Cold War and Post-War Global Conflicts Vocabulary

Vocabulary flashcards covering Cold War history, post-war conflicts, ideological movements, treaties, and socio-political developments across the globe.

Barbary Pirates

Those who plied the seas along the Barbary Coast, captured other Europeans in the Mediterranean, and then sold them to the sultan or other high-ranking officials.

Impressed

Forced into service in the navy as enslaved galley workers.

Sephardic Jews

Jews who trace their heritage back to Spain.

Ashkenazi Jews (Ach Lenazi / Ash Lanzi Jews)

Jews from central and eastern Europe.

Tehran Conference

A meeting in Iran where the Allies agreed that the Soviet Union would focus on freeing Eastern Europe, while Britain and the US would concentrate on Western Europe.

Yalta Conference

A conference on the Black Sea where leaders focused on plans for reconstructing Eastern Europe and defeating Japan; Britain and the US also gave some Polish territory to the Soviet Union.

Potsdam Conference

The final meeting among leaders of the Big Three, where President Truman wanted free elections in Eastern Europe, but the Soviets refused.

Cold War

A conflict that does not involve direct military confrontation between two or more rival states.

Military-Industrial Complex

The informal alliance between the government and large defense contractors.

Satellite Countries

Small states that are economically or politically dependent on a larger, more powerful state.

Containment

The policy formulated by George Kennan of not letting communism spread farther.

Truman Doctrine

A strong statement that the US would do what it had to do to stop the spread of communist influence, specifically in Greece and Turkey.

Marshall Plan

An initiative that offered $12 billion to aid all nations in Europe, including Germany.

Sputnik

The Soviet Union's first artificial satellite that was launched into orbit around Earth.

NATO

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization, created by western nations to coordinate their defenses in case of a conflict with the Soviets.

Warsaw Pact

The Soviet Union's response to NATO, in which member nations combined their armed forces and based their army leaders in Moscow.

Communist Bloc

The nations participating in the Warsaw Pact: Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union.

Domino Theory

The idea that if one country in a region became communist, other countries would soon follow.

Bay of Pigs

A failed invasion of Cuba to overthrow Fidel Castro, conducted by a group of Cuban exiles who opposed Castro with US government backing.

Great Leap Forward

A movement by Mao Zedong in China where peasant lands were organized into communes—large agricultural communities where the state held the land rather than private owners.

Red Guards

Groups of revolutionary students in China.

White Revolution

A series of progressive reforms instituted without bloodshed by Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi in Iran.

Muslim League

An organization that advocated a separate nation for Indian Muslims.

Organization of African Unity

An organization founded with the vision of Pan-Africanism, which included returning Africans back to Africa, unity of African culture, and the rejection of colonial intervention.

Ho Chi Minh

The communist leader of North Vietnam.

Viet Cong

South Vietnamese individuals who supported the communists.

Suez Crisis

A crisis triggered when Nasser of Egypt seized the Suez Canal administered by Britain and France; Israel invaded Egypt at the command of Britain and France, Britain and France occupied the area around the canal, and the Soviet Union and the US resolved the crisis with the UN.

Quiet Revolution

A period in Quebec where the Liberal Party gained power and reformed economic policies, leading to further desires for separation from the rest of British-controlled Canada.

Six-Day War

A war in which Israel fought on three fronts simultaneously, gaining the Gaza Strip from Egypt, the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan, and the Golan Heights from Syria.

Yom Kippur War

A conflict in which Israel repelled a surprise invasion launched by Egypt and Syria.

Camp David Accords

A peace agreement signed between Prime Minister Menachem Begin of Israel and President Anwar Sadat of Egypt.

PLO

The Palestinian Liberation Organization, which wanted the return of occupied lands and the creation of an independent nation of Palestine.

Khmer Rouge

A communist guerrilla organization under Pol Pot that overthrew the right-wing government of Cambodia.

Kashmir

A border region in the mountainous north that was fought over by India and Pakistan.

Prague Spring

A reform movement in Czechoslovakia where Alexander Dubcek of the Communist Party accepted popular demands by increasing freedom of speech and press, allowing greater freedom of travel, and agreeing to democratize the political system.

Brezhnev Doctrine

A doctrine stating that the Soviet Union and its allies would intervene if an action by one member threatened other socialist countries.

Irish Republican Army

The Catholic faction in the Catholic-Protestant conflict in Northern Ireland.

Ulster Defence Association

The Protestant faction in the Catholic-Protestant conflict in Northern Ireland.

Shining Path

A revolutionary organization founded by Abimael Guzmán based on the ideas of Mao Zedong and Cambodia's Khmer Rouge.

Détente

A relaxation of strained relations between nations.

SALT

The Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty between Nixon and the Soviets, designed to freeze the number of intercontinental ballistic missiles that each power could keep.

SDI

The Strategic Defense Initiative; a US missile defense program intended to destroy any Soviet nuclear missiles targeted at the US or its allies.

Perestroika

Attempts to restructure the Soviet economy to allow elements of free enterprise.

Glasnost

The policy of opening up Soviet society and the political process by granting greater freedom.