The Cold War Begins 1945-1952

Chapter 36

Return to a Peacetime Economy

After WWII was over people continued to spend money, preventing inflation

GI Bill was created to help veterans buy homes, go to college, and establish businesses

The cost of living rose and workers went on strike for better pay

Truman’s Domestic Program

Truman fought against a Republican Congress to: Expand Social Security Benefits Raise minimum wage from 40¢

to 75¢ an hour Clear public housing and slums Plan a system of national health

insurance Protect African Americans’ right

to vote Abolish poll taxes Make lynching a federal crime

Most of his efforts were unsuccessful, until after the 1948 election and even then the civil rights legislation and health insurance would not pass

The Long Telegram

Because of increased tension with the USSR, George Kennan sent a telegram of 5540 words explaining Soviet goals as he saw them from the US Embassy in Moscow

He claimed that Communists believed they were in a long-term struggle against capitalism and weren’t going to budge

Kennan proposed containing Communism, rather than fighting it, and this is the position the Truman administration accepted

The Truman Doctrine

The Soviets attempted to push into Greece and Turkey to have a direct line to the Mediterranean

Communist groups launched a guerilla was in Greece and Britain helped fight back, but couldn’t stay long

Truman asked Congress for $400 million to help fight Communist aggression in Greece and Turkey

He outlined a policy of aiding “free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures” later known as the Truman Doctrine

The Marshall Plan Postwar Western Europe was

facing terrible problems Economies in ruin, people near

starvation, political chaos Secretary of State George C.

Marshall proposed the European Recovery Program (known as the Marshall Plan) to give money to rebuild the economies of Western Europe

The Soviet Union rejected the offer for help, but Western Europe accepted and it was successful, making communism much less appealing

West Germany is Founded

By 1948 the US concluded the Soviets were deliberately trying to undermine the German economy

We decided to merge our portion of Germany with France and Britain to create the Federal Republic of Germany (aka West Germany) and allow it to be independent to prevent it from joining the Soviet Union

The Berlin Airlift

In 1948 Soviet troops cut all road and rail traffic to West Berlin

Truman ordered long-range bombers with atomic weapons to bases in Britain and warned the Soviets of what might happen

Truman then ordered cargo planes to drop food, medicine, and coal to the people of Berlin to show our support for them

NATO The Berlin blockade

convinced many Americans to back military alliance with Western Europe and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) was created

NATO members agreed to come to the aid of any member who was attacked

6 years later NATO allowed West Germany to rearm and join NATO, which alarmed the Soviets who responded by organizing the Warsaw Pact (basically a NATO for Eastern Europe)

The Cold War Spreads to East Asia

China became Communist after WWII and signed a treaty of friendship and alliance with the Soviet Union

We had new interest in helping Japan to recover from WWII to prevent Communism from spreading in Asia

President Truman announced in 1949 that there had been an explosion in the USSR, shocking Americans

Plans went ahead for the development of a hydrogen bomb (thermonuclear) to reestablish the U.S. as the world’s leading nuclear power

Election of 1948 Most people thought Truman

would surely lose the election because of how charismatic his opponent, Thomas Dewey, was

Truman traveled more than 20,000 miles and made more than 350 speeches

Truman called Congress the “Do Nothing” congress because of their failure to pass his legislative agenda The idea stuck, and not only did

Truman win, but Congress regained a Democratic majority after the election

HUAC and the Hollywood Ten

All new federal employees were investigated and the FBI looked into current employees who might be disloyal

The HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee) was formed to investigate disloyalty during WWII

Claiming that movies had tremendous influence over the public, many Hollywood figures were accused of being members of the Communist party

The celebrities had to face a committee with little chance to defend themselves

Ten refused to answer the committee’s questions and were cited for contempt of Congress and served jail terms

Hollywood would now focus on pure entertainment because people were afraid of being blacklisted

The Red Scare Congress passed the

McCarran-Walter Act to reaffirm the quota system established in 1924 and discriminate against immigrants from Asia and Southern and Central Europe

President Truman vetoed the bill calling it “one of the most un-American acts I have ever witnessed in my public career,” but Congress passed it over the veto

Spy Cases Inflame the Nation

Alger Hiss was accused by Whittaker Chambers, a former communist and Time magazine editor, of having been a communist

Hiss sued his accuser for slander and Chambers then accused him of being a spy

Hiss was not tried for espionage because of the statute of limitations, but was tried for lying to a federal grand jury investigating him for espionage and was convicted

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were members of the Communist Party and were accused of passing atomic secrets to the Soviets during WWII

They were convicted and executed for espionage

After examining once-classified U.S. and Soviet records, it appears that both Alger Hiss and Julius Rosenberg were guilty, though Ethel Rosenberg herself may only have had knowledge of her husband’s espionage

Dividing Korea After WWII American and

Soviet forces entered Korea to disarm the Japanese troops stationed there and divided Korea at the 38th parallel North Korea became Soviet

controlled South Korea became US

controlled The North Koreans had a well

equipped army and invaded the South to claim control

Troops were taken from Japan to fight back

China then entered the war on the side of North Korea

UN Police Action The United States had

blocked Communist China’s admission into the UN and the Soviet delegation walked out in protest

Because of this, President Truman was able to bring the issue of North Korean aggression to the UN and the USSR was not there to exercise its veto power to approve resolutions to brand North Korea an aggressor and have member countries help defend South Korea

Waging the War MacArthur (in charge of the Korean

War) asked Truman for a blockade of Chinese ports and the use of atomic weapons on Chinese cities as a part of his “Home by Christmas” offensive

Truman refused and MacArthur sent a letter to House Minority Leader Joseph Martin, which was later made public In the letter, MacArthur attacked the

President’s policies Truman fired MacArthur for

insubordination, but MacArthur was still popular with the people

The Communist forces were eventually pushed back into North Korea and an armistice signed in 1953

The Effects of the Korean War

Americans questioned the war and whether the government was serious about stopping communism because of the limited success of the war

The Korean War was the first war in which white and black Americans served in the same units

Led to huge military spending, almost half the federal budget by 1960

Further stressed relations with Communist China