Cold War Class Notes

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (1949)

• United States
• Belgium
• Britain
• Canada
• Denmark
• France
• Iceland
• Italy
• Luxemburg
• Netherlands
• Norway
• Portugal
• 1952: Greece & Turkey
• 1955: West Germany
• 1983: Spain

Warsaw Pact (1955)

• Albania
• Bulgaria
• Czechoslovakia
• East Germany
• Hungary
• U.S.S.R.
• Poland
• Romania

The Policy of Containment

• The US must maintain a relationship with European nations that share their economic and political values
• Soviet leaders are trying to extend communism throughout the world
• It is important to keep nations from falling to communism
• Prevent any Soviet expansion
• Focus on alliance (economic, political, and military) to stop communism from spreading

Truman Doctrine (1947)

• Civil War in Greece between communists and nationalists
• Turkey under pressure from the USSR
• “The U.S. should support free peoples throughout the world who were resisting takeovers by armed minorities or outside pressures… We must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.”
• The U.S. gave Greece & Turkey $400 million in aid
• Later, the U.S. also set up military bases there

Marshall Plan (1948)

• “European Recovery Program”
• Secretary of State, George Marshall
• The U.S. should provide aid to all European nations that need it. This move is not against any country or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos
• $Billions of US aid to Western Europe & USSR, [but this was rejected].

NSC-68 (National Security Council)

• Report that said the U.S. was the only country that could stop the Soviets
• To do this, it recommended a massive military build-up of weapons

Also recommended a bigger, better bomb

The Arms Race: The Soviet Union exploded its first A-bomb in 1949.

Hydrogen Bomb

• US developed the first thermonuclear bomb (H-bomb) in 1952
• 450 times more powerful than bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
• By 1954, US developed a bomb 1,000 times more powerful
• Soviets had their own atomic bomb in 1949, so the development of the H-bomb reestablished the United States; dominance in the nuclear power

Cold War Anxiety

Nuclear Anxiety: 1950s

• 1950s - arms race between the US and Soviet Union intensifies
• 1950 - US hydrogen bomb, 1000x more powerful than bombs used in WWII
• 1952 - US hydrogen bomb test vaporizes Bikini Atoll
• 9 months later - Soviets successfully test their own H-bomb

American Fear: Global Destruction

• Investment in churches rose:
  • 1946 - $76 million
  • 1957 - $868 million
• Government response:
  • Many Americans turned to religion to deal with nuclear war anxiety
  • Congress adds the phrase “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance, “In God We Trust” to U.S. coins

American Fears:

• Nuclear tests were spewing radioactive material into the air
• Evidence of radiation sickness in the Pacific
• Solution?
  • Fallout shelters; about $1500 at your local county fair
  • Typical contents: flashlights, battery radio, portable toilet, water, 2 weeks supply of food

American Fear - Soviet Technological Superiority:

• Oct 1958, Soviets launch Sputnik satellite (200 lbs, compared to 3 lb US device)
• Nov 1957, Soviets launch Sputnik II (1000 lb device, orbited Earth 200 days, sustained a dog for days)
• Government Response:
  • 1958, US launches Explorer I
  • Government programs:
  • NASA
  • National Defense Education Act: millions to improve math, science, and foreign language education

1951: Federal Civil Defense Administration

• Campaign to educate the public
  • On Communism
  • What to do in case of a nuclear attack
• Distribution
  • Pamphlets, films, TV shows, “Duck and Cover” programs in schools, etc.

Civil Liberties

• Freedom of speech
• Freedom of the Press
• Freedom of Association
• Freedom to Petition Government (protest)
• Due Process of Law (fairness of the law)
• Equal Protection

Senator Joseph McCarthy

McCarthyism

The Red Scare

Julius & Ethel Rosenberg (1953)

Alger Hiss (1948)

House Un-American Activities Committee (HVAC) (1933):

• Investigated Hollywood to determine if the film industry was sympathetic to communism or if actors/actresses were members of communist organizations

• Investigated Elizabeth Bentley (defected Soviet spy), Whittaker Chambers (defected Soviet spy), Alger Hiss (high-ranking gov’t official), and others accused of spying for the Soviet Union

• The Hatch Act (1939): Made it illegal for the federal government to hire Communists (Prevent federal gov’t employees from participating in partisan political activities while on the job)

• Smith Act (1940): Made it a federal offense to be a member of a group that advocates the violent overthrow of the government.

  Yates v. United States (1957) overturned convictions of communist party leaders who were charged with violating the Smith Act (differentiated between advocating for actions vs advocating for ideas)

  Executive Order 9835:

  Allowed the federal government to investigate and dismiss employees if they were members of the communist Party, a fascist, or had “sympathetic associations” with either group. Created the Federal Employees Loyalty and Security Program, which enabled the federal government to require all federal employees to take an oath that they were not, and had never been, a member of the Communist Party.

  McCarran Internal Security Act (1950):

  Required members of the Communist Party to register with the federal government; Forbade defense plants from hiring Communists; denied passports to members of communist organizations

  People Investigated through McCarthyism

  • Lucille Ball - testified in front of HUAC in 1953
  • Langston Hughes - testified in 1953
  • Charlie Chaplin - banned from re-entering the US
  • WEB DuBois
  • Albert Einstein testified as a witness to support DuBois. Einstein spoke out against McCarthy
  • Orson Welles - director (Citizen Kane)
  • Arthur Miller - wrote The Crucible (about the Salem Witch Trials)
  • Robert Oppenheimer (Manhattan Project) - top security clearance revoked

Venona Project

• Project by US counterintelligence to decrypt Soviet messages (1943-1980)
• The messages decrypted were released in 1995
• Espionage was discovered through the decryption of these messages from the Soviet Union

Timeline of Events

• Korea had been controlled by the Japanese from 1905 to 1945

• In 1945,

  • USSR occupied the NORTH
  • US the SOUTH

• The two halves were divided by the 38th Parallel

• North

  • Communist government
  • Supplied with weapons by the Soviets

• South

  • Capitalist System
  • Supported by the US

• 1949 - Both the US and the Soviet troops withdraw from Korea

• Also in 1949

  • Mao Zedong and Chinese Communists take control of China
  • Chiang Kai-Shek, the leader of the Chinese nationalists, retreated to Taiwan

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• “We face an entirely new war” MacArthur said. He called for nuclear attacks on Chinese cities

• President Truman had different opinion. “We are trying to prevent a World War, not start one.”

• MacArthur tried to go over President Truman by talking to Congress and the Press

• In response Truman fired MacArthur. On April 11, 1951 Truman announced that he had relieved MacArthur from his position.

Stage 6 started the slow recapturing of Seoul. →”meat grinder”

• Estimates that 12-15% of the North Korean population was killed during the Korean War (1.5 million out of 10 million)
• Air bombings of North Korea - estimates that 85% of buildings were destroyed
• 75% of Pyongyang was destroyed

Results of the Korean War

• Armistice signed in July 1953
• Still two separate countries today (Demilitarized zone between the two countries)
• Still US troops in South Korea

Harry S. Truman (1945-1953)

• Truman Doctrine
• Marshall Plan
• Berlin Airlift
• Soviet Union tested their own atomic bomb
• China fell to communism in 1949
  • Mao Zedong (communist leader in China from 1949-1975)
  • Jiang Jieshi (National leader of China moved the government to Taiwan)
• Korean War

Dwight D. Eisenhower (1953-1961)

• Massive retaliation
• Brinkmanship
• Eisenhower Doctrine
• Suez Canal Crisis
• Covert operations (CIA)
• Sputnik
• Founding of NASA
• U-2 spy plane shot down

Eisenhower Cold War Policies

• Massive retaliation - policy of threatening to use nuclear weapons against a communist state

• Brinkmanship - willingness to go to brink of war to force the other side to back down

• Eisenhower Doctrine (1957) - extends the Truman Doctrine to the Middle East. Authorizes the President to use military force to help nations threatened by communism

  World Events

  • 1957 launch of Sputnik first satellite into space
  • NASA was founded in 1958
  • U-2 spy plane shot down in Russia
  • Eisenhower said it was weather plane and then Khrushchev produce pilot of plane
  • This event ended talks between the US and USSR
  • Military - Industrial complex - relationship established between the military and defense industry
  • In his farewell address, Eisenhower warned of this relationship

The Suez Crisis (1956)

• Egypt bought weapons from Communist Czechoslovakia (this showed the US that the Soviet Union was increasing its influence globally)
• Egyptian troops seize control of Suez Canal from Anglo-French COmpany and nationalize the Canal
• British and French Troops invade Egypt, Soviets threaten to use rocket attacks on Great Britain and France
• US prepares nuclear weapons to be used if needed
• US pressures Britain and France to withdraw their troops
• Show a global power shift to the US and Soviet Union as the two superpowers
• Nassar is celebrated as an anti-colonist hero
• Soviet Union gains influence in the Middle East

CIA - Covert Operations

Iran

• In 1951, Mohammad Mosaddegh, Prime Minister of Iran, nationalizes Anglo-Iranian Oil Company
• In protest, the British stopped buying Iranian oil, which impacted Iran’s economy
• The US was concerned that Iran would turn to the Soviets/Communism for help (Historians differ on the motivations for American Involvement in the coup).
• CIA organizes street riots and arrange a coup to put the pro-American Shah back in power in 1953. The Shah returned the oil fields to the Western companies
• 1979 a revolution overthrew the Shah
• 2013 - declassification of documents and the CIA/gov’t acknowledged American involvement in the coup
• Some documents about the coup were destroyed
• The British approached the US about a plan for a coup. (docs declassified in 2017 revealed this). British told the US that Mosaddegh would not be successful in any sort of communist influence/takeover in Iran

Guatemala

• President Jacobo Arbenz Guzman elected with communist support
• Land reform program which hurts American-owned United Fruit Company (now Chiquita Brands International)
• May 1954 Czechoslovakia sells weapons to Guatemala
• US arms and trains rebels at secret camps in Nicaragua and Honduras and US backed the coup which overthrew the Guatemalan president
• Guatemalan Civil War lasted for 36 years
• American involvement in the coup was criticized by both enemies and allies
• Operation PB History - after the coup, this operation sought to find Soviet connections to Arbenz, but nothing was found

John F. Kennedy (1961-1963)

• Flexible Response
• Alliance for Progress
• Bays of Pig Invasion
• Berlin Wall was built by USSR
• Cuban Missile Crisis

Foreign Policy

• Flexible Response: U.S. should build up both troops and weapons (nuclear and non-nuclear)
  • Green Berets (Special Forces) were created
• Alliance for Progress Renewed interest in Latin America. Series of cooperative aid projects to help it become “free and prosperous”
• Peace corps": an organization that sent young people to other countries to perform humanitarian services

Space Race

• Kennedy wanted the U.S. to be the first to land a man on the moon
• He urged Congress to help the U.S. achieve this goal before the decade was through
• Neil Armstrong landed on the moon in July 1969

Berlin Wall

• People leaving East Berlin to West Berlin
  • Since the Berlin Aircraft, around 3 million people left East Germany to flee into West Berlin
• Khrushchev wanted France, Britain, and the US to leave Berlin
• Berlin wall became the symbol for the Cold War

Bay of Pigs (April 1961) - Goals

• The Bay of Pigs Invasion was an attempt by United States - backed Cuban exiles to overthrow the Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, which came to power in 1959
• The invasion plan was approved by Eisenhower’s successor, John F. Kennedy

Cuba and the Cold War

Bay of Pigs

• April 17, 1961, 1400 exiles armed with U.S. weapons, landed at the Bay of Pigs
• Fighting ended on April 19; 90 exiles had been killed and the rest had been taken as prisoners

Bay of Pigs - Outcome

• The failure of the invasion seriously embarrassed the young kennedy administration
• Additionally, the invasion made Castro weary of the U.S.

New York Times journalist in 1962:

• “The Bay of Pigs invasion made the United States look like fools to our friends, rascals to our enemies, and incompetents to the rest.”

13 Days

Cuban Missile Crisis (October 1962)

October 27, 1962

• Kennedy accepted Khrushchev’s proposal to end the crisis; Soviets will remove missiles and United States will end blockade and promise not to invade Cuba
• Secretly, the U.S. also agreed to remove its missile sites from Turkey

October 28, 1962

• Khrushchev announced the weapons will be returned to the Soviet Union

Outcomes of the Cuban Missile Crisis

• Turning point in the U.S. - Soviet relations during the Cold War
• Increased communication between the White House and the Kremlin (“hot line”)
  • During the Cuban Missile Crisis, many hours were spent sending and translating the communication from the Soviet Union
• 1963 - Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (no atmospheric or underwater testing)

Baby Boom

• 1945-1961 more than 65 million children born
  • At the height one child born every seven seconds
  • Reasons for baby boom
  • Return from wars
  • Easier to buy houses
  • Popular culture

G.I. Bill (Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944)

• The GI Bill would invest more in education grants, business loans, and home loans than all previous New Deal programs combined.

Original GI Bill ended in 1956

• Almost 8 million veterans received education or job training
• 4.3 million home loans worth $33 billion were handed out
• Veterans made up 20% of buyers of new homes built after WWII
• In NY and NJ suburbs, out of 67,000 mortgages, fewer than 100 were taken out by non-whites (Ira Katznelson)

The Affluent Society

• Levittown - one of the earliest mass - produced suburbs
  • Some wanted to escape the crime and congestion of the cities
  • Affordable housing for a wide number of people
  • 85% of new home construction in the 1950s were in the suburbs
  • From 1940 to 1960 the number of Americans who owned their own homes rose from 41% to 61%

Music and Poetry

• Rock’n’ Roll
  • Music that stemmed from African American rhythms and sounds
  • Elvis Presley - King of Rock and Roll
  • Helped create generation gap
  • Beat Movement
  • Harshly criticized the conformity of American Life

Mass Media

• Rise of television
  • Comedy, action and adventure, variety of entertainment
• Hollywood
  • Created 3-D movies
  • Wide-screen full color movies

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War

• During the Cold War, the US was committed to containing communism
  • The US was effective in limiting communist influence in Europe
  • But, the spread of communism in Asia led the US to become involved in a Civil War in Vietnam

US involvement in Vietnam (1950 - 1973)

• Truman (1945-1953)
• Eisenhower (1953-1961)
• Kennedy (1961-1963)
• Johnson (1963=1969)
• Nixon (1969-1974)

Before the War

• Japan seized control of Vietnam during WWII
• France regained control after WWII and recreated French Indochina
  • By 1945, Communist leader Ho Chi Minh led a war of independence for Vietnam
  • Truman & Eisenhower feared the spread of Communism in Asia (“domino theory”) and sent aid to France
• France lost Vietnam to the Vietnam at the battle of Dien Bien Phu (1954)

Geneva Accords

• The Geneva Accords divided French Indochina into 3 seperate nations Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam
• Vietnam was divided along the 17th parallel
• The Accords also called for a nationwide election in Vietnam

America’s Commitment to Vietnam

• Vietnam won independence in 1954 but was divided along the 17th parallel
• Ngo Dinh Diem became non-communist president of South Vietnam
• Ho Chi Minh gained control of communist North Vietnam

Overthrow of Diem

• Diem was Catholic and banned all Buddhism in Vietnam
• He persecuted all Buddhists
• Diem was overthrown and killed by his generals
  • CIA removed their protection of Diem and allowed for the generals to assassinate him
• Self-immolation of Buddhist monk named Thich Quang Duc as a protest to the persecution caused by Diem

Johnson & Vietnam

• A US ship, the USS Maddox was fired on, and President Johnson appealed to Congress for help
• Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (1964) authorized the president to “take all necessary measures to repel any armed attack against the forces of the United States and prevent further aggression”

The Escalation of the Vietnam War

• In an effort to contain the spread of communism into South Vietnam, LBJ began sending US troops in 1965

Stalemate

• The Vietcong used ambushes, booby traps, and guerrilla tactics
• We used Napalm a gasoline that explodes and Agent Orange a chemical that strips leaves from trees to get through the dense forests of Vietnam

Ho Chi Minh Trial - supply lines through Laos and cambodia to the Viet Cong in South Vietnam

The U.S. military used a variety of tactics to fight the war in Vietnam

• The air force bombed villages & supply lines (Ho Chi Minh Trial)
• The military used napalm to destroy villages & pesticides (Agane Orange) to destroy crops
• Despite overwhelming military superiority, the U.S. could not win in Vietnam & the war became unpopular at home
• TV broadcasts reported body counts, atrocities, declining troop morale, & lack of gains in the war

The Draft

• A draft was instituted by a lottery system to get soldiers for the war
• Doves - people against the war
• Hawks - people for the war
• Some were able to avoid the draft, which angered people across the county
• More than half of the 27 million men eligible for the draft during the Vietnam War were deferred, exempted, or disqualified

Tet Offensive

• On the Vietnamese holiday of Tet the North Vietnamese launched a huge offensive
• Guerilla fighters attacked American bases all down the Ho Chi Minh trail and to the American embassy in Saigon
• Tet was a huge military failure for the Communists
• It was a political victory for the Communists because Americans could not believe that we didn’t know Tet would occur
• Johnson decides not to run for re-election

General Westmoreland & the Credibility Gap

• “Vietcong surrender is imminent”
• “The U.S. has never lost a battle in Vietnam”
• “There is a light at the end of the tunnel”
• But the military continued to draft more young men to fight in Vietnam
• The American public believed there was a “credibility gap” between what the gov’t was saying & the reality of the Vietnam War

My Lai Massacre (March 1968)

• In March 1969, Ron Ridenhour wrote a letter calling for an investigation of events that happened in My Lai
• In Nov. 1969, Americans learned about a platform under Lt. William Calley and the events that happened at the small hamlet of My Lai
• Over 500 unarmed South Vietnamese civilians in My Lai were killed
• Multiple soldiers were charged, but one was found guilty - Lt. Calley. While sentenced to life, Calley spent three years under house arrest
• Hugh Thompson, who flew a helicopter, and his two crew members are credit with ending the My Lai Massacre
• Thompson reported the massacre in March 1968, but nothing was done in response
• The events themselves, as well as the cover up, further fueled the unpopularity and disapproval of the way

US Fatalities in Vietnam

• Estimates of 1-3 million Vietnamese killed
• 58,000 American troops
• 100,000+ of Cambodians and Laotians killed
• Massacres and atrocities were committed by both sides
  • Hue Massacre (January 1968 - during the Tet Offensive) - Viet Cong killed 3,000 - 6,000 civilians
  • My Lai Massacre (March 1968) - American troops killed 500 villagers mostly women and children

Nixon & Vietnam

Nixon Wins

• During the 1968 campaign, he promised to withdraw troops from Vietnam
• Vietnamization: the process of teaching the South Vietnamese to fight on their own and then slowly withdrawing

Invasion of Cambodia

• “I’m not going to be the first American president who loses a war.” - Nixon, 1969
• Protests were sparked by the invasion of neutral Cambodia
• Kent State University - on May 4, 1970, Ohio National Guard killed 4 students and wounded at least 9 others
• Jackson State College police killed two African American students during a demonstration

Pentagon Papers

• Many Congressmen were outraged that Nixon never notified them of his actions in Cambodia
• In Dec. 1970, Congress repealed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
• In 1971, the Pentagon Papers were leaked to the New York TImes
  • Top secret study completed by the Department of Defense to look into the US’ involvement in Vietnam (1945 - 1967)
  • The documents revealed that many government officials during Johnson’s administration questioned the war while publicly defending it
  • Showed that president’s advisors purposely deceived Congress, the press, and the public about what was occurring in Vietnam

U.S. Pulls Out of Vietnam

• By Oct. 1972, Henry Kissinger emerged from secret negotiations to announce “peace is at hand”
  • Kissinger was the National Security Advisor and Secretary of State for Presidents Nixon and Ford
• By Dec. 16, 1962 peace talks broke with the Communists, the next day the U.S. began the Christmas bombings
• Jan. 27, 1973, an agreement was signed to end the war and restore peace (Paris Peace Accords)
• On April 30, 1975 South Vietnam falls to the North. Saigon is renamed Ho Chi Minh City

Nixon and the Cold War

• Sino-Soviet Split (late 1950s/early 1960s) - China and the USSR begin to differ in their interpretations and applications of Marxism
• détente - a period of improved relations between the US and USSR
• February 1972 - President Nixon and Mrs. Nixon visit China. Nixon and National Security Advisor, Henry Kissinger, meet with Chinese officials. Nixon worked toward reopening diplomatic relations with China.
• May 1972 - Nixon visits Moscow. He and Brezhnev sign the Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty (SALT I)

Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan

• 1978 - a coup, which results in a communist government taking over. This led to tumultuous rebellions
• USSR invaded Afghanistan in December 1979 (9 year war)
  • The USSR intervened to install a Soviet-loyal leader and to maintain the communist government
  • Carter withdraw Salt II from being approved, placed embargoes, and boycotted the Olympics in Moscow
• Even before the intervention, the US conducted covert funding and training of the anti-communist fighters in Afghanistan (Mujahideen)
• Reagan increased the aid sent to the Mujahideen (millions of dollars on aid and weapons)
• 1988 - Soviet Union signed the Geneva accords to withdraw troops. The withdrawal of troops was completed in February 1989
• Afghanistan is left shattered and civil war continued. In 1996, the Taliban formed the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan.

The End of the Cold War

• Ronald Reagan
  • Strong stand against communism and the Soviet Union
  • In a speech, he called the Soviet Union an “evil empire”
  • Increased military spending ($2 trillion)
  • Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) aka Star Wars - a plan to protect the US from Soviet nuclear attacks
• Mikhail Gorbachev
  • USSR facing issues
  • Low industrial and agricultural production
  • Huge military spending on the war in Afghanistan and having tanks in Eastern Europe
  • Trying to complete with “Star Wars” in the space race
  • Glasnost - openness - to encourage freedom of speech and expression
  • Perestroika - relaxed some of the government controls over farms and factories to make production more efficient; allowed for small business to open
  • Democratization - allowed for citizens to vote for Communist politicians (but only Communist politicians)
• Gorbachev and Reagan signed the arms control agreement, which banned the use of Intermediate-range nuclear missiles (1988)

The Fall of the Eastern Bloc 1989-90

1. Poland

   1. 1988 sees strikes throughout the country & by June 1988 the communist government is defeated in free elections

2. Hungary

   1. Although in May 1989 Hungary opens its borders with Austria, the Communist government is not defeated until early 1990

3. East Germany

   1. In September 1989 thousands of East Germans escape through Hungary to West Germany & by November the Berlin Wall comes down. In 1991 Germany is reunited

4. Czechoslovakia

   1. Following huge Demonstrations from against communism, the government resigns in November & a non-communist becomes President in December

5. Romania

   1. (the most brutal government in Eastern Europe)
   2. Following huge Demonstrations from December 1989 & a very violent response from the secret police, democratic elections are eventually held in 1990

6. Bulgaria

   1. Early 1990 democratic elections are held & the renamed Communist Party wins

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• Warsaw Pact is dissolved in July 1991
• Rise of nationalism (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania declare independence)
• After an unsuccessful coup to overthrow Gorbachev, he resigned a few months later in December 1991. The Soviet Union is dissolved

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