WHAP Contemporary Era Vocabulary

Francisco Madero

Francisco Madero

Early leader in the Mexican Revolution; in 1911 became president of Mexico; wanted land ownership and free, honest elections, two years later he was murdered, led to power struggles

Pancho Villa

A popular leader during the Mexican Revolution. An outlaw in his youth, when the revolution started, he formed a cavalry army in the north of Mexico and fought for the rights of the landless in collaboration with Emiliano Zapata.

ANZAC

Australian and New Zealand Army Corps

Paris Peace Conference

The great rulers and countries excluding Germany and Russia met in Versailles to negotiate the repercussions of the war, such leaders included Lloyd George (Britain), Woodrow Wilson (America), Clemenceau (France) and Italy. The Treaty of Versailles was made but not agreed to be signed and the conference proved unsuccessful.

Weimar Republic

German republic founded after the WWI and the downfall of the German Empire's monarchy.

U-Boat (submarines)

ships that traveled underwater, German ones attacked British ships and sank the Lusitania

Collectivize

bring under central government control

Russian Civil War

1918-1920: conflict in which the Red Army successfully defended the newly formed Bolshevik government against various Russian and interventionist anti-Bolshevik armies. Red vs. White Army.

Spanish Civil War

In 1936 a rebellion erupted in Spain after a coalition of Republicans, Socialists, and Communists was elected. General Francisco Franco led the rebellion. The revolt quickly became a civil war. The Soviet Union provided arms and advisers to the government forces while Germany and Italy sent tanks, airplanes, and soldiers to help Franco.

Luftwaffe

German Air Force

Decolonization

The collapse of colonial empires. Between 1947 and 1962, practically all former colonies in Asia and Africa gained independence.

Mandate System

Allocation of former German colonies and Ottoman possessions to the victorious powers after World War I; to be administered under League of Nations supervision.

Balfour Declaration

British document that promised land in Palestine as homeland for Jews in exchange for Jews help in WWI

Chiang Kai-Shek

General and leader of Nationalist China after 1925. Although he succeeded Sun Yat-sen as head of the Guomindang, he became a military dictator whose major goal was to crush the communist movement led by Mao Zedong.

Indian National Congress

Major Indian political party; began as leading organization of Indian independence movement

Anschluss

Union of Austria and Germany

Munich Agreement

Agreement between Chamberlain and Hitler that Germany would not conquer any more land, and if did, would declare war

Rome-Berlin Axis

the alliance between Italy and Germany (Mussolini and Hitler)

Reichstag

German Parliament (name)

D-Day

Allied invasion of France on June 6, 1944

Hiroshima/Nagasaki

City in Japan, the first to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, on August 6, 1945. The bombing hastened the end of World War II. Japanese city in which the second atomic bomb was dropped (August 9, 1945).

Nonaggression Pact

An agreement in which nations promise not to attack one another

Atlantic Charter

1941-Pledge signed by US president FDR and British prime minister Winston Churchill not to acquire new territory as a result of WWII and to work for peace after the war

Darfur

a region in western Sudan where ethnic conflict threatened to lead to genocide

Janjaweed

Black Arabic-speaking militia responsible for most of the Darfur genocide

Tehran Conference

First major meeting between the Big Three (United States, Britain, Russia) at which they planned the 1944 assault on France and agreed to divide Germany into zones of occupation after the war

Potsdam Conference

July 26, 1945 - Allied leaders Truman, Stalin and Churchill met in Germany to set up zones of control and to inform the Japanese that if they refused to surrender at once, they would face total destruction.

Hydrogen Bomb

New nuclear weapon even more destructive than the atomic bomb

Satellite Countries

Countries bordering USSR that Soviets made Communist to have "friendly ring of countries"

Containment

American policy of resisting further expansion of communism around the world

Truman Doctrine

1947, President Truman's policy of providing economic and military aid to any country threatened by communism or totalitarian ideology, mainly helped Greece and Turkey

Marshall Plan

A United States program of economic aid for the reconstruction of Europe (1948-1952)

Domino Theory

A theory that if one nation comes under Communist control, then neighboring nations will also come under Communist control.

Bay of Pigs

In April 1961, a group of Cuban exiles organized and supported by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency landed on the southern coast of Cuba in an effort to overthrow Fidel Castro. When the invasion ended in disaster, President Kennedy took full responsibility for the failure.

SEATO

1954-1977; created to oppose the spread of Communism in SE Asia after France's withdraw from Indochina. Original members included the US, Britain, France, Pakistan, Thailand, and the Philippines. The organization was meant to justify an American presence in Vietnam.

Nuclear Test Ban Treaty

(JFK) 1963, Wake of Cuban Missile Crisis (climax of Cold War, closest we've ever come to nuclear war) Soviets & US agree to prohibit all above-ground nuclear tests, both nations choose to avoid annihilating the human race w/ nuclear war, France and China did not sign

Nikita Khrushchev

A Soviet leader during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Also famous for denouncing Stalin and allowed criticism of Stalin within Russia

Great Leap Forward

Started by Mao Zedong, combined collective farms into People's Communes, failed because there was no incentive to work harder, ended after 2 years.

Cultural Revolution

Campaign in China ordered by Mao Zedong to purge the Communist Party of his opponents and instill revolutionary values in the younger generation.

Haile Selassie

Emperor of Ethiopia (r. 1930-1974) and symbol of African independence. He fought the Italian invasion of his country in 1935 and regained his throne during World War II, when British forces expelled the Italians. He ruled Ethiopia as an autocrat.

Kwame Nkrumah

founder of Ghana's independence movement and Ghana's first president

Gamal Abdel Nasser

He led the coup which toppled the monarchy of King Farouk and started a new period of modernization and socialist reform in Egypt

Suez Crisis

July 26, 1956, Nasser (leader of Egypt) nationalized the Suez Canal, Oct. 29, British, French and Israeli forces attacked Egypt. UN forced British to withdraw; made it clear Britain was no longer a world power

Muslim League

an organization formed in 1906 to protect the interests of India's Muslims, which later proposed that India be divided into separate Muslim and Hindu nations

Organization of African Unity

An organization started in 1963 by thirty-two newly independent African states and designed to prevent conflict that would lead to intervention by former colonial powers.

Prague Spring

Attempted liberation of Czechoslovakia in 1968.

Irish Republican Army

a militant organization of Irish nationalists who used terrorism and guerilla warfare in an effort to drive British forces from Northern Ireland and achieve a united independent Ireland

Mikhail Gorbachev

Head of the Soviet Union from 1985 to 1991. His liberalization effort improved relations with the West, but he lost power after his reforms led to the collapse of Communist governments in eastern Europe.

Perestroika

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

Glasnost

a policy of the Soviet government allowing freer discussion of social problems

Malaria

disease caused by mosquitoes implanting parasites in the blood

Polio Vaccine

(1995) created by Dr. Jonas Salk. worked by introducing killed or weak pieces of the virus to allow body to develop antibodies

Kyoto Protocol

An International agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in an effort to slow global warming; as of November 2007, 174 countries had subscribed to the agreement.

WTO

International body representing 149 nations that negotiates the rules for global commerce and is dedicated to the promotion of free trade.

Margaret Thatcher

Conservative British prime minister from 1979 to 1991; held that office longer than any other person; worked to cut welfare and housing expenses, promote free enterprise.

Deng Xiaoping

He was a leader in the Communist Party of China (CCP). He held office as the head of state or the head of government but served as the de facto ("in practice" but not spelled out by law) leader of the People's Republic of China from the late 1970s to the early 1990s.

Desmond Tutu

South African activist and Christian cleric who rose to worldwide fame as an opponent of apartheid. He was the first black South African Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town and primate of the Church of the Province of Southern Africa. He has also been active in defense of human rights and uses his high profile to campaign to fight AIDS, tuberculosis, homophobia, transphobia, poverty and racism.

W.E.B. Du Bois

First African American to receive a doctorate. America's foremost black intellectual at the turn of the twentieth century, and an outspoken leader of the black cause. He disagreed with Booker T. Washington's accommodationist posture and called upon blacks to insist on equal rights. He was a founder of the NAACP and editor of its journal, "The Crisis."

Green Peace

Environmentalist movement established in British Columbia in 1970. From that year to the present, it has been one of the key NGOs in the world to bring about change in attitudes towards environmental protection. Causes have ranged from protesting against nuclear testing to preventing the destruction of old growth forest.

Universal Declaration of Human Rights

A 1946 United Nations covenant binding signatory nations to the observance of specified rights.

Consumer Culture

America, 1900s: a culture based around the consumer and the acquiring of goods to fuel the economy, economy based on consumption.

Young Turks

A coalition starting in the late 1870s of various groups favoring modernist liberal reform of the Ottoman Empire. It was against monarchy of Ottoman Sultan and instead favored a constitution. In 1908 they succeed in establishing a new constitutional era.

Emiliano Zapata

Revolutionary and leader of peasants in the Mexican Revolution. He mobilized landless peasants in south-central Mexico to seize and divide the lands of the wealthy landowners. Though successful for a time, he was ultimately defeated and assassinated.

The Great War

name originally given to the First World War (1914-1918).

Triple Alliance

An alliance between Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy in the years before WWI.

Black Hand

Serbian nationalist/terrorist group responsible for the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand which resulted in the start of World War I.

Militarism

A policy of glorifying military power and keeping a standing army always prepared for war

Self-determination

Concept that ethnicities have the right to govern themselves

Stalemate

A situation in which no progress can be made or no advancement is possible

Propaganda

Ideas spread to influence public opinion for or against a cause.

Reparations

Payment for war damages

Lusitania

A British passenger ship that was sunk by a German U-Boat on May 7, 1915. 128 Americans died. The sinking greatly turned American opinion against the Germans, helping the move towards entering the war.

Zimmerman Note

secret message from Germany to Mexico, threatening to act together against America. Helps lead U.S. toward war with Germany.

Total War

A conflict in which the participating countries devote all their resources to the war effort

Big Four

Four most important leaders, and the most important ones at the Paris Peace Conference. They were Woodrow Wilson- USA, David Lloyd George- UK, George Clemenceau- France, and Vittorio Orlando- Italy.

Fourteen Points

A series of proposals in which U.S. president Woodrow Wilson outlined a plan for achieving a lasting peace after World War I

League of Nations

an international organization formed in 1920 to promote cooperation and peace among nations

Treaty of Versailles

Treaty that ended World War I - most important part was the forced blame on Germany and other allies

Trench Warfare

A form of warfare in which opposing armies fight each other from trenches dug in the battlefield.

Inflation

A general and progressive increase in prices

Great Depression

the economic crisis beginning with the stock market crash in 1929 and continuing through the 1930s

New Deal

A series of reforms enacted by the Franklin Roosevelt administration between 1933 and 1942 with the goal of ending the Great Depression.

Five-Year Plan

Stalin's economic policy to rebuild the Soviet economy after WWI. tried to improve heavy industry and improve farm output, but resulted in famine

Fascism

A political system headed by a dictator that calls for extreme nationalism and racism and no tolerance of opposition

Totalitarian State

country where a single party controls the government and every aspect of the lives of the people

USSR

Russian federal system controlled by the Communist Party established in 1923.

Soviet Union

A Communist nation, consisting of Russia and 14 other states, that existed from 1922 to 1991.

Francisco Franco

fascist leader of the Spanish revolution, helped by Hitler and Mussolini

Gulag

Russian prison camp for political prisoners

Civil Disobedience

A form of political participation that reflects a conscious decision to break a law believed to be immoral and to suffer the consequences.

Mohandas Gandhi

A philosopher from India, this man was a spiritual and moral leader favoring India's independence from Great Britain. He practiced passive resistance, civil disobedience and boycotts to generate social and political change.

Jawaharlal Nehru

Indian statesman. He succeeded Mohandas K. Gandhi as leader of the Indian National Congress. He negotiated the end of British colonial rule in India and became India's first prime minister (1947-1964).

Mao Zedong

(1893-1976) Leader of the Communist Party in China that overthrew Jiang Jieshi and the Nationalists. Established China as the People's Republic of China and ruled from 1949 until 1976.

Pan-Arabism

movement in which Arabs sought to unite all Arabs into one state

Salt March

passive resistance campaign of Mohandas Gandhi where many Indians protested the British tax on salt by marching to the sea to make their own salt.

Chinese Communist Party

Authoritarian party that has ruled China from 1949 to the present

Long March

The 6,000-mile (9,600-kilometer) flight of Chinese Communists from southeastern to northwestern China. The Communists, led by Mao Zedong, were pursued by the Chinese army under orders from Chiang Kai-shek.

Palestine

A territory in the Middle East on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Disputed with Israel.

Pakistan

a Muslim republic that occupies the heartland of ancient south Asian civilization in the Indus River valley

Neville Chamberlain

Great British prime minister who advocated peace and a policy of appeasement