Cold War and Korean War Vocabulary

Cold War

the hostile but nonviolent struggle for power between the US and the Soviet Union, as well as their respective allies, from the end of WWII to the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991

Yalta Conference

held in February 1945 in the Soviet city of Yalta, a conference of the main allied leader - US president FDR, British prime minister inMexico proposing that if the US ended the war, Mexico and Germany should become allies, it helped the US to declare war on Germany five weeks later

Potsdam conference

in July and August 1945 in the German city of Potsdam, a conference of the main Allied leaders - US president Harry Truman, British prime minister Winston Churchill and later his successor Clement Atlee, and Soviet premier Joseph Stalin- to finalize post WWII plans for Europe

Proletariat

the working class in a society

Collectivism

an economic system in which the people, often under supervision of the state, jointly own the means of production and distribution

Superpowers

a nation that is so powerful that it influences or controls less powerful states

Containment

after WWII, the US foreign policy practice of attempting to restrict the expansion of Soviet influence around the world

atomic energy

the power released by a nuclear reaction

UN Atomic Energy Commission

a panel established by the UN in 1946 to propose ways to control atomic energy and restrict the development of nuclear weapons

Iron Curtain

the ideological barrier that existed between Eastern and Western Europe from 1945 to 1990

Hegemony

the dominating influence of one country or group over others

Truman Doctrine

a US foreign policy, established in 1947 by Truman, of providing economic and military aid to countries- initially Greece and Turkey- that were attempting to resist communism

Marshall Plan

a US plan, initiated by the Secretary of State George Marshall and implemented from 1948 to 1951, to aid in the economic recovery of Europe after WWII by offering certain European countries substantial funds

Molotov Plan

a Soviet Plan to aid in the economic recovery of Eastern Europe after WWII by helping those who accepted communism

Berlin Blockade

the Soviet blockade of Berlin, Germany, implemented from 1948-49 to halt land travel into the city in hopes of forcing the US, Great Britain, and France to give up their plan to combine their occupation zones into a single, democratic West German state; the Allied nations resisted the blockade by airlifting food and supplies into Berlin

coup d’etat

the sudden overthrow of a government by violent force

satellite nations

a country under another country’s control

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

as part of the Cold War, a military alliance formed in 1949 among the US, Canada, France, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, Iceland, Italy, Britain, Denmark, Norway, and Portugal- and expanded to include Greece and Turkey in 1952 and West Germany 1955- to establish collective security against the Soviet Union

Warsaw Pact

as part of the Cold War and in response to the formation of NATO, an agreement signed in 1955 by the Soviet Union, Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, and Romania to establish a military alliance for mutual defense

Korean War

a war fought on the Korean Peninsula from 1950 to 1953 after troops from communist North Korea, armed with Soviet weapons, invaded democratic South Korea, prompting the US and the UN to send forces to support South Korea and fight to unify the Korean Peninsula into one democratic nation, which in turn prompted China to join the war on North Korea’s side; at war’s end, the peninsula remained divided into two nations

demilitarized zone

an area, often along the border between two military powers, that no military forces are allowed to enter

Third World

originally, the group of nations that had recently gained independence from colonial rule and were not aligned with the West (first world) or the East (second world) after WWII; more broadly, the developing nations of the world

covert action

a secret political, economic, or military operation that aims to shape events or influence affairs in a foreign country in order to support the initiating nation’s foreign policy

arms race

a competition between nations to achieve the more powerful weapons arsenal

H-bomb

a hydrogen bomb, or a bomb created by fusing atoms; more powerful than an atomic bomb, a weapon of mass destruction that the US first tested in 1952 as part of the arms race

Brinksmanship

a foreign policy characterized by a willingness to push a dangerous situation to the brink, or edge, of war rather than give up to an opponent

Deterrence

a foreign policy in which a nation develops a weapons arsenal so deadly that another nation will not dare attack

Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD)

during the arms race between the US and the Soviet Union, the principle that either side would respond to a nuclear attack by launching its own missiles, which helped prevent the COld War from becoming a hot war

communist sympathizers

a person who believes in communist ideology but is not a member of the Communist Party

subversion

a plot or an action intended to overthrow a government

loyalty oaths

a pledge of loyalty to a group, such as an organization or a nation

House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)

formed in 1938, a committee of the US House of Representatives that investigated subversive organizations in the US until 1975

Incriminate

to provide evidence that makes someone appear guilty

contempt of Congress

willful failure to obey the authority of Congress

blacklist

a list of people or groups who are under suspicion for something and are thus excluded from certain opportunities

Alger Hiss Case

a court case involving Alger Hiss, a US State Department official accused of passing secrets to the Soviet Union that contributed to a growing fear of subversion during the early Cold War; in 1950 a federal grand jury convicted Hiss of perjury, but his guilt in regard to espionage was not proven

perjury

willfully lying while under oath to tell the truth

Rosenberg trial

the controversial 1951 trial of two Americans, Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, charged with passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, these two were sentenced to death and executed in 1953, making them the only American civilians to be put to death for spying during the Cold War

McCarthyism

the practice of publicly accusing people of subversive activities without evidence to back up the charges; named for Senator Joseph McCarthy, who began such a practice in the early 1950s as part of the search for communists in the US during the early Cold War

censured

to formally scold someone

Atomic Age

a bomb with explosive power that comes from the energy suddenly released by splitting the nuclei of uranium or plutonium atoms

civil defense

the organization and training of citizens to work with the armed forces and emergency services during a war or natural disaster

Federal Civil Defense Administration (FCDA)

a federal agency established by Congress in 1951 to plan for civil defense during the arms race by preparing Americans to survive a nuclear attack