[APUSH 2] Cold War Vocabulary

Nuremberg/Tokyo Trials

post-war trials for German and Japanese war criminals

United Nations (UN)

international organization committed to world peace led by its security council with 5 permanent members: US, Britain, Russia, France, and China

Cold War

non-shooting war of tension between the US and the Soviet Union from 1945 to 1990

• This is where “Communist” became a bad word

Taft-Hartley Act

outlawed the closed shop and made union leaders swear they weren’t Communists

• Closed Shop: hiring practice where you can’t hire someone until they join a union

• Truman vetoed the act and Congress overrides it

• This was the second Red Scare in history, and was the worst one

Dixiecrats

Southern Democrats who broke with the party over Civil Rights

• In 1948, they ran a candidate, Strom Thurmond

  • He won 4 States: South Carolina, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Mississippi

Baby Boom

refers to the high birth rate between 1946-1964

• America’s post-WWII economy was really good, which led to more people wanting to have children (also explains why during the Great Depression, birth rates were really low)

• Having a lot of old people is a bad thing because they all get Social Security and Medicare, which takes up a big chunk of the National Debt

Fair Deal

Truman’s economic plan that called for full employment and a national healthcare system that was never passed

• Full Employment = Unemployment drops below 3% (it's impossible to have 0%)

• Second to the widespread fear of Communism, the US fears another depression

• A national healthcare system is extremely expensive

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

America’s spies

Joseph McCarthy

Wisconsin Senator who accused people in the government of being Communist

• Insignificant before he went on a rampage to find Communists in the government in order for his wish to be president to be fulfilled

• Truman does nothing to go against or for McCarthy

• McCarthy accused the army of being Communist, and the American public didn’t believe that because the army is so revered and honored

• Congress “censors” McCarthy and he loses all of his credibility

• The Crucible utilizes the Salem Witch Trials as an allegory to McCarthyism, and although Arthur Miller screws up the stories historically, he uses this to evade censorship

Alger Hiss

member of the State Department and was a Communist who went to jail for perjury

• Perjury: lying under oath

• Everybody in the state department makes a pledge to not be a Communist (Hiss pledged)

• People are allowed to be Communists, but you can’t be a Communist and work in the gov’t

• Gave him maximum sentence (4 years in jail) for perjury

The Rosenbergs

American couple convicted and executed for being Communist spies

• Julius Rosenberg was actually guilty of being a Soviet spy

• Ethel Rosenberg had her sons claim that she was innocent; evidence doesn’t support that

House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC)

congressional committee that investigated Communists in American society, led by Richard Nixon

• McCarthy is investigating the government itself, and HUAC targeted Hollywood actors

  • Targeted Hollywood due to its large influence on society

  • HUAC also found homosexuals, which they didn’t approve of either (not as bad as being a Communist, however)

GI Bill of Rights

also known as the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act, this provided WWII veterans with college tuition, job training, mortgages, and small business loans, and created the modern American middle class

• College Tuition: leads to America being much more educated and increases household income

• Job Training: government provides job training for people that don’t want to go to college

• Mortgage: low-interest mortgages, leading to more houses being constructed

• Small Business Loans: McDonald’s was formed by 2 brothers through a small business loan from the GI Bill of Rights, but they sold it for $1M

Marshall Plan

when the US gave money to any country who wanted to rebuild after WWII

• EXTREMELY expensive, but allowed the US to democratize other European countries

• If you took Marshall Plan money, your country would become a democracy

• If Russia asked for Marshall Plan money, the US would’ve given it to them, but they would need to change their entire government structure (Communist to Democratic)

Containment

US foreign policy during the Cold War to stop the spread of Communism

• Containment (overall policy) consists of Brinkmanship & Domino Theory

• This wasn’t done to annihilate Communism, but rather to stop its spread, as completely destroying Communism would be unrealistic and virtually impossible

Brinkmanship

US foreign policy to go to the edge of WWIII to stop Communism

• Fallout Shelters were constructed mainly to make students & parents feel “safe” as they were expensive and only held a small amount of of people in proportion to the buildings they were constructed in

• If WWIII were to start, it would start in Berlin (Berlin shared with the US and the Soviets)

Domino Theory

US foreign policy that says if 1 country falls to Communism, all of its neighbors would follow

• This theory caused the US to get involved in the Vietnam War, as Korea got split into North and South Korea (Communist & Free), so they thought Vietnam would be next

Satellite Nations

countries completely dominated by the Soviet Union

• Poland is the best example of this (Yalta Conference)

• Soviets are afraid of another invasion, so they wanted buffer countries to protect them from a potential US invasion

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

mutual defense group made up of the US and Western Europe

• 2 Major Rules to NATO

  • All countries must spend 2% of GDP on their military (many countries don’t follow)

  • An attack on one country is an attack on all countries

    • America was the only country to invoke this second part (due to 9/11)

• Being in NATO serves as a deterrent in being attacked because it strengthens countries

Warsaw Pact

mutual defense group made up of the Soviet Union & Eastern Europe

• Poland was initially part of the Warsaw Pact (during 1960s) but they eventually switched over to NATO, which made Russia mad, and thus inspired Russia to cross the border into Ukraine

  • If Russia invaded Poland, NATO would end up backing Poland, causing Russia to be in a tough spot, so they invade Ukraine instead

Truman Doctrine

when Truman gave $400 million to Turkey and Greece to fight Communism

Eisenhower Doctrine

when the US gives money to any Middle Eastern country fighting Communism

• Eisenhower refused to meet with the President of Mexico, and he wanted to talk to the Middle East because of their oil

• The US is the Middle East’s (and technically the entire world’s) biggest customer of oil

Berlin Airlift

when Stalin blockaded West Berlin, Truman started an airlift and Stalin backed down

• Berlin is entirely in the Soviet Zone, and all roads go through East German territory, and Stalin wants the entirety of Berlin, so he blockades those roads leading into Berlin

• Stalin didn’t want to start a war with the US because the US had atomic bombs, and Stalin didn’t, but Truman was ready for those planes to be shot down if Stalin did

Israel

Jewish homeland created after WWII

• To prevent a second Holocaust, Israel was created to protect Jewish people (by using Israel’s military)

• If you were a Jew surviving the Holocaust, your safest place was in America, and this essentially caused a lot of Jews from America to inhabit Israel after WWII, leading to the creation of a democratic country in the Middle East

Nikita Khrushchev

leader of the Soviet Union after Stalin died

• Khrushchev must prove he’s not like Stalin, but also has to prove he’s not weak to the US