STD: 10-9

STD: 10-9

At the end of WWII two countries emerged as the most powerful military nations on earth: US and USSR.Yalta Conference: - Divide Germany into zones of occupation.

- USSR compensated by Germany for loss.- Eastern Europe to have free elections.

United Nations – 50 nations sign on to “save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.”

- New peacekeeping organization to stop aggression

- 50 member General Assembly- 11 member Security Council – power to

investigate and settle disputes.- 5 permanent members to Sec. Council , GB, China,

Fr, US,USSR have veto power over the council.

Superpower Agendas

-Encourage democracy to prevent the spread of communism.

- Gain access to raw material and markets to fuel economies.

- Rebuild European gov’t to promote stability and create new markets for the US.

-Reunite Germany to stabilize Europe.

Encourage communism and the worldwide worker’s revolution.

- Rebuild its economy using East European factories and raw materials.

-Control East Europe to protect its borders from the “west.”

-Keep Germany divided to prevent it from waging war again.

US USSR

STD: 10-9

Stalin broke his promise at Yalta to have free elections in East Europe. He installed Communist gov’ts in Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Czech., Romania, Poland and Yugoslavia. Germany is split into East and West.

POTSDAM (July 1945) – Stalin refuses to free these countries from Soviet hegemony.

1946 – Stalin declares that communism and capitalism could not exist in the same world and war was certain. Europe is now divided into East and West.

Winston Churchill- while visiting the US says that ..”an iron curtain has descended across the continent”.

Containment Policy - 1946-47 relations worsen. Truman says its time to stop “babying the Soviets.” The west must block Soviet influence by preventing communist expansion. The west must create alliances and help weak countries resist Soviet advances.

Truman Doctrine – Support countries that reject communism even if we support dictators.

Marshall Plan - $12.5 billion to rebuild Europe. The Eastern bloc refuses aid as a capitalist plot. The west builds economic infrastructure. The plan achieved spectacular success.

Berlin Airlift June 24, 1948, Stalin halted all traffic into and out of the Russian sector of Berlin. He also cut off all electricity to the city of Berlin claiming "Technical Difficulties". General Curtis LeMay (Commander of the U S Air Forces in Europe) asked if they could start flying food supplies into Berlin. The Berlin Airlift was actually started without President Harry S Truman's permission.

At the beginning of the airlift the only route into Berlin was by means of three twenty mile wide corridors across the Soviet zone of Berlin. The American name for the Berlin Airlift was first called " The LeMay Coal and Feed Delivery Service". July 2, 1948, U.S., British and French leaders demanded that the Russians lift the entire blockade.

July 14 Russia informed the west that they no longer had any right to be in Berlin and that the blockade was invoked to protect "The economy of the soviet zone". Moscow asserted that West Berlin "is in the center of the Soviet zone and is part of that zone". The Western reaction was that no "Threats, pressure or other actions" could squeeze the U S out of Berlin.

July 17, 1948 "The place to make a stand against Russia is right here in Berlin. This in not a Cold War. It is Hot as Hell

December 31, 1948 the 100,000th airlift mission was flown since it's beginning.

May, 1949 Russia finally announces to end the blockade after 328 days.

Berlin Airlift

After WWII, Korea is divided at the 38th Parallel. The industrial North Korea was backed by the communist Soviets. The Agricultural and democratic South was backed by the US.

Syngman Rhee Kim Il Sung

South Korean President North Korean Leader

January 1950 - Sec. Of State states that the western defense perimeter of the US stops short of the Korean peninsula. This gives is interpreted by the North Koreans that the US would not defend the South.

June 25, 1950 – North Korean People’s army invades South Korea with seven assault divisions.

June 1950 – Under US pressure, the UN asks members countries to aid The Republic of Korea. President Truman the orders US ground forces into Korea and the Air Force to bomb North Korean targets.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur is selected to lead the UN forces

where he quickly stabilizes the Pusan Perimeter. MacArthur’s next step was a bold amphibious landing in central Korea at the port

of Inchon. This move cut off and surrounded most of the invading North Korean Army.

UN forces quickly seize momentum and chase to North Korean Army to that Yalu River that borders China.

October 1950 – China feels threatened and sends 300,000 “volunteers’ to help the North Koreans. The UN troops are greatly outnumbered and are chased out of North Korea and finally recapture

the South Korean Capitol of Seoul.

Chinese volunteers attack at Chosin Reservoir

After these huge setbacks, MacArthur called for the use of nuclear weapons. Truman thought this proposal was “reckless.” After taking his case to the press and Congress, Truman fired MacArthur.

Over the next two years, both sides fought back and forth over the 38th parallel.

July 1953 – UN forces and North Korea sign an armistice at Panmunjom ending the fighting.

The fighting ended with the border almost where it had begun. 5 million soldiers and civilians died during the conflict.

North Korea established collective farms, increased industry and continued to build its

massive military similar to the Chinese and Soviet model. Under Kim Il Jong, the North has developed nuclear weapons but has very serious food shortages and energy problems.

South Korea, thanks to US aid, concentrated on developing industry and foreign trade. In 1987, after a succession of dictators, a democratic constitution was adopted. Currently, South Korea has one of the highest economic growth rates in the world.

The two Koreas are separately by a de-militarized zone. The US still has a military presence of 37,000 troops as a deterrent to any North Korean aggression

1950’s – The US supported dictator Fulgencio Batista. A lawyer named Fidel Castro led a revolution overthrowing the dictator. At first Castro made many economic reforms. But, later suspended elections and individual rights. Castro also nationalized US owned businesses.

When the US placed a trade embargo against Cuba. Then Castro sought aide from the USSR. At this time the US supported exiled Cubans in an attempt to re-take Cuba at the Bay of Pigs. This ill fated invasion was a great defeat and embarrassment for the US.

CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS After the Bay of Pigs, Castro sought

further assistance from the USSR. The Soviets secretly built 42 nuclear missile sites in Cuba. Now the USSR could attack the US without much warning. President Kennedy demanded that the missiles be removed and placed a quarantine around Cuba. After great tension, the USSR dismantled the missile sites thus avoiding WWIII.

The Cuban missile crisis left Castro totally dependent upon the USSR. The USSR even pressed for the use of Cuban troops in an anti-imperialist revolution in Angola.

1950’s The USSR gains influence in Afghanistan. As its influence began to increase and as the Iranian Islamic revolution spread, a Muslim revolt threatened to topple the Afghani Communist regime.

Dec. 1979 – The USSR finds it necessary to invade Afghanistan to prop up its Communist gov’t.

The USSR though that this would be a quick war but, found themselves stuck and “quagmire” like the US was in Vietnam.

Afghan rebels (mujahideen) out-maneuvered and and overpowered the Soviet superpower. The Soviets use helicopter gun ships to take the cities while the rebels held the countryside in Afghanistan's rugged mountain terrain.

US President Jimmy Carter feared the Soviet invasion as a threat to Middle eastern oil supplies as an attempt to gain access to the Persian Gulf. Carter approved weapons shipment to the mujahideen, embargoed grain shipments to the USSR and boycotted the Olympic Games held in Moscow.

By the 1980’s and after a 10 year occupation Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev order his forces to withdraw. By this time economic problems were tearing the USSR apart.

Before WWII, France held control of French Indochina. Nationalist independence movements were underway to free Indochina of French hegemony.

One nationalist group was the Indochinese Communist Party led by Ho Chi Minh. Ho led revolts and strikes against the French. The French in turn jailed and executed nationalist leaders. Ho fled and went into exile.When Japan conquered French

Indochina in 1941, Ho returned to Vietnam and founded the Vietminh (Independence) League.

In 1945, with the Japanese defeat, Ho expected Vietnamese independence. Instead France intended to regain the colony. War broke out between the French and Vietminh. The Vietminh used guerilla tactics to fight and eventually defeat the French at Dien Bien Phu.

The US supported the French because the Vietminh were communists. The US policy of containment and a belief in the domino theory led to a fear of a threat to national security.

After France’s defeat, an international peace conference was held in Geneva. It was decided that Vietnam would be divided into half at the 17th parallel. The North was led by Ho and his communists. The South was led by Ngo Dinh Diem and an anti-communist government.

North Vietnam – Ho began a popular land redistribution program while in the South Diem cancelled elections and his government became corrupt.

Viet Cong – Opposition grew due to Diem’s rigid policies. The Communist supported Viet Cong gained control of the countryside where a bitter civil war erupted in SVN.

Coup d’etat – Diem generals saw his corruption and unpopularity. Diem was assassinated in 1963. New leaders of SVN were still as unpopular.

The US saw that a lack of leadership in SVN would lead to a communist takeover. In 1964, President Johnson began so send US ground troops to halt Viet Cong successes. By 1965, 185,000 troops were in-country. At the height of the war over 550,000 troops were committed to the conflict.

Unable to gain an upper hand in the ground war. The US started a bombing campaign against the North. More bombs were dropped on NVN than in all of WWII

This bombing campaign destroyed millions of acres of farmland and forests. This drove the rural peasants to further oppose the SVN gov’t.

Vietnamization -In the US, anti-war protests and the disillusion with the war forced a political solution rather than a military one. Under President Nixon, a policy of increased material support and training allowed the SVN take a more active role in the war. This allowed US troops to be withdrawn at a gradual rate.

Cambodian Incursion – In order to secure communist infiltration

routes on the Ho Chi Minh trail, Nixon ordered raids into Cambodia and Laos to destroy their hiding places.

By 1973 most US combat troops had left SVN. In two years, the SVN gov’t could not fend off the communist attacks. In April, 1975 NVA troops entered the capitol of Saigon and the war was over.

1.5 million Vietnamese and 58,000 Americans had been killed. SVN trying to escape the communist “blood bath” left by the thousands. Many refugees in boats arrived in the US. More than 200,000 of these “boatpeople” died at sea.

The Khmer Rouge turned Cambodia to year zero. They banned all institutions, stores, banks, hospitals, schools, religion, and the family. Everyone was forced to work 12 - 14 hours a day. Children were separated from their parents. People were killed if they were not like them, if they didn’t work hard enough, if they were educated, if they came from different ethnic groups, or if they showed sympathy when family members were taken away to be killed. Everyone had to pledge total allegiance to Angka, the Khmer Rouge gov’t. It was a campaign based on instilling constant fear and keeping their victims off balance.

The Vietnamese liberated the Cambodian people from the Khmer Rouge. 600,000 Cambodians fled to Thai border camps. 10 million landmines were left in the ground. The UN installed the largest peacekeeping mission in the world in Cambodia to ensure free and fair elections after the withdrawal of the Vietnamese troops.

April 17, 1975 the Khmer Rouge, (Cambodian

communist guerrillas) led by Pol Pot, took power of Cambodia. They forced all city dwellers into the countryside labor camps. During their rule, an estimated that 2 million (30%) Cambodians died by starvation, torture or execution.

NATO – North Atlantic Treaty Organization – USSR actions during the Berlin Airlift crisis heightened western fears. 10 European countries, the US and Canada form a defensive military alliance.

Warsaw Pact – in response the USSR forms a similar alliance with its satellite nations (USSR, Poland, East Germany, Czech, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Albania.)

H Bomb -1949 – The USSR successfully tests a nuclear weapon. Both superpowers are now nuclear powers. With this news Truman authorizes the development of thermonuclear weapons (Hydrogen bomb.) This is a fusion bomb that combines atoms rather than splitting them. By Nov. 1952 the US successfully tested its first H Bomb. By the next August, the USSR did the same.

Brinkmanship- 1953 – Dwight D. Eisenhower is elected president. His Sec. Of State John Foster Dulles says that “if the USSR attacks US interests…(we) would retaliate instantly, by means and a place of our choosing.” This is the willingness to go to the brink of nuclear war on important issues.

Cold War in the Sky- the USSR pulls ahead of the US in technology

ICBM – The USSR announces in 1957 that they have developed a rocket that can go great distances.

Sputnik I – USSR launches the first artificial satellite outside of earth’s atmosphere. The US feels that they can create a nuclear platform from space.

U2 Incident – A US spy plane is shot down over Soviets territory and pilot Francis Gary Powers is captured. The Eisenhower administration is caught in a lie.

1972 - Nixon visits Superpowers. As part of détente. Nixon first visits China then the USSR as a sign of goodwill.

SALT – Strategic Arms Limitation Talks – limit the quantity of nuclear arms each side could have in its arsenal.

1981 – Ronald Reagan becomes president and immediately retreats from détente. He announces SDI – Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars) to protect the US from enemy missiles. Though the weapons system is never deployed, its possible existence forces the soviets into financial chaos. By 1989, soviet satellite countries begin to free themselves of communist hegemony. Finally, the break up of the USSR occurs.

March 5, 1953 – Stalin dies. Nakita Khrushchev assume control over the USSR. Khrushchev publicly denounced Stalin’s policies towards soviets citizens. This speech launched a policy of destalinization. Though life was better for Soviets, their satellite countries suffered under old Stalinist rules.

1956 – Hungary Imre Nagy promises free elections and demands the removal of USSR troops. The USSR quickly invaded Hungary and brutally suppressed any hope for rebellion.

1959 – China would not follow Soviet style communism. China exported their version to Africa and other parts of Asia. Soon both countries stopped sharing nuclear secrets. The split became so serious that border skirmishes occurred. Today they maintain an fragile peace.

1964 – Czechoslovakia – Alexander Dubcek promises a “human face” on socialism. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev quickly invades Czechoslovakia claming the right to prevent satellites from rejecting communism.

Détente and realpolitik – After the Vietnam War Richard Nixon lessened tension with the USSR. Under Sec. of State Henry Kissinger the US started to deal with other nations in a real and practical manner.