history figures 5-8

George F. Kennan (1904–2005)

State Department diplomat ("Mr. X") who authored 1947 "Long Telegram"; framed containment strategy asserting Soviet expansionism was driven by internal political instability.

George C. Marshall (1880–1959)

WWII Chief of Staff and Truman's Secretary of State; proposed Marshall Plan (European Recovery Program) to rebuild European economies and block communism.

Jan G. Masaryk (1886–1948)

Lone non-communist Foreign Minister of Czechoslovakia; died mysteriously following 1948 Soviet-backed communist coup in Prague.

Dean Acheson (1893–1991)

Truman's Secretary of State and key architect of containment, Marshall Plan, and NATO; co-authored Acheson-Lilienthal Plan and outlined Pacific "defensive perimeter."

Henry A. Wallace (1888–1965)

FDR's VP and Truman's Commerce Secretary; ran as 1948 Progressive candidate opposing containment and urging Soviet cooperation.

Andrei Zhdanov (1896–1948)

Stalin's chief ideologue and Cominform founder; authored Zhdanov Doctrine dividing world into imperialist (US) and anti-imperialist (USSR) camps.

Josef Stalin (1878–1953)

Soviet dictator who established Eastern European satellite states, rejected Marshall Plan aid, and ordered crash nuclear program.

Harry S. Truman (1884–1972)

33rd President; announced Truman Doctrine (1947), committed troops to Korea, authorized Hydrogen bomb, and fired MacArthur.

Syngman Rhee (1875–1965)

Princeton-educated first President of South Korea (1948–1960); authoritarian anti-communist who brutally suppressed leftists and sought forced reunification.

Kim Il-Sung (1912–1994)

First communist dictator of North Korea; launched June 1950 invasion across 38th parallel to unify Korea under communist rule.

Douglas MacArthur (1880–1964)

UN Supreme Commander in Korea who executed Inchon landing; fired by Truman in 1951 for public insubordination after demanding expansion into China.

J. Robert Oppenheimer (1904–1967)

Former Los Alamos director and head of AEC General Advisory Committee; expressed moral remorse and opposed developing thermonuclear Hydrogen bomb.

General Leslie R. Groves (1896–1970)

Manhattan Project military director; predicted Soviet Union would take at least 15–20 years to build atomic bomb.

David E. Lilienthal (1899–1981)

TVA director and first Atomic Energy Commission chairman; co-authored Acheson-Lilienthal Plan for UN atomic energy control.

Bernard Baruch (1870–1965)

Financier who modified Acheson-Lilienthal proposal into Baruch Plan; demanded U.S. retain nuclear monopoly until full inspections and sanctions were established.

Andrei Gromyko (1909–1989)

Soviet UN representative; submitted Gromyko counter-proposal demanding immediate U.S. nuclear disarmament before inspections.

Edward Teller (1908–2003)

Hungarian-born physicist known as "father of the Hydrogen bomb"; aggressively championed thermonuclear "Super" fusion weapon.

Louis A. Johnson (1891–1966)

Defense Secretary under Truman; backed Edward Teller against scientists and supported rapid authorization of Hydrogen bomb.

John von Neumann (1903–1957)

Hungarian-born Princeton mathematician; developed Game Theory and pioneer computer (MANIAC) used to calculate hydrogen bomb fusion mathematics.

Albert Einstein (1879–1955)

Theoretical physicist; publicly condemned Hydrogen bomb development, warning thermonuclear weapons pointed toward "general annihilation."

Andrei Sakharov (1921–1989)

Theoretical physicist known as "father of Soviet hydrogen bomb"; later became leading anti-nuclear activist and Soviet political dissident.

Igor Kurchatov (1903–1960)

Leading Soviet nuclear physicist who directed USSR atomic bomb project to achieve Soviet atomic detonation in 1949.

Pyotr Kapitsa (1894–1984)

Prominent Soviet physicist who refused to participate in military atomic bomb research under Stalin.

Robert A. Taft (1889–1953)

Republican Senator from Ohio ("Mr. Republican"); led conservative isolationist faction calling for reduced overseas troop commitments and opposing NATO.

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969)

34th U.S. President; instituted NSC 162/2 "New Look" policy emphasizing nuclear deterrence ("massive retaliation") and reduced ground forces.

John Foster Dulles (1889–1959)

Eisenhower's Secretary of State; authored policy of "massive retaliation" and "brinksmanship," threatening nuclear strikes against communist aggression.

Adlai E. Stevenson (1900–1965)

Democratic Governor of Illinois; twice ran as Democratic presidential nominee against Eisenhower in 1952 and 1956.

Joseph McCarthy (1908–1957)

Republican Senator from Wisconsin whose 1950 Wheeling speech sparked anti-communist hysteria; alleged widespread subversion in State Department and Army until censured in 1954.

Alger Hiss (1904–1999)

High-ranking State Department official accused by Whittaker Chambers of communist espionage; convicted of perjury in 1950.

Whittaker Chambers (1901–1961)

Former Communist Party underground agent and Time editor; exposed Alger Hiss and produced "Pumpkin Papers" before HUAC.

Julius Rosenberg (1918–1953) & Ethel Rosenberg (1915–1953)

American communists convicted of conspiring to pass atomic bomb secrets (implosion lens diagrams) to Soviet Union; executed at Sing Sing in 1953.

Klaus Fuchs (1911–1988)

German-born British physicist at Los Alamos who confessed in 1950 to passing atomic bomb design secrets to Soviet agents.

Elizabeth Bentley (1908–1963)

Vassar graduate and former Soviet spy courier who turned FBI informant in 1945; exposed extensive Soviet spy networks in government to HUAC.

Juliet Stuart Poyntz (1886–1937?)

Barnard graduate and CPUSA leader turned KGB secret agent; mysteriously disappeared in 1937 during Stalin's purges.

Owen Lattimore (1900–1989)

Johns Hopkins China scholar and State Department consultant; falsely accused by McCarthy of being top Soviet agent responsible for "loss of China."

Judge Irving Kaufman (1910–1992)

Federal district judge who presided over Rosenberg trial, sentencing both Julius and Ethel Rosenberg to death for espionage.

Nikolai Novikov

USSR's ambassador to the United States from 1946-1947. September 1946 Novikov Telegram, Soviet counterpart to Kennan's Long Telegram that warned Moscow of aggressive American plans for global supremacy.