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Soviet Union
A Communist nation, consisting of Russia and 14 other states, that existed from 1922 to 1991.
Joseph Stalin
The military dictator of the Soviet Union from 1922 until his death in 1953.
United Nations
An international body agreed upon at the Yalta Conference, and founded at a conference in San Francisco in 1945, consisting of a General Assembly, in which all nations are represented and a Security Council of the five major Allied powers-the Untied States, Britain, France, China and the Soviet Union - and seven other nations elected on a rotating basis.
Security Council
One of the six principal organs of the United Nations, charged with the maintenance of international peace and security as well as accepting new members to the United Nations and approving any changes to its United Nations Charter. Its powers include the establishment of peacekeeping operations, the establishment of international sanctions, and the authorization of military action. China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States are permanent members.
World Bank
An international bank created to provide loans for the reconstruction of war-torn Europe as well as for the development of former colonized nations in the developing world.
International Monetary Fund (IMF)
A fund established to stabilize currencies and provide a predictable monetary environment for trade, with the U.S. dollar serving as the benchmark.
Satellites
Nations under the control of a greater power. During the Cold War nations such as Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Hungary and Czechoslovakia served as buffer states for the Soviet Union.
Iron Curtain
The barrier separating the former Soviet bloc and the West prior to the decline of communism that followed the political events in eastern Europe in 1989.
Containment
The basic U.S. policy of the Cold War, which sought to stop the spread of communism within its existing geographic boundaries. Initially, the policy focused on the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, but in the 1950s it came to include China, North Korea, and other parts of the developing world.
George Marshall
He served in World War I, Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army in World War II and served as President Harry Truman's Secretary of State from 1947 to 1949. He oversaw the U.S. led reconstruction of Western Europe.
Dean Acheson
An American statesman and lawyer. As United States Secretary of State in the administration of President Harry S. Truman from 1949 to 1953, he played a central role in defining American foreign policy during the Cold War. He helped design the Marshall Plan and was a key player in the development of the Truman Doctrine and creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
George Keenan
An American diplomat and historian. He was known best as an advocate of a policy of containment of Soviet expansion during the Cold War.
Truman Doctrine
President Truman's commitment to "support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." First applied to Greece and Turkey in 1947, it became the justification for U.S. intervention into several countries during the Cold War.
Marshall Plan
Aid program begun in 1948 to help European economies recover from World War II.
Berlin Airlift
In response to the Berlin blockade (26 June 1948 - 30 September 1949) Western Allies organized to carry supplies to the people of West Berlin. They flew over 200,000 flights in one year, providing to the West Berliners up to 8,893 tons of necessities each day, such as fuel and food.
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
Military alliance formed in 1949 among the United States, Canada, and Western European nations to counter any possible Soviet threat.
Warsaw Pact
A military alliance established in Eastern Europe in 1955 to counter the NATO alliance; it included Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union.
National Security Act
A major restructuring of the United States government's military and intelligence agencies following World War II. The Act created the Department of Defense, the National Security Council and the Central Intelligence Agency.
NSC-68
Top-secret government report of April 1950 warning that national survival in the face of Soviet communism required a massive military buildup.
Douglas MacArthur
Following World War II he was put in charge of the reconstruction of Japan. He was fired from his position as Commander of the United Nations Command by President Harry Truman in 1951 for his conduct in the Korean War.
Chiang Kai-shek
A political and military leader who served as the leader of the Republic of China between 1928 and 1975. He was defeated by Mao Zedong after the creation of the People's Republic of China. He led the Republic of China in exile from Taiwan.
Mao Zedong
The leader of the communist revolution in China in 1949. He ruled as the leader of the People's Republic of China from 1949 until his death in 1976.
Taiwan
Also known as the Republic of China, this self governing island lies 100 miles off of the Southeast coast of the People's Republic of China. Chinese Nationalists led by Chain Kai-shek fled there following their defeat on the mainland in 1949.
People's Republic of China
Established by Mao Zedong as a communist nation in 1949. The United States did not recognize the nation until January 1, 1979 (severed formal relations with Taiwan).
38th Parallel
Used as the pre-Korean War boundary between North Korea and South Korea.
Kim IlSung
The Communist leader of North Korea during the Korean War.
Syngman Rhee
The conservative nationalist leader of South Korea during the Korean War.
John Foster Dulles
As Secretary of State under President Eisenhower he advocated for the aggressive stance of "brinkmanship" against communism throughout the world.
Brinkmanship
The art or practice of pursuing a dangerous policy to the limits of safety before stopping. Advocated by John Foster Dulles, he once described the policy as, "The ability to get to the verge without getting into the war is the necessary art."
Massive retaliation
A military doctrine and nuclear strategy in which a state commits itself to retaliate in much greater force in the event of an attack.
Open-skies policy
A policy proposal between the United States during the Cold war to allow aerial photography of the opposing nation to eliminate the chance of a surprise nuclear attack.
Nikita Khrushchev
The Premier of the Soviet Union from 1953 until 1964. He oversaw the early progress of the Soviet space program (Sputnik) and led the Soviet Union during the Cuban Missile Crisis.
Hungarian revolt
A student led uprising in Budapest in 1956 against the Soviet led government. It was violently crushed by the Soviet Union. The refusal to intervene on the side of the revolutionaries by the United States was an unspoken acceptance of Soviet power in Eastern Europe.
Sputnik
The world's first satellite, launched by the Soviet Union in 1957. After its launch, the United Sates funded research and education to catch up in the Cold War space competition.
National Defense Education Act
A 1958 act, passed in response to the Soviet launching of the Sputnik satellite, that funneled millions of dollars into American universities, helping institutions such as the University of California at Berkeley and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, among others, became the leading research centers in the world.
NASA
Created in 1958 to direct the U.S. efforts to build missiles and explore outer space. Billions were appropriated to compete with the Soviets in the space race.
U-2 Incident
During the leadership of Eisenhower and Khrushchev in 1960 a United States spy plane was shot down while in Soviet airspace. The aircraft, flown by Central Intelligence Agency pilot Francis Gary Powers was performing photographic aerial reconnaissance when it was hit by a surface-to-air missile and crashed. Powers parachuted safely and was captured. This event led to the cancellation of a planned peace summit between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
Fidel Castro
A Cuban communist revolutionary and politician who governed the Republic of Cuba as Prime Minister from 1959 to 1976 and then as President from 1976 to 2008. Under his administration, Cuba became a one-party communist state, while industry and business were nationalized and state socialist reforms were implemented throughout the society.
Military-industrial complex
A term President Eisenhower used to refer to the military establishment and defense contractors who, he warned, exercised undue influence over the national government.
Bay of Pigs
A failed U.S.-sponsored invasion of Cuba in 1961 by anti-Castro forces who planned to overthrow Fidel Castro's government.
Berlin Wall
A barrier that surrounded West Berlin and prevented access to it from East Berlin and adjacent areas of East Germany during the period from 1961 to 1989.
Cuban Missile Crisis
The 1962 nuclear standoff between the Soviet Union and the United States when the Soviets attempted to deploy nuclear missiles in Cuba.
Flexible response
U.S. defense strategy during the Kennedy administration in which a wide range of diplomatic, political, economic, and military options are used to deter an enemy attack. This policy was an alternative to Eisenhower's policy of massive retaliation.
Robert McNamara
He served as the United States Secretary of Defense from 1961 to 1968 under Presidents Kennedy and Johnson. He oversaw the U.S. military buildup in Vietnam.
Henry Kissinger
He served as the United States Secretary of State and National Security Advisor under the presidential administrations of Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford. A practitioner of Realpolitik, he played a prominent role in United States foreign policy between 1969 and 1977. He pioneered the policy of détente with the Soviet Union, orchestrated the opening of relations with the People's Republic of China, and negotiated the Paris Peace Accords, ending American involvement in the Vietnam War. He has also been associated with such controversial policies as U.S. involvement in a military coup in Chile and U.S. support for Pakistan during the Bangladesh War despite a genocide.
Detente
The easing of conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Nixon administration, which was achieved by focusing on issues of common concern, such as arms control and trade.
Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT)
Two rounds of bilateral conferences and corresponding international treaties involving the United States and the Soviet Union, the Cold War superpowers, on the issue of arms control.
Dennis et al. v. United States
A 1951 Supreme Court ruling which upheld the constitutionality of the Smith Act.
Smith Act
Legislation passed in 1940 which made it illegal to advocate or teach the overthrow of the government by force or to belong to an organization with this objective.
McCarran Internal Security Act
Legislation passed over the veto of President Truman in 1950 which made it unlawful to advocate or support the establishment of a totalitarian government, restricted the employment and travel of those joining Communist-front organizations and authorized the creation of detention camps for subversives.
House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)
Congressional committee especially prominent during the early years of the Cold War that investigated Americans who might be disloyal to the government or might have associated with communists or other radicals.
Whittaker Chambers
A former Communist spy who defected to the United States. Under subpoena in 1948, he accused Alger Hiss of being a communist spy.
Alger Hiss
An American government official who was accused of being a Soviet spy in 1948 and convicted of perjury in connection with this charge in 1950. Before he was tried and convicted, he was involved in the establishment of the United Nations both as a U.S. State Department official and as a U.N. official.
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
United States citizens who were executed on June 19, 1953 after being convicted of committing espionage for the Soviet Union. They were accused of transmitting nuclear weapon designs to the Soviet Union; at that time the United States was the only country with nuclear weapons.
Joseph McCarthy
A Republican U.S. Senator from Wisconsin from 1947 until 1957. He is known for recklessly alleging that numerous Communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated the United States federal government, universities, film industry, and elsewhere without any evidence. Ultimately, the smear tactics he used led him to be censured by the U.S. Senate.
Servicemen's Readjustment Act (GI Bill)
Legislation authorizing the government to provide World War II veterans with funds for education, housing, and health care, as well as loans to start businesses and buy homes.
Baby boom
The surge in the American birthrate between 1945 and 1965, which peaked in 1957 with 4.3 million births
Dr. Benjamin Spock
an American pediatrician whose book Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, is one of the biggest best-sellers of all time. Its revolutionary message to mothers was that "you know more than you think you do." He was the first pediatrician to study psychoanalysis to try to understand children's needs and family dynamics. His ideas about childcare influenced several generations of parents to be more flexible and affectionate with their children.
Levittown
Developed between 1946 and 1951 on Long Island, New York, it was an early example of a completely preplanned and mass-produced housing complex. More than 17,000 low-cost homes were built, with accompanying shopping centers, playgrounds, swimming pools, community halls, and schools.
Sun Belt
Name applied to the Southwest and South, which grew rapidly after World War II as a center of defense industries and non unionized labor.
Rust Belt
The once heavily industrialized regions of the Northeast and Midwest that went into decline after deindustrialization. By the 1970s and 1980s, these regions were full of abandoned plants and distressed communities.
22nd Amendment
No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once.
Taft-Hartley Act
Law passed by the Republican-controlled Congress in 1947 that overhauled the 1935 National Labor Relations Act, placing restrictions on organized labor that made it more difficult for unions to organize workers.
Fair Deal
The domestic policy agenda announced by President Harry S. Truman in 1949. Including civil rights, health care, and education reform, Truman's initiative was only partially successful in Congress.
Highway Act
Legislation passed in 1956 which authorized the construction of 42,000 miles of roads linking all the nation's major cities. This immense public works project created jobs, promoted the trucking industry, accelerated the growth of the suburbs, and contributed to a more homogenous national culture.
New Frontier
A term used by liberal Democratic presidential candidate John F. Kennedy in his acceptance speech in the 1960 United States presidential election to the Democratic National Convention as the Democratic slogan to inspire America to support him. The phrase developed into a label for his administration's domestic and foreign programs.
Peace Corps
Program launched by President Kennedy in 1961 through which young American volunteers helped with education, health, and other projects in developing countries around the world.
Stagflation
An economic term coined in the 1970s to describe the condition in which inflation and unemployment rise at the same time.
The Affluent Society
A 1958 book by John Kenneth Galbraith that analyzed the nation's successful middle class and argued that the poor were only an "afterthought" in the minds of economists and politicians.
Catch-22
A 1961 novel by Joseph Heller that satirized the rigidity of the military and the insanity of war.
Beatniks
A small group of literary figures based in New York City and San Francisco in the 1950s who rejected mainstream culture and instead celebrated personal freedom, which often included drug consumption and casual sex.
Warren Commission
A Presidential appointed commission to investigate the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The study concluded that President Kennedy was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald and that Oswald acted alone. It also concluded that Jack Ruby also acted alone when he killed Oswald two days later.
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