Transcript The Cold War

The Cold War
Important dates to remember from
WW2
• 1939-1945: World War 2
• 1941-1945: US involvement in WW2
– (1933)1943-1945 The Holocaust in Europe
• 1931: Japan invades Manchuria
– 1937; Rape of Nanking
• December 7th, 1941; Japan bombs Pearl
Harbor
• 1945 US drops atom bombs on Japan
Aftermath
• Germany is completely conquered and is divided
up geographically between the United States,
Britain, France and the Soviet Union
– Nuremberg Trials
• Japan is utterly destroyed and the United States
sets up a provisional government under the
administration of General Douglas MacArthur.
• The Soviet Union and the United States emerge
as the two dominant super-powers in the world.
Allied Plans for the Postwar World
• The WW2 Allies had three meetings to
determine what the world would be like
after the war.
• 11/1943- Tehran
• 2/1945 Yalta
• 7/1945 Potsdam
Tehran- 1943
• At Tehran it was
decided that Germany
would be split in half
between the western
Allies and the Soviet
Union after the war
Yalta- 2/1945
• The Allies tried to agree
to free elections in
Eastern Europe
• Agreed that Germany
must surrender
unconditionally
Potsdam; 7/1945
• At this conference,
the American
president and British
PM demanded free
elections in Eastern
Europe- Stalin
refused.
So, When did the Cold War begin?
Two Answers based on POV
American/Western POV
• 1945 at Potsdam
when Stalin refused
to allow for popular
sovereignty in
formerly Germanoccupied EasternEuropean nations.
Soviet POV
• 1918: During the Russian
Civil War when the U.S.A. &
Great Britain invaded Russia
to prevent the Soviet
government from keeping
power after the Russian
Revolution.
• After 1941 when the
Western Allies refused to
open a “2nd Front” to relieve
them from the Germans.
Aspects of the Cold War
• Atomic/Nuclear Arms race (aka the Space Race)
• The Cold War was “fought” between the USA
and the USSR and later, Communist China
• U.S. Pressure for German re-armament
• Soviet desire for “Satellites” or, “Buffer
zones”
• Development of The 1st, 2nd, & 3rd “Worlds”
• Proxy wars between the major powers
Proxy Wars
• Arab-Israeli Wars: 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973, &
1982…
• Korea 1951-1953
• Vietnam (1954)1968-1973
• Afghanistan 1979-89
Cold War
• ARMS RACE
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Soviets demonstrate their Atom Bomb 1949
Americans demonstrate Hydrogen Bomb 1952
1957 Sputnik
MAD
“Duck and Cover!”
• Space Race
– “Our Germans are better than their Germans”.
– 1957 Sputnik
– 1961 Yuri Gagarin, 1963 1st Woman in space, 1965 1st
Spacewalk
– 1969 Neil Armstrong- 1st to walk on the Moon.
questions
• 1980- The creation of “Solidarity” in Poland
– Massive shipyard strikes led by Lech Walesa
– Forced Polish Government to recognize workers’
right to protest.
• 1983- “Star Wars”- the Strategic Arms
Defense Initiative
• 1985- Mikhail Gorbachev comes to power
– Glasnost & perestroika
• 1989- The Berlin Wall falls
– Hungary becomes the 1st Eastern Bloc nation to
open borders to the West
• 1991- The Soviet Union breaks up