Assured Destruction

A Cold War policy to respond to any attack with nuclear force, resulting in the total destruction of both parties

John Foster Dulles

Secretary of State under President Eisenhower; he foreword building up the American nuclear arsenal as part of an effort to decrease Soviet influence around the world.

Brinkmanship

The practice of threatening an enemy with massive military retaliation for any aggression.

Warsaw Pact

A military alliance formed in 1955 by the Soviet Union and it’s Eastern European Satellies.

Eisenhower Doctrine

A U.S commitment to defend the Middle East against attack by any communist country, announced by President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1957

Nikita Khrushchev

Leader of the Soviet Union after Joseph Stalin who thought communism could peacefully take over the world; he came into conflict with President Eisenhower during the U-2 Incident.

Francis Gray Powers

American Pilot; his U-2 Spy Plane was shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960, causing an international incident.

U-2 Incident

The downing of a U.S. spy plane and capture of its pilot by the Soviet Union in 1960

Flexible Response

A policy; developed during the Kennedy administration; that involved preparing for a variety of military responses to international crises rather than focusing on the use of nuclear weapons.

Domino Theory

The idea that if a nation falls under communist control, nearby nations will also fall under communist control.

Fidel Castro

Communist political leader of Cuba from 1959 to 2008; he helped overthrow the Cuban govt in 1959 and seized control of the country, exercising total control of the government and economy.

Berlin Wall

A concrete wall that separated East Berlin & West Berlin from 1961 to 1989, built by the communist East German government to prevent its citizens from fleeing to the west.

Hot Line

A communication link established in 1963 to allow the leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union to contact each other in times of crisis.

Limited Test Ban Treaty

The 1963 Treaty in which the U.S and the Soviet Union agreed not to conduct nuclear weapons tests in the atmosphere.

Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)

Treaty signed in 1968 under which nuclear powers agreed not to sell or give nuclear weapons to any other country and no nuclear powers promised not to develop or acquire such weapons.

Henry Kissinger

German-born political scientist and secretary ofstate under President Nixon; he believed in real politik and helped create the detente policy.

Realpolitik

A foreign policy advocated by Henry Kissinger in the Nixon administration, based on consideration of a nations power rather than its ideals or moral principles.

Detente

The flexible policy; involving a willingness to negotiate and an easing of tensions, that was adopted by President Nixon and his advisor Henry Kissinger in their dealings with communist nations.

SALT 1 Treaty

A 5 year agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union, signed in 1972, that limited the nation’s numbers of intercontinental ballistic missiles and submine-Launched missiles

Mikhail Gorbachev

Russian politician; he was the last president of the Soviet Union before the country’s collapse in 1991.

Strategic Defense Initiative

A proposed defense system popularly known as star wasrs intended to protect the United States against missile attacks.

Glasnot

The open discussion of social problems that was premitted in the Soviet Union in 1980s

Perestroika

The restructuring of the economy and the government instituted in the Soviet Union in the 1980s

Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF)

A 1987 agreement between the United States & the Soviet Union that eliminated some weapons systems and allowed for on-site inspection of military installations