Transcript Explain (At least 1 sentence) - Chandler Unified School District

World War II and
Restructuring the PostWar World
Pre-AP Unit #14
Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact
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Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact – Agreement between Hitler and
Stalin signed on August 23, 1939. The two nations agreed not to
attack each other and to divide control of Poland between the two.
The agreement enabled the Soviet Union to pursue military
expansion in northeastern. By 1940 the Soviets had annexed
Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, & Finland.
Meanwhile, Hitler continued to believe that the West would not fight over Poland. He now feared, however, that the West and the
Soviet Union might make an alliance. Such an alliance could mean a two-front war for Germany. To prevent this possibility, Hitler
made his own alliance with Stalin. On August 23, 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union signed the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact.
Because he expected to fight the Soviet Union anyway, it did not matter to Hitler what he promised.
On September 17th, 1939, Stalin sent Soviet troops to occupy the eastern half of Poland. Stalin then moved to annex countries to the
north of Poland. Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia fell without a struggle, but Finland resisted. In November, Stalin sent nearly one
million Soviet troops into Finland. The Soviets expected to win a quick victory, so they were not prepared for winter fighting. This was
a crucial mistake. The Finns were outnumbered and outgunned, but they fiercely defended their country. In the freezing winter
weather, soldiers on skis swiftly attacked Soviet positions. In contrast, the Soviets struggled to make progress through the deep snow.
The Soviets suffered heavy losses, but they finally won through sheer force of numbers. By March 1940, Stalin had forced the Finns to
accept surrender terms.
Closure Question #1: Why did Stalin, the leader of communist nation, make a
military agreement with Adolf Hitler, a fascist who openly condemned
communism?
Closure Question #2: Describe the
course of World War II in Europe until
the end of 1940. (At least 3 sentences)
Blitzkrieg
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Literally meaning “Lightning War”, the Blitzkrieg was a relatively
new style of warfare used by Germany that emphasized the use of
speed and firepower to penetrate deep into enemy’s territory.
Germany used this tactic first in invading Poland on September 1,
1939, conquering the entire country in less than one month.
In 1939, finally, British and French leaders saw the need to take action. They vowed not to let Hitler take over another country without
consequences. Realizing that Hitler’s next move would be against Poland, Britain and France signed an alliance with Poland, guaranteeing aid if
Hitler attacked. Hitler, however, was more concerned about war with the Soviet Union than with Britain and France. Not wanting to fight a war
on two fronts, Germany signed the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression pact with the Soviets on August 23, 1939. The two former rivals publicly
promised not to attack one another. Secretly, they agreed to invade and divide Poland and recognize each other’s territorial ambitions. The public
agreement alone shocked the West and guaranteed a German offensive against Poland.
War came to Europe in the early hours of September 1, 1939, when a massive German blitzkrieg, or sudden attack, hit Poland from three
directions. Blitzkrieg means “lighting war”. It was a relatively new style of warfare that emphasized the use of speed and firepower to penetrate
deep into the enemy’s territory. The newest military technologies made it devastatingly effective. Using a coordinated assault by tanks and planes,
followed by motorized vehicles and infantry, Germany broke through Poland’s defenses and destroyed its air force. The situation became even
more hopeless on September 17th when the Soviet Union invaded Poland from the east. Although France and Britain declared war against
Germany, they did nothing to help save Poland. By the end of the month, a devastated Poland fell in defeat.
Charles de Gaulle
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French WWII Hero and political leader from 1946 to 1969; de Gaulle
drafted the constitution for the French Fifth Republic in 1958,
increasing his powers as president. He also oversaw economic growth
and led the French military in development of their first atomic bomb
in 1960, rebuilding France into one of the most powerful countries in
the world.
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With the economic aid of the Marshall Plan, the countries of Western Europe recovered relatively rapidly from the
devastation of World War II. Between 1947 and 1950, European countries received $9.4 billion for new equipment
and raw materials. By 150, industrial output in Europe was 30% of prewar levels. This economic recovery continued
well into the 1950s and 1960s. It was a time of dramatic economic growth and prosperity in Western Europe.
The history of France for nearly a quarter of a century after the war was dominated by one man – the war hero
Charles de Gaulle. In 1946 de Gaulle helped establish a new government, the Fourth Republic. The government,
however, was largely ineffective. In 1958 leaders of the Fourth Republic, frightened by bitter divisions caused by a
crisis in the French colony of Algeria, asked de Gaulle to form a new government. That year, de Gaulle drafted a new
constitution for the Fifth Republic that greatly enhanced the power of the president.
The French president would now have the right to choose the prime minister, dissolve parliament, and supervise
both defense and foreign policy. French voters overwhelmingly approved the constitution, and de Gaulle became the
first president of the Fifth Republic. As the new president, de Gaulle wanted France to be a great power once again.
To achieve the status of a world power, de Gaulle invested heavily in nuclear arms. France exploded its first nuclear
bomb in 1960.
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Closure
Question #2:
Describe the
course of World
War II in Europe
until the end of
1940. (At least
3 sentences)
Closure Question #2: Describe the course of World War II
in Europe until the end of 1940. (At least 3 sentences)
Winston Churchill
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Prime Minister of Great Britain during World War II, Churchill had always
warned against Hitler since the early 1930s and during the Battle of Britain
from 1940 to 1941 Churchill was the lone world leader that stood against
Hitler and the Axis forces.
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The Miracle of Dunkirk was a proud moment for Britain, but as the new prime minister Winston Churchill cautioned
Parliament, “wars are not won by evacuations.” Although the British army escaped, the Germans took Paris and forced the
French to surrender in the same railway car that the French had used for the German surrender in 1918. France was then
divided into two sections: a larger northern section controlled by the Germans and known as Occupied France, and a smaller
southern section controlled by the Germans and known as Unoccupied France, or Vichy France, after its capital city.
Although Vichy France was officially neutral, it collaborated with the Nazis.
France had fallen to Hitler in just 35 days. Hitler next turned his fury on Britain. After the evacuation at Dunkirk, Churchill
made it clear that he had no intention of continuing the policy of appeasement. Churchill’s words stirred his nation as the
British readied themselves for battle. Hitler’s plan to invade Britain, code-named Operation Sea Lion, depended upon
Germany’s Luftwaffe, or air force, destroying the British Royal Air Force and gaining control over the skies above the English
Channel. The Battle of Britain, then, was an air battle fought over the English Channel and Great Britain. It began in July
1940. The British lost nearly 1,000 planes, the Germans more than 1,700. Germany bombed civilian as well as military targets,
destroying houses, factories, and churches and conducted a months-long bombing campaign against London itself, known as
“the blitz.” But the British held on and, sensing failure, Hitler made a tactical decision to postpone the invasion of Britain
indefinitely.
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Closure Question #2: Describe the course of World War II
in Europe until the end of 1940. (At least 3 sentences)
Battle of Britain
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(July 1940 – June 1941) The German Air Force (Luftwaffe) bombed
civilian and military targets in Great Britain in preparations for
invasion. However, the British Royal Air Force’s firm resistance
combined with the resilience of the British people led Hitler to
abandon plans for invasion of England, making the battle a British
victory.
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Winston Churchill referred to the United States in many of his speeches during the crisis in France and the
Battle of Britain. The fight against Hitler, Churchill implied, was more than simply a European struggle. Nazi
aggression threatened the freedoms and rights cherished by democratic nations everywhere. The contest was
between ideologies as well as nations. President Roosevelt shared Churchill’s concerns but at the beginning of
the war in Europe he understood that the majority of Americans opposed U.S. intervention. The severe
economic crisis of the Great Depression had served to pin the nation’s attention firmly on domestic affairs
throughout the 1930s. In addition, many believed that U.S. involvement in World War I had been a deadly,
expensive mistake. The rise of fascism in Europe made the sacrifices of World War I seem even more pointless.
In the 1930s, numerous books and articles presented a new theory about why the United States had become
involved in World War I that disturbed many Americans. The theory held that big business had conspired to
enter the war in order to make huge fortunes selling weapons. In 1934, a senate committee chaired by Gerald
Nye of South Dakota looked into the question. Although the Nye Committee discovered little hard evidence, its
findings suggested that “merchants of death” – American bankers and arms manufacturers – had indeed pulled
the United States into World War I. The committee’s findings further reinforced isolationist sentiments.
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Erwin Rommel
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(1899-1941) Nicknamed “The Desert Fox”, Rommel is considered one of the most
talented tactical German Generals, but was also known for his humane treatment of
prisoners of war and civilians. He led German forces in North Africa until 1943, then
commanded German forces against the Allied invasion on D-Day. However, in 1944
Rommel was accused of being involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler and was
executed.
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American soldiers had to fight in many unfamiliar types of terrain. But the Sahara of North Africa – the world’s largest
desert – presented special challenges: In hot, dry weather, sandstorms choked and blinded troops. In wet weather, mud
halted machinery. The high visibility of the desert terrain made it difficult for troops to move without being seen.
Poisonous reptiles, ants, and scorpions added to the problems. Brilliant tank strategies like Patton and Rommel were
able to overcome such challenges. But the tanks themselves caused other problems, such as kicking up enormous dust
clouds that could be seen for miles.
In the deserts and mountains of North Africa the British had been fighting the Germans and Italians since 1940. Several
goals motivated the Allied campaign in North Africa. Stalin had wanted America and Britain to relieve the Soviet Union
by establishing a second front in France. However, FDR and Churchill felt they needed more time to prepare for an
invasion across the English Channel. An invasion of North Africa, however, required less planning and fewer supplies.
In addition, forcing Germany out of North Africa would pave the way for an invasion of Italy.
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Closure Question #3: Why did the United States give more
and more help to the Allies? (At least 1 sentence)
Lend-Lease Act
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Lend-Lease Act – Passed by Congress in March 1941, the act
authorized Roosevelt to “sell, transfer title to, exchange, lease, lend,
or otherwise dispose of, to any such government any defense article”
whenever he thought it was “necessary in the interests of the U.S.”
Roosevelt used this Act to exclusively lend supplies to the Allies,
making it an economic declaration of war on the Axis Powers.
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In the election of 1940, Republican nominee Wendell Willkie was critical of FDR’s handling of both the economy
and foreign affairs but not the President’s basic positions on either. Given such little differences between
candidates, American voted overwhelmingly not to change leaders in the middle of a crisis. Once safely reelected,
President Roosevelt increased his support of Britain. When Britain began to run short on funds to purchase cashand-carry goods in the United States, FDR took the opportunity to address Congress. On January 6, 1941, he
spoke about “four freedoms” – freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom from want, and freedom from
fear – that were threatened by Nazi and Japanese militarism. Roosevelt believed that the best way to stay out of
the conflict with Germany was to aid Britain. Roosevelt compared America’s situation to the scenario of a fire in
a neighbor’s home. If a neighbor asked to borrow your fire hose to put out the fire, you would not debate the
issue or try to sell the hose. Extending help was both being a good neighbor and acting to keep the fire from
spreading to your own home.
Closure Question #3: Why did the United States give more
and more help to the Allies? (At least 1 sentence)
Atlantic Charter
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Atlantic Charter – Secret pact signed
by FDR and Winston Churchill in
August 1941, endorsing national selfdetermination and an international
system of “general security”. The pact
signaled the deepening alliance
between the U.S. and Great Britain.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt denounced the aggressors, but the United States followed a
strict policy of isolationism. Many Americans felt that the United States had been drawn into
World War I due to economic involvement in Europe, and they wanted to prevent a recurrence.
Roosevelt was convinced that the neutrality acts actually encouraged Axis aggression and
wanted the acts repealed. They were gradually relaxed as the United States supplied food, ships,
planes, and weapons to Britain. Hitler realized that an amphibious (land-sea) invasion of Britain
could succeed only if Germany gained control of the air. At the beginning of August 1940, the
Luftwaffe – the German air force – launched a major offensive. German planes bombed British
air and naval bases, harbors, communication centers, and war industries.
How were Napoleon’s invasion of Russia and Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union
similar? (At least 1 complete sentence)
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With the Balkans firmly in control, Hitler could move ahead with Operation Barbarossa,
his plan to invade the Soviet Union. Early in the morning of June 22, 1941, the roar of
German tanks and aircraft announced the beginning of the invasion. The Soviet Union
was not prepared for the attack. Although it had the largest army in the world, its troops
were niether well equipped nor well trained. The invasion rolled on week after week until
the Germans had pushed 500 miles inside the Soviet Union. As the Soviet troops
retreated, they burned and destroyed everything in the enemy’s path. The Russians had
used this scorched-earth strategy against Napoleon.
On September 8, German forces put Leningrad under siege. By early November, the city
was completely cut off from the rest of the Soviet Union. To force a surrender, Hitler was
ready to starve the city’s more than 2.5 million inhabitants. German bombs destroyed
warehouses where food was stored. Desperately hungry people began eating cattle and
horse feed, as well as cots and dogs and, finally, crows and rats. Nearly one million
people died in Leningrad during the winter of 1941-1942. Yet the city refused to fall.
Impatient with the progress in Leningrad, Hitler looked to Moscow, the capital and
heart of the soviet Union. A Nazi drive on the capital began on October 2, 1941. By
December, the Germans had advanced to the outskirts of Moscow. Soviet General
Georgi Zhukov counterattacked. As temperatures fell, the Germans, in summer
uniforms, retreated. Ignoring Napoleon’s winter defeat 130 years before, Hitler sent his
generals a stunning order: “No retreat!” German troops dug in about 125 miles west of
Moscow. They held the line against the Soviets until March 1943. Hitler’s advance on the
Soviet Union gained nothing but cost Germans 500,000 lives.
Closure Assignment #1
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Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 32, Section 1:
1. Why did Stalin, the leader of communist nation, make a
military agreement with Adolf Hitler, a fascist who
openly condemned communism?
2. Describe the course of World War II in Europe until the
end of 1940. (At least 3 sentences)
3. Why did the United States give more and more help to
the Allies? (At least 1 sentence)
Isoroku Yamamoto
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Japanese military leader who
orchestrated the surprise attack on the
US Naval Base at Pearl Harbor on
December 7th, 1941.
Although Japan and the United States had been allies in World War I, conflict over power in Asia and the
Pacific had been brewing between the two nations for decades prior to 1941. Japan, as the area’s industrial and
economic leader, resented any threats to its authority in the region. America’s presence in Guam and the
Philippines and its support of China posed such a threat. Yet Japan relied on trade with the United States to
supply much-needed natural resources. As war broke out in Europe, the Japanese Empire continued to grow in
China and began to move into Indochina. President Roosevelt tried to stop this expansion, in July of 1940, by
placing an embargo on important naval and aviation supplies to Japan, such as oil, iron ore, fuel, steel, and
rubber. After Japan signed the Tripartite Pact in 1940 with Germany and Italy, FDR instituted a more extensive
embargo. The embargo slowed, but did not stop, Japanese expansion as the Japanese were able to secure the
resources they needed within their new possessions.
In 1941, General Hideki Tojo became the Japanese prime minister. Known as “the Razor” for his sharp mind,
he focused intently on military expansion but sought to keep the United States neutral. Throughout the summer
of 1941, Japan and the United States attempted to negotiate an end to their disagreement, but with little success.
Japan was bent on further expansion, and the United States was firmly against it. Finally, in late November 1941,
Cordell Hull, the U.S. Secretary of State, rejected Japan’s latest demands. Formal diplomatic relations continued
for the next week, but Tojo had given up on peace. By the beginning of December he had made the decision to
deliver a decisive first blow against the U.S. As Japanese diplomats wrangled in the U.S. capital, Japan’s navy
sailed for Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, the site of the United States Navy’s main Pacific base. The forces that Tojo sent
to from Japan under the command of Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo included 6 aircraft carriers, 360 airplanes,
an assortment of battleships and cruisers, and a number of submarines. Their mission was to eradicate the
American naval and air presence in the Pacific with a surprise attack. Such a blow would prevent
Americans from mounting a strong resistance to Japanese expansion.
Closure Question #1: Was the Japanese attack on Pearl harbor a
success or failure from the Japanese point of view? Explain (At
least 1 sentence)
Pearl Harbor
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Main base of the U.S. Navy’s Pacific fleet which, on December 7th,
1941, was attacked without warning by the Japanese, leaving 2,500
Americans dead and the entire fleet out of commission for nearly six
months. This event pulled the U.S. into World War II.
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The attackers struck with devastating power, taking the American forces completely by
surprise. The Americans suffered heavy losses: nearly 2,500 people killed, 8 battleships
severely damaged, 3 destroyers left unusable, 3 light cruisers damaged, and 160 aircraft
destroyed and 128 more damaged. The U.S. battlefleet was knocked out of commission
for nearly six months, allowing the Japanese to freely access the needed raw materials of
their newly conquered territories, just as they had planned.
Despite these losses, the situation was not as bad as it could have been. The most
important ships – aircraft carriers – were out at sea at the time of the attack and survived
untouched. In addition, seven heavy cruisers were out at sea and also avoided detection
by the Japanese. Of the battleships in Pearl Harbor, only three – the USS Arizona, the
USS Oklahoma, and the USS Utah – suffered irreparable damage. American submarine
bases also survived the morning, as did important fuel supplies and maintenance facilities.
In the final analysis, Nagumo proved too conservative. He canceled a third wave of
bombers, refused to seek out the aircraft carriers, and turned back toward home because
he feared an American counterstrike. The American Pacific Fleet survived.
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Douglas MacArthur / Bataan Death March
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Douglas MacArthur – Commander of the U.S. Army forces in Asia
during WWII; MacArthur’s troops stationed in the Philipines were
defeated by the Japanese in the Spring of 1942, forcing MacArthur to
flee to Australia, leaving 75,000 soldiers behind as POWs.
Bataan Death March – The forced 63-mile march of American and
Filipino POWs through the hot Filipino rain forest in May 1942. 7,000
American and Filipino troops died during the journey.
With Pearl Harbor smoldering, the Japanese knew they had to move fast to gain important footholds in Asia and
the Pacific. Although Japan’s population was smaller than America’s, the Japanese did have military advantages,
including technologically advanced weapons and a well-trained and highly-motivated military. At the start of the
Pacific war the outlook was grim for America. In December 1941, General Douglas MacArthur, commander of
the United States Army forces in Asia, struggled to hold the U.S. positions in the Philippines with little support.
This task grew even more daunting when the Japanese destroyed half of the army’s fighter planes in the region
and rapidly took Guam, Wake Island, and Hong Kong. The main land attack came on December 22. MacArthur
positioned his forces to repel the Japanese invasion, but he badly miscalculated the strength of the enemy and
was forced to retreat. U.S. forces fell back from Manilla to the Bataan Peninsula and a fortification on Corregidor
Island, where they dug in for a long siege. Trapped in Corregidor, Americans suffered, lacking necessary military
and medical supplies and living on half and quarter rations. Although MacArthur was ordered to evacuate to
Australia, the other Americans remained behind. They held out until early May 1942, when 75,000 Allied soldiers
surrendered. Japanese troops forced the sick and malnourished prisoners of war, or POWs, to march 55 miles up
the Bataan Peninsula to reach a railway that took them inland where they were forced march 8 more miles. More
than 7,000 American and Filipino troops died during the grueling march.
Closure Question #2: Do you believe that it was necessary to imprison
Japanese Americans during WWII? (Explain your answer in at least 1
sentence)
Japanese Internment Camps
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During WWII Japanese Americans living near the west coast were forced
to relocate to internment camps due to fears that they might help the
Japanese if a Japanese invasion of the west coast took place.
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The attack on Pearl Harbor spread fear across America. The federal government began drafting policies toward
immigrants and aliens from the Axis nations. All resident “enemy aliens” were required to register with the government,
submit to fingerprinting, and list their organizational affiliations. Originally laws made no distinction among nationalities.
German, Italian, and Japanese aliens were subject to arrest or deportation if deemed dangerous to national security. Some
11,000 German immigrants and hundreds of Italian immigrants were held in camps; others faced curfews or travel
restrictions. Federal orders also forced all three groups to vacate the West Coast temporarily in the winter of 1942. Once
public fears subsided, FDR removed Germans and Italian from the enemy aliens list.
Japanese aliens and Japanese American citizens received no such respite. Believing Japanese Americans to be inherently
disloyal, West Coast leaders pressed FDR to address the “threat”. In February 1942, the President issued Executive
Order 9066, designating certain areas as war zones from which anyone might be removed for any reason. By September,
the government evacuated more than 100,000 Japanese Americans on the West Coast. Evacuees – including both Issei,
Japanese immigrants, and Nisei, native-born American citizens of Japanese descent – were forced to sell their property at
a loss and allowed to take only necessary items. Why did Japanese Americans generally face harsher treatment than Italian
or German Americans? Several factors help explain the difference; racism, the smaller numbers of Japanese Americans,
their lack of political clout, and their relative isolation from other Americans. In Hawaii, where Japanese Americans
comprised one third of a multiracial society, they escaped a similar fate.
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Battle of Midway
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June 4th, 1942; Considered the turning point of the war in the Pacific, the U.S. Navy,
led by Admiral Chester Nimitz, successfully defended the Midway Island, a key
American Naval base in the Central Pacific, from Japanese attack, sinking 4
Japanese aircraft carriers and ending Japanese threats to the American west coast.
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What Yamamoto did not realize was that Admiral Chester Nimitz knew the Japanese plans. Navy code
breakers had intercepted the Japanese plans. To meet the expected assault, Nimitz sent his only available
aircraft carriers to Midway. The Japanese navy was stretched out across more than a thousand miles, from
the Aleutians to well west of Midway. American forces were all concentrated near Midway. The Japanese
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commenced their attack on June 4, 1942. In the most important naval battle of World War II, the United States dealt
Japan a decisive defeat. Torpedo planes and dive bombers sank 4 Japanese aircraft carriers, along with all 250 aircraft
on board and many of Japan’s most experienced pilots. America lost only one aircraft carrier.
The first American offensive in the Pacific took place in August 1942, with an assault on Guadalcanal in the
Solomon Islands. After three months of intense fighting, the United States Marines drove the Japanese off the island.
Guadalcanal was the first leg in a strategy to approach Japan from both the southwest Pacific and the central Pacific,
using combined U.S. Marine, Navy, and Army forces. The logic behind the dual offensives was to force Japan to
fight a two-front war and to capture bases from which to bomb the Japanese home islands. In jungles and coral
reefs, under torrential monsoons and the blistering sun, fighting for every new piece of territory. American
servicemen began their slow, painful trek toward Japan.
Closure Question #3: How does the Battle of Midway illustrate the importance of
intelligence gathering and espionage in modern warfare? (Explain in at least 1 sentence)
Battle of Guadalcanal
(October 1942 – February 1943) Location of an
important Japanese airbase in the south Pacific, US
marines and Japanese troops fought for control of
the island for 6 months. After losing more than 24,000
of their 36,000 soldiers, Japan finally abandoned the
island.
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Japan treated the countries under its rule as conquered lands. Japanese leaders had hoped that
their lightning strike at American bases would destroy the U.S. fleet in the Pacific. The
Roosevelt administration, they thought, would now accept Japanese domination of the Pacific.
The American people, in the eyes of Japanese leaders, were soft. Their easy, rich life had made
them unable to fight. The Japanese miscalculated, however. The attack on Pearl Harbor unified
American opinion about becoming involved in the war. Once bitterly divided over participating
in the war, the American people now took up arms.
Beginning in 1943, U.S. forces went on the offensive and advanced across the Pacific. As the
Allied military power drew closer to the main Japanese islands in the first months of 1945,
Harry S. Truman, who had become president after Roosevelt died in April, had a difficult
decision to make. Should he use newly developed atomic weapons to bring the war to an end?
If the United States invaded Japan, Truman and his advisers had become convinced that
American troops would suffer heavy casualties. At the time, however, only two bombs were
available; no one knew how effective they would be.
Closure Assignment #2
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1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 32, Section 2:
Was the Japanese attack on Pearl harbor a success or
failure from the Japanese point of view? Explain (At
least 1 sentence)
Do you believe that it was necessary to imprison
Japanese Americans during WWII? (Explain your
answer in at least 1 sentence)
How does the Battle of Midway illustrate the
importance of intelligence gathering and espionage
in modern warfare? (Explain in at least 1 sentence)
Closure Question #1: How were Hitler’s racial ideas and policies connected to his
concept of extreme nationalism? (At least 1 sentence)
Aryan
“Germanic peoples”; Nazis claimed that Aryans were a
master race, superior to all others, especially Jews.
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From the start, the Nazi movement trafficked in hatred and anti-Semitism. Hitler blamed Jews
for all the ills of Germany, from communism to inflation to abstract painting – and, especially,
for the defeat of Germany in World War I. Other extremists influenced Hitler’s ideas and
shared his prejudices. In the 1920s, his was just another angry voice in the Weimar Republic,
advancing simplistic answers for the nation’s grave economic, political, and social troubles. In
1933, however, Hitler became chancellor of Germany. Hitler’s persecution of the Jews began as
soon as he came to power. At first, his focus was economic. He urged Germans to boycott
Jewish-owned businesses, and he barred Jews from jobs in civil service, banking, the stock
exchange, law, journalism, and medicine.
The inevitable question about the Holocaust is: Could it have been prevented? Could the
nations in the democratic West – especially Britain, France, and the United States – have
intervened at some point and stopped the slaughter of millions of innocent people? There are
no simple answers to these questions. However, many people today believe that the West could
have done more than it did. Before the war, the United States (as well as other countries) could
have done more if it had relaxed its immigration policy. It could have accepted more Jewish
refugees and saved the lives of many German and Austrian Jews. However, the State
Department at first made a conscious effort to block Jewish immigration. Later commentators
have blamed this failure to help European Jews on a variety of factors: anti-Semitism, apathy,
preoccupation with the problems of the Great Depression, and a tendency to underestimate
Hitler’s genocidal plans. Once the war started, news of the mass killings had filtered to the
West.
Holocaust
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“Sacrifice by fire”; Term chosen by survivors following WWII to
describe the Nazi attempt to kill all Jews under their control.
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From the time he came to power, Adolf Hitler had targeted Jews for persecution. By the end of
the war, the Nazis had murdered 6 million Jews and 5 million other people they considered
inferior. Today, we continue to remember this tragedy and seek ways to prevent anything like it
from every happening again.
On April 15th, 1945, American radio listeners sat stunned as newsman Edward R. Murrow told
of a horror beyond belief. Murrow was reporting about his visit to the Nazi concentration camp
at Buchenwald. He described the emaciated, hollow-eyed prisoners, the stink which was
“beyond all description,” the children with identification numbers tattooed on their arms, and
the hundreds of “bodies stacked up like cordwood.” Toward the end of his report, Murrow
said: “I pray you to believe what I have said about Buchenwald. I have reported what I saw and
heard, but only part of it. For most of it I have no words. Dead men are plentiful in war, but the
living dead, more than twenty thousand of them in one camp… If I’ve offended you by this
rather mild account of Buchenwald, I’m not in the least sorry.”
–CBS Radio Broadcast,
th
April 15 , 1945
What Edward R. Murrow saw at Buchenwald was just a fragment of the most horrific chapter
in the Nazi era. In 1945, there was no word for it. Today, it is called the Holocaust. The mass
murders of Jews, as well as other “undesirables”, were a direct result of a racist Nazi ideology
that considered Aryans (white gentiles, especially those of Germanic, Nordic, and Anglo-Saxon
blood) superior to other people.
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Kristallnacht
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(November 9, 1938) “Night of the Broken Glass”; After a Jewish
refugee was accused of killing a German diplomat in Paris, Nazi
officials ordered attacks on Jews in Germany, Austria, and the
Sudetenland. 1,500 synagogues & 7,500 Jewish owned businesses
were destroyed, more than 200 Jews were killed, and thousands of
Jews were arrested.
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Acts of violence against Jews were common. The most serious attack occurred on November
9th, 1938, and is known as Kristallnacht. Nazi officials ordered attacks on Jews throughout the
Reich. Secret police and military units destroyed more than 1,500 synagogues and 7,500 Jewishowned businesses, killed more than 200 Jews and injured more than 600 others. The Nazis
arrested thousands of Jews.
Between 1933 and 1937, about 129,000 Jews fled Germany and Nazi-controlled Austria. They
included some of the most notable figures in the scientific and artistic world, including physicist
Albert Einstein. More Jews would have left, but they were not generally welcomed into other
countries. During the Great Depression, with jobs scarce, the United States and other countries
barred their doors to many Jews. In 1939, the ocean liner St. Louis departed Germany for Cuba
with more than 900 Jewish refugees on board. Only 22 of the passengers received permission to
stay in Cuba. U.S. officials refused to accept any of the refugees. The ship returned to Germany.
Almost 600 of the Jews aboard the St. Louis died in Nazi concentration camps.

Closure Question #2: One historian has said that the Holocaust began on “the
day that the Jews started to be treated differently.” Explain what this statement
means and what evidence supports it. (At least 2 sentences)
Segregated Jewish areas; In the aftermath of Kristallnacht, Hitler ordered
Jews in all countries to be moved to ghettos “for their own protection”,
sealing them off with barbed wire and stone walls/
Ghetto


The Nuremberg Laws were named for the city that served as the spiritual center of Nazism. They
denied German citizenship to Jews, banned marriage between Jews and non-Jews, and segregated
Jews at every level of society. Yet even these measures were not enough for Hitler. He hinted
that, in the future, there might be what he called the “Final Solution to the Jewish question.” In
Nazi Germany, Jews were forced to wear yellow stars with the word Jude (“Jew”). By the time of
Kristallnacht, Hitler’s policy of anti-Semitism had progressed from discrimination to organized
violence – but there was even worse to come. Hitler employed the full power of the state in his
anti-Semitic campaigns. Newspapers printed scandalous attacks against Jews. Children in schools
and the Hitler Youth movement were taught that Jews were “polluting” German society and
culture. Comic books contained vile caricatures of Jews.
Nazi administration in the conquered lands of the east was especially ruthless. Seen as the “living
space” for German expansion, these lands were populated, Nazis thought, by racially inferior
Slavic peoples. Hitler’s plans for an Aryan racial empire were so important to him that he and the
Nazis began to put their racial program into effect soon after the conquest of Poland. Himmler’s
task was to move the Slavic peoples out and replace them with Germans. Slavic peoples included
Czech, Polish, Serbo-Croatian, Slovene, and Ukrainian. The resettlement policy was first applied
to the lands of western Poland. Hundreds of thousands of ethinc Germans (German descendants
who had migrated years ago from Germany to different parts of southern and eastern Europe)
were brought into colonize the German provinces in Poland. By 1942, two million ethnic
Germans had been settled in Poland.
Concentration Camp

Prison where members of specially designated groups were
confined. The year he became chancellor (1933), Hitler opened the
first Nazi concentration camp to imprison political opponents and
turn them into “useful members of society.”

Camp administrators tattooed numbers on the arms of prisoners and dressed them in vertically
striped uniforms with triangular insignias. For example, political prisoners wore red insignias,
homosexuals pink, Jews yellow, and Jehovah’s Witnesses purple. Inside the walls of the
concentration camps, there were no real restraints on sadistic guards. They tortured and even
killed prisoners with no fear of reprisals from their superiors.
Death by starvation and disease was an everyday occurrence. In addition, doctors at camps such
as Dachau conducted horrible medical experiments that either killed inmates or left them
deformed. Prisoners were made subjects of bogus experiments on oxygen deprivation,
hypothermia, and the effects of altitude. Bodies were mutilated without anesthesia. Thousands
of prisoners died in agonizing pain, including some 5,000 mentally or physically disabled
children.

Closure Question #3: Do you think that the U.S. military should have decided to
bomb railway lines leading to the death camps? Why or Why not? (At least 1
sentence)
“Final Solution” / Genocide

“Final Solution” – Adolf Hitler’s plan to “cleanse” Europe of the Jewish race in an
efficient and thorough manner. The Holocaust is an example of a genocide (i.e.
The willful annihilation of a racial, political, or cultural group.)

Since 1933, the Nazis had denied Jews the rights of citizenship and
committed acts of brutality against them. These acts of persecution were
steps toward Hitler’s “Final Solution to the Jewish question”: nothing
short of the systematic extermination of all Jews living in the regions
controlled by the Third Reich. In 1933, the year he became chancellor,
Hitler opened the first Nazi concentration camps, where members of
specially designated groups were confined. The earliest camps included
Dachau, Sachsenhausen, and Buchenwald. Later, Ravensbruck, not far
from Berlin, was opened for female prisoners.
In theory, the camps were designed not to kill prisoners, but to turn them
into “useful members” of the Third Reich. The Nazis imprisoned political
opponents such as labor leaders, socialists, and communists, as well as
anyone – journalists or novelists, ministers or priests – who spoke out
against Hitler. Many Jews as well as Aryans who had intimate relations
with Jews were sent to camps. Other groups targeted as “undesirable”
included Gypsies, Jehovah’s Witnesses, homosexuals, beggars, drunkards,
conscientious objectors, the physically disabled, and people with mental
illness.

Death Camp/Auschwitz



Nazi concentration camp in which prisoners were systematically exterminated.
Auschwitz in southern Poland was the largest of these camps. At least 11 million
Europeans, including 6 million Jews, were murdered by the Nazis by 1945.
When Germany invaded Poland and the Soviet Union, the Nazis gained control of large
territories that were home to millions of Jews. Under Nazi rule, Jews in Warsaw, Lodz, and
other Polish cities were forced to live in crowded, walled ghettos. Nazis also constructed
additional concentration camps in Poland and Eastern Europe. At first, the murder of
Jews and other prisoners tended to be more arbitrary than systematic. But at the Wannsee
Conference in January 1942, Nazi leaders made the decision to move toward Hitler’s
“Final Solution”. Reinhard Heydrich, an SS leader known as “the man with an iron heart,”
outlined a plan to exterminate about 11,000,000 Jews. Although the minutes of the
meeting do not use the word “kill”, everyone there understood that killing was their goal.
Many concentration camps, especially in Poland, were designated as death camps. The
largest death camp was Auschwitz in southern Poland. Others included Treblinka,
Maidenek, Sobibor, Belsec, and Chelmno. Prisoners from various parts of the Reich were
transported by trains to the death camps and murdered. Nazis forced prisoners into death
chambers and pumped in carbon monoxide or crammed the prisoners into showerlike
facilities and released the insecticide Zyklon B. Some concentration camps that the Nazis
converted into death camps did not have gassing equipment. In these camps, Nazi guards
shot hundreds of thousands of prisoners. Nazi “Action Groups” that followed the army
into Eastern Europe also shot several million Jews and buried them in ditches. In fully
functioning death camps, the bodies of murdered prisoners were farther desecrated.
Human fat was turned into soap; human hair was woven into wigs, slippers, and
mattresses; cash, gold fillings, wedding rings, and other valuables were stripped off the
victims. After the Nazis had taken what they wanted, they burned the bodies in
crematories
Closure Assignment #3

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from Chapter 32,
Section 3:
How were Hitler’s racial ideas and policies connected to his concept of extreme
nationalism? (At least 1 sentence)
One historian has said that the Holocaust began on “the day that the Jews
started to be treated differently.” Explain what this statement means and what
evidence supports it. (At least 2 sentences)
Do you think that the U.S. military should have decided to bomb railway lines
leading to the death camps? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Battle of Stalingrad



The True turning point of WWII in Europe; Breaking
their prior treaty, Germany invaded Russia in 1941 but
was stopped at Stalingrad by the bitter cold of the
Russian winter and the superior number of Russian
soldiers, surrendering on January 31, 1943.
Germany had attacked Russia in June 1941, sending one army north toward Leningrad, a second east
toward Moscow, and a third south toward Stalingrad. Although Hitler’s forces penetrated deep into
Soviet territory, killing or capturing millions of soldiers and civilians, they did not achieve their main
objective of conquering the Soviet Union. Soviet resistance and a brutal Russia winter stopped the
German advance. In 1942, Hitler narrowed his sights and concentrated his armies in southern Russia.
His goal this time was to control the rich Caucasus oil fields. To achieve this objective, he would have
to capture the city of Stalingrad.
The struggle for Stalingrad was especially ferocious. German troops advanced slowly fighting bitter
block-by-block, house-by-house battles in the bombed-out buildings and rubble. Soviet troops then
counterattacked, trapping the German forces. Yet Hitler refused to allow his army to retreat. Starving,
sick, and suffering from frostbite, the surviving German troops finally surrendered on January 31,
1943. The battle of Stalingrad was the true turning point of the war in Europe. It ended any realistic
plans Hitler had of dominating Europe. Nazi armies were forced to retreat westward back toward
Germany. Instead, it was the Soviet Union that now went on the offensive.
Allied Powers/ Yalta Conference
Closure
Question #1:
Identify one
 Allied Powers – Alliance that originally only included Britain and France,
possible
but eventually several other nations including the Soviet Union, the
consequence
United States, and China during WWII.
of the Allied
 Yalta Conference - February 1945 meeting of the leaders of the three
disagreements Allied powers: Joseph Stalin (U.S.S.R.), Winston Churchill (U.K.), and
at Yalta. (At
Franklin D. Roosevelt (U.S.A.). The three agreed that after WWII
least 1
Eastern European countries, such as Poland and Bulgaria, would hold
sentence)
free elections. Stalin never kept this promise, instead keeping Soviet
troops in these countries and establishing communist governments
controlled by the U.S.S.R.

World War II differed from World War I in several ways. One major difference was that it was fought to the bitter end.
In 1918, the Kaiser had surrendered before the Allies could invade Germany. By contrast, in World War II, Japan and
Germany kept fighting long after their defeat was certain. In the last year of the war, they lost battle after battle,
retreated from the lands they had conquered, and saw the slow destruction of their military forces. Allied bombing
devastated their cities and industries. Yet Germany fought on until Hitler committed suicide, and Japan refused to
surrender until after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The protracted fight gave the Allies time to make plans
for a postwar world. Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin met at Yalta on the Black Sea in February 1945 to discuss final
strategy and crucial questions concerning postwar Germany, Eastern Europe, and Asia. At the Yalta Conference, the
Big Three agreed that Poland, Bulgaria, and Romania would hold free elections. However, Stalin later reneged on this
promise. Roosevelt and Churchill were not in a good position to press Stalin too hard. The Red Army already occupied
much of Eastern Europe, and Roosevelt wanted Soviet help in the war against Japan. Vague promises were about as
much as Stalin would give.
Dwight D. Eisenhower


(1890-1969) Commander of successful American
invasions in North Africa & Italy; Eisenhower
became Supreme Commander of all Allied forces in
Europe in 1944, directing the D-Day invasion of
Europe. “Ike” went on to serve as President of the
USA after the war from 1952 to 1960.
As a young man,. Dwight Eisenhower had not been considered a brilliant student at the U.S.
Military Academy at West point. During the 1930s, though, his career rose due to his
organizational skills and ability to work with others. In 1942, Ike was given command of all
American forces in Europe – even though more than 350 other generals had more seniority. In
October 1942, the British won a major victory at El Alamein in Egypt and began to push
westward. The next month, Allied troops landed in Morocco and Algeria and began to move east
toward key German positions. An energetic American officer, General Dwight D. Eisenhower –
known as Ike – commanded the Allied invasion of North Africa. In February 1943, German
general Erwin Rommel (known as the Desert Fox) led his Afrika Korps against the Americans at
the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia. Rommel broke through the American lines in an attempt to reach
the Allied supply base at Tebessa in Algeria. Finally, American soldiers stopped the assault. Lack
of supplies then forced Rommel to retreat.
D-Day



(June 6, 1944) The first day of the Allied invasion of
western Europe; American, British, Canadian and
Polish troops landed on the northern coast of France
(Normandy), suffering heavy casualties but eventually
overrunning German defenses and beginning the push
east to Germany.
Six months after the Teheran Conference, the plan to open a second front in France became reality. The massive Allied
invasion of France was given the code name Operation Overlord. Overlord involved the most experienced Allied officers
in Europe. American General Dwight D. Eisenhower again served as Supreme Commander. British General Bernard
Montgomery served as commander of the ground forces, while General Omar Bradley led the United States First Army.
Overlord involved landing 21 American divisions and 26 British, Canadian, and Polish divisions on a 50-mile stretch of
beaches in Normandy. The fleet was the largest ever assembled, comprising more than 4,400 ships and landing crafts. The
plan dictated striking five beaches in Normandy (code-named Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword).
On D-Day the Allies hit Germany in force. More than 11,000 planes prepared the way, attempting to destroy the German
communication and transportation networks and soften Nazi beach defenses. At 6:30 AM, after a rough crossing of the
English Channel, the first troops landed. On four of the beaches, the landings were only lightly opposed and casualties
relatively low. But at Omaha, one of the two beaches assigned to American forces, the German offered stiff opposition.
On the cliffs overlooking the beach, the Germans had dug trenches and built small concrete pillbox structures from which
heavy artillery could be fired. They had the beach covered with a wide variety of deadly guns. They had also heavily mined
the beaches. When the first American soldiers landed, they stepped out of their landing crafts into a rainstorm of bullets,
shells, and death. Some crafts dumped their occupants too far from the beach; soldiers, weighted down by heavy packs,
drowned. One writer called D-Day “the longest day.”
George S. Patton Jr.



(1885-1945) Following Eisenhower’s advancement to
Supreme Commander, Paton was given command of
all US mechanized units (tanks) in Europe. Paton
combined innovative tank tactics with single-minded
devotion to duty and victory, earning the nickname of
“Blood and Guts”.
The fighting at the Kasserine Pass taught American leaders valuable lessons. They needed aggressive
officers and troops better trained for desert fighting. To that end, Eisenhower put American forces in
North Africa under the command of George S. Paton Jr. Patton told his junior officers in 1943: “You
usually will know where the front is by the sound of gunfire, and that’s the direction you should
proceed. Now, suppose you lose a hand or an ear is shot off or perhaps a piece of your nose, and you
think you should walk back to get first aid, if I see you, it will be the last… walk you’ll ever take.”
Patton’s forces advanced east with heightened confidence. Simultaneously the British pressed
westward from Egypt, trapping Axis forces in a continually shrinking pocket in Tunisia. Rommel
escaped, but his army did not. In May 1943, German and Italian forces – some 240,000 troops –
surrendered.
Battle of the Bulge



(December 1944) The last desperate counterattack by the German
army against the Allies on the western front; German tanks
barreled through the Ardennes forest, retaking several towns
before being stopped by American forces at the Belgian town of
Bastogne and pushed back into Germany.
After D-Day, Germany faced a hopeless two-front war. Soviet solders were advancing steadily from the east, forcing German armies out of
Latvia, Romania, Slovakia, and Hungary. Mile by mile, Germany lost the lands it had once dominated and the natural resources it had once
plundered. Allied armies were also on the move in the west. In August 1944, the Allies liberated Paris. Hitler had ordered his generals to destroy
the French capital, but they disobeyed him, leaving the “City of Lights” as beautiful as ever. As Parisians celebrated, Allied troops kept
advancing. As a mood of hopelessness fell over Germany, Rommel and other leading generals plotted to overthrow Hitler. On July 20, 1944, an
officer planted a bomb at Hitler’s headquarters. The explosion killed or wounded 20 people, but Hitler survived. Rommel took poison to escape
being put on trial. Claiming that fate was on his side, Hitler refused to surrender to the advancing troops. In December 1944, Hitler ordered a
counter-attack. With Allied troops strung out between the English Channel and the Alps, German forces massed near the Ardennes. Hitler’s
scenario called for English-speaking German soldiers in U.S. uniforms to cut telephone lines, change road signs, and spread confusion. German
tanks would then secure communication and transportation hubs.
The counterattack, known as the Battle of the Bulge, almost succeeded. The Germans caught the Allies by surprise, created a bulge in the
American line, and captured several key towns. Snowy, cloudy skies prevented the Allies from exploiting their air superiority. But at the Belgian
town of Bastogne American forces held despite frostbite and brutal German assaults. Then, on December 23, the skies cleared and Allied
bombers attacked German positions. After reinforcements arrived, the Allies went back on the offensive, steadily pushing the Germans out of
France. The Battle of the Bulge was a desperate attempt to drive a wedge between American and British forces. Instead, it crippled Germany by
using its reserves and demoralizing its troops. Ultimately, it shortened the time Hitler had left.
V-E Day


A week after Adolf Hitler and his wife committed
suicide in Berlin rather than be captured, on May 7,
1945, in a little French schoolhouse that had served
as Eisenhower’s head-quarters, what remained of
the leadership of Nazi Germany surrendered. The
Allied Powers celebrated V-E (Victory in Europe)
Day.
Sadly, FDR did not see the momentous day. He had died a few weeks earlier. It would be up to
the new President, Harry S. Truman, to see the nation through to final victory. By January, the
Soviet Army had reached the Oder River outside Berlin. The Allies also advanced northward in
Italy. In April 1945, Mussolini tried to flee to Switzerland but was captured and executed. By
this time, American and British troops had crossed the Rhine River into Germany. In April, a
U.S. army reached the Elbe River, 50 miles west of Berlin. Allied forces were now in position
for an all-out assault against Hitler’s capital. Hitler was by now a physical wreck; shaken by
tremors, paranoid from drugs, and kept alive by mad dreams of a final victory. He gave orders
that no one followed and planned campaigns that no one would ever fight. Finally, on April 30,
he and a few of his closest associates committed suicide. His “Thousand Year Reich” had lasted
only a dozen years.
Closure Question #2: How were the final phases of the war in Europe similar to
the final phases of the war in the Pacific? How were they different? (At least 2
sentences)
Kamikaze



“Divine Wind”; Japanese suicide-bomber pilots
who deliberately crashed their planes full of jet fuel
into American ships in the Pacific during the late
stages of WWII.
The fight Okinawa in April 1945 was even deadlier than Iwo Jima. Only 340 miles from Japan,
Okinawa contained a vital air base, necessary for the planned invasion of Japan. Taking Okinawa
was the most complex and costly operation in the Pacific campaign, involving half a million
troops and 1,213 warships. U.S. forces finally took Okinawa but at a cost of roughly 50,000
casualties.
From Okinawa and other Pacific bases, American pilots could bomb the Japanese home islands.
Short on pilots and aircraft, low on fuel and ammunition, Japan was virtually defenseless.
American bombers hit factories, military bases, and cities. In a single night in March 1945, B-29
bombers destroyed 16 square miles of Tokyo. The raid killed over 83,000 Japanese – more than
either of the later atomic bombs – and injured 100,000 more.Advances in technology, as well as
the troops helped determine the outcome of World War II. Allied and Axis scientists labored to
make planes faster, bombs deadlier, and weapons more accurate. The most crucial scientific
development was the atomic bomb.
Island Hopping



U.S. strategy in the Pacific against Japan; The Navy
captured some Japanese-held islands while ignoring
others in a steady path toward Japan from 1942 to 1945.
While war still raged in Europe, American forces in the Pacific had been advancing in giant leaps.
From Tarawa and Makin in the Gilbert Islands, American forces jumped ahead to Eniwetok and
Kwajalein in the Marshall Islands. Then, they took another leap to Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the
Mariana Islands. American forces took each island only after a nearly unbelievable life-and-death
struggle. Time and again, Japanese defenders fought virtually to the last man. Rather than surrender,
many Japanese troops readily killed themselves. At the same time, Japanese kamikaze pilots
deliberately crashed their planes into American ships. By the end of the war, more than 3,000 Japanese
pilots had died in kamikaze missions. There deaths, however, did not prevent General Douglas
MacArthur from retaking the Philippines or the United States Navy from sinking Japanese ships.
One of the fiercest battles in the island-hopping campaign took place in February and March 1945. On
Iwo Jima, a five-mile-long island 650 miles southeast of Tokyo, United States Marines faced a dug-in,
determined enemy. In 36 days of fighting, more than 23,000 marines became casualties. But they took
the island. The famous photograph of six marines (including Native American, Ira Hayes) planting the
American flag on Iwo Jima symbolized the heroic sacrifice of American soldiers.
Battle of Iwo Jima



Battle of Iwo Jima – (February-March, 1945) One of
the fiercest battles of the U.S. island-hopping
campaign. In 36 days of fighting on this 5-milelong island 23,000 marines became casualties. The
famous photograph of six marines (including
Native American and Arizonan Ira Hayes) planting
the American flag on Iwo Jima symbolized the
heroic sacrifice of American soldiers.
While war still raged in Europe, American forces in the Pacific had been advancing in giant leaps. From Tarawa
and Makin in the Gilbert Islands, American forces jumped ahead to Eniwetok and Kwajalein in the Marshall
Islands. Then, they took another leap to Saipan, Tinian, and Guam in the Mariana Islands. American forces
took each island only after a nearly unbelievable life-and-death struggle. Time and again, Japanese defenders
fought virtually to the last man. Rather than surrender, many Japanese troops readily killed themselves. At the
same time, Japanese kamikaze pilots deliberately crashed their planes into American ships. By the end of the
war, more than 3,000 Japanese pilots had died in kamikaze missions. There deaths, however, did not prevent
General Douglas MacArthur from retaking the Philippines or the United States Navy from sinking Japanese
ships.
One of the fiercest battles in the island-hopping campaign took place in February and March 1945. On Iwo
Jima, a five-mile-long island 650 miles southeast of Tokyo, United States Marines faced a dug-in, determined
enemy. In 36 days of fighting, more than 23,000 marines became casualties. But they took the island. The
famous photograph of six marines (including Native American, Ira Hayes) planting the American flag on Iwo
Jima symbolized the heroic sacrifice of American soldiers.
Manhattan Project / Harry S. Truman


Harry Truman - (1884-1972) Vice-President to FDR, Truman became
president following Roosevelt’s death in April 1945 and served until
January 1953. Truman received Germany’s surrender in May 1945 &
Japan’s surrender in August 1945, and was the first President of the
Cold War era, but he is best known for making the decision to use the
Atomic Bomb against Japan.
Manhattan Project - The atomic bomb began with an idea. In the
early 1930s, scientists learned how to split the nuclei of certain
elements. They also discovered that this process of nuclear fission
released tremendous energy. They learned more about the nature of
the atom, the effect of a chain reaction, and the military use of
uranium. Early in the war, Albert Einstein signed a letter that alerted
Roosevelt about the need to proceed with atomic development. In
1942, FDR gave the highest national priority to the development of an
atomic bomb. The program, code-named the Manhattan Project, cost
several billion dollars & employed tens of thousands of people.



Potsdam Conference
(July 1945) First meeting between the new U.S.
President, Harry Truman, and Joseph Stalin. The
Allies agreed to divide Germany into 4 zones of
occupation, establish new borders for Poland &
support free elections there, and permit the Soviets to
claim reparations for war damages from their zone of
occupation in Germany.
A dramatically altered Big Three met in the Berlin Suburb of Potsdam. Although Stalin remained in power in the Soviet
Union, Harry S. Truman had become U.S. President upon the death of FDR. After the start of the conference, Clement
Atlee replaced Churchill as prime minister of Britain. While in Potsdam, Truman learned of the successful test of the
atomic bomb. But he was more focused on Europe and the Soviet Union than on Asia. Though in the conference
Stalin reaffirmed his pledge to enter the war against Japan, the Potsdam Conference is remembered for increasing
tension between the Soviets and Americans.
After the war ended in August 1945, plans for the postwar world had to be turned into realities. However, the changes
that took place were not often what the Allies had envisioned at Yalta and Potsdam. World War II altered the political
realities of the world. The borders of Poland, for example, shifted slightly to the west. In time differences between the
Soviet Union and its former Allies led to the division of Germany into two countries: communist East Germany and
noncommunist West Germany. Nearly all the nations of Eastern Europe became communist states under Soviet
control. Other countries experienced profound political changes. In China, a long-standing civil war between
Nationalists and communists resumed. In Japan, General Douglas MacArthur headed an American military occupation
and supervised the writing of a new constitution. It abolished the armed forces except for purposes of defense, gave
women the right to vote, enacted democratic reforms, and established the groundwork for full economic recovery.
Hiroshima / Nagasaki


Hiroshima (August 6, 1945) – Site of the first
atomic-bomb attack. The bomb exploded at 9:14
A.M. By 9:16 A.M. more than 60,000 of
Hiroshima’s 344,000 residents were dead or
missing. An estimated total of 140,000 residents
were killed by the blast and the radiation
poisoning that followed, and 69% of the city’s
buildings were completely destroyed.
Nagasaki (August 9, 1945) – Second atomic-bomb
attack site. 35,000 were killed by the blast, with a
total of nearly 75,000 killed by the blast and
radiation. The destruction, coupled with a
declaration of war by the Soviet Union on the same
day, led the Japanese to surrender on August 15th,
officially ending WWII.
V-J Day

Following the bombing of Hiroshima Japanese leaders
debated whether to surrender or continue to fight for 3
more days. Then, on August 9th, two events rocked
Japan. First, the Soviet Union declared war against
Japan and invaded Manchuria. Next, the United States
dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Debate
continued at the highest levels of Japanese government.
Finally, Emperor Hirohito made the decision to
surrender. On August 15, the Allies celebrated V-J
(Victory in Japan) Day. Japan officially surrendered on
September 2nd aboard the USS Missouri. The most
costly war in history was over. As many as 60,000,000
people, mostly civilians, had died in the conflict.
Closure Question #2: How were the final phases of the war in Europe similar to
the final phases of the war in the Pacific? How were they different? (At least 2
sentences)
Closure Assignment #4

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 32, Section 4:
Identify one possible consequence of the Allied
disagreements at Yalta. (At least 1 sentence)
How were the final phases of the war in Europe similar
to the final phases of the war in the Pacific? How were
they different? (At least 2 sentences)
Did President Truman make the correct decision in
using the atomic bomb? Why or why not?
Refugees/Nazi Collaborators



Refugees – Survivors of war who either or no longer
welcome in their home country or whose home
country no longer exists; In the aftermath of World
War II millions of Europeans found themselves
homeless and penniless.
Nazi Collaborators – People who assist the enemy;
During WWII many non-German Europeans aided
the SS in locating and arresting Jewish Europeans.
After the war collaborators became targets of an
anti-Nazi backlash throughout Europe.
The Nazis were responsible for the deliberate death by shooting, starvation, or overwork of at least nine to ten
million non-Jewish people. The Nazis considered the Roma (sometimes known as Gypsies), like the Jews, to be
an alien race. About 40% of Europe’s one million Roma were killed in the death camps. The leading citizens of
the Slavic peoples – the clergy, intellectuals, civil leaders, judges, and lawyers – were arrested and killed.
Probably an additional four million Poles, Ukrainians, and Belorussians lost their lives as slave laborers. Finally,
at least three or four million Soviet prisoners of war were killed.
Closure Question #1: Why do you think so many Europeans
favored communism after World War II? (At least 1 complete
sentence)
Nuremberg Trials



Trials of Nazis for war crimes in violation of the Geneva
Convention. The trials, which were followed closely by Americans,
highlighted the horrors of the Holocaust. Though most of the
defendants pleaded that they were only following orders and that
Hitler was to blame for all crimes, virtually all accused were
convicted and sentenced to either death by hanging or long prison
sentences.
In the effort to create a better world, the Allies did not forget to punish the people who had caused so much destruction
and death. During the war, the Axis Powers had repeatedly violated the Geneva Convention. The Allies tried more than a
thousand Japanese citizens for committing atrocities in China, Korea, and Southeast Asia and brutally mistreating prisoners
of war. Hundreds were condemned to death, including Prime Minister Hideki Tojo and the general responsible for the
Bataan Death March.
Americans more closely followed the Nuremberg Trials, held in the German town that was the spiritual center of the Nazi
movement. The trials turned a glaring spotlight on the evils of the Third Reich. The first of the Nuremberg Trials involved
key leaders of Nazi Germany, such as Hermann Goring. In the following decades, Allied or Israeli authorities captured and
tried such other Nazis as Adolf Eichmann, a leading architect of the “Final Solution.” The periodic trials kept alive the
memory of the Nazi crimes against humanity.
Closure Question #2: Do you think it was right for the Allies to try only Nazi and
Japanese leaders for war crimes? Why or why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Israel



Jewish nation established in Palestine in 1948 with
the support of all 3 Allied Powers; Arab Muslims,
who had controlled the region for nearly 1800 years,
were forced out of the area, sparking conflict in the
region and Muslim resentment towards the United
States.
For most Americans, the enormity of the Nazi crime became real only when soldiers began to
liberate the concentration camps that dotted the map of Germany. When they saw it all – the
piles of dead bodies, the warehouses full of human hair and jewelry, the ashes in crematoriums,
the half-dead emaciated survivors – they realized as never before that evil was more than an
abstraction. Hardened by war, accustomed to the sight and smell of death, the soldiers who
liberated the camps were nevertheless unprepared for what they saw. The liberation of the
camps led to an outpouring of American sympathy and sincere longing to aid the victims. Many
survivors found temporary or permanent homes in the United States.
The revelation of the Holocaust also increased demand and support for an independent Jewish
homeland. In 1948, when the Jewish community in Palestine proclaimed the State of Israel,
President Truman immediately recognized the new nation. The United States became perhaps
the staunches ally of the new Jewish state.
The Holocaust





9/11/01??
April 11th, 1945 – American soldiers liberate Buchenwald Concentration Camp, the first direct
exposure to the Holocaust by American citizens.
May 7th, 1945 – Germany officially surrenders, ending the war in Europe. Approximately 3 million
Jewish refugees were freed from Concentration Camps.
November 29th, 1947 – The United Nations, due to pressure from U.S. President Harry Truman,
recognizes the formation of the Jewish state of Israel, leading 250,000 Muslim Arabs to leave their
homes in the third-holiest city of the Islamic Faith, Jerusalem. To this day, most Arab nations
refuse to recognize the sovereignty of the Jewish state of Israel.
1967; 1969-1970; 1973; 1977; 1981; 1982; 1987; 1991; 2006; 2009 – Years in which the nation of Israel has
been engaged in official warfare with Muslim nations, including Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq,
Palestine, & Lebanon. In each of these conflicts the United States has supported Israel.
September 11th, 2001 – Saudi Arabian Muslims, funded by the terrorist group Al Qaeda, carry out
kamikaze attacks on the Twin Towers in New York and the Pentagon in Washington. One of the
justifications given by Al Qaeda for carrying out acts of terrorism against the United States is that
the USA continues to support the “illegal” Jewish state of Israel.
Demilitarization/ Democratization



Demilitarization – Disbanding a nation’s armed forces;
As a condition of their surrender, Japan agreed to
completely break-up its military, leaving Japan with
only a small police force while the United States, under
the command of General Douglas MacArthur,
established military bases throughout the country.
Democratization – The Process of creating a
government elected by the people. In February 1946,
MacArthur and his American political advisers drew up
a new constitution, changing Japan into a constitutional
monarchy similar to Great Britain.
MacArthur was not told to revive the Japanese economy. However, he was instructed to
broaden land ownership and increase the participation of workers and farmers in the new
democracy. To this end, MacArthur put forward a plan that required absentee landlords with
huge estates to sell land to the government. The government then sold the land to tenant
farmers at reasonable prices. Other reforms pushed by MacArthur gave workers the right to
create independent labor unions.
United Nations


International organization established in April 1945 which, many
hoped, would succeed where the League of Nations had failed in
preventing warfare and resolving conflict between nations. The
five major WWII allies – the U.S.A., U.S.S.R., Britain, France, and
China – make up the most powerful arm of the U.N., the Security
Council.
The United States led the charge for the establishment of the United Nations. In April 1945, delegates from 50 nations met
in San Francisco to write the charter for the UN. The Senate overwhelmingly ratified the charter, and the UN later set up
its permanent home in New York City. The United Nations was organized on the basis of cooperation between the Great
Powers, not on the absolute equality of all nations. All member nations sat on the General Assembly. However, the five
major World War II Allies were assigned permanent seats on the most powerful arm of the UN, the Security Council.
Closure Question #3: Why do you think Americans supported participation in the
UN after WWII when they had opposed participation in the League of Nations after
World War I? (At least 1 sentence)
Closure Assignment #5

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what
you have learned from Chapter 32, Section 5:
Why do you think so many Europeans favored
communism after World War II? (At least 1
complete sentence)
Do you think it was right for the Allies to try only
Nazi and Japanese leaders for war crimes? Why
or why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Why do you think Americans supported
participation in the UN after WWII when they
had opposed participation in the League of
Nations after World War I? (At least 1 sentence)
The Trial of Harry Truman
Iron Curtain

Term first used by Winston Churchill to describe Soviet domination of
Eastern Europe. The “Iron Curtain” prevented the entrance of western
ideas to the east & did not allow east Europeans to travel to the west
during the Cold War.

Truman left Potsdam believing that the Soviet Union was “planning world conquest” and that the alliance with
the Soviet Union was falling apart. With the Soviet Red Army at his command, Stalin seemed to present a real
threat. Thus, the state was set for a worldwide rivalry between the United States and the Soviet Union. The 46year struggle became known as the Cold War because the two superpowers never faced each other directly in a
“hot” military conquest. President Truman was no the only world leader who believed that Stalin had
aspirations toward world domination. Winston Churchill also spoke out forcefully against the Soviet Union. On
March 5, 1946, he gave an important speech at Fulton College in Missouri, Truman’s home state. Referring to a
map of Europe, Churchill noted that “an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. East of that iron
curtain, the Soviet Union was gaining more control by installing communist governments and police states and
by crushing political and religious dissent. In addition, Churchill feared the Soviets were attempting to spread
communism to Western Europe and East Asia. The only solution, Churchill said, was for the United States and
other democratic countries to stand firm.
Truman shared Churchill’s beliefs. Born in a small town in Missouri, Truman had been too poor to attend
college. He was the only president in the twentieth century with no college education. Instead, he worked the
family farm, fought in France during World War I, and eventually began a political career. His life was a
testament to honesty, integrity, hard work, and a willingness to make difficult decisions. “The buck stops here,”
was his motto as President. It meant that the person sitting in the Oval Office had the obligation to face
problems head-on and make hard decisions.

Containment
Closure Question #1: In your opinion, why did the United States assume global
responsibility for containing communism? (At least 1 sentence)
Truman Doctrine



Truman Doctrine - U.S. Foreign Policy during the Cold
War; The United States gave monetary aid to nations
struggling against communist movements in an effort to
keep communism from spreading.
Known to the Soviets as the Great Patriotic War, the German-Soviet war witnessed the greatest
land battles in history, as well as incredible ruthlessness. The initial military defeats suffered by the
Soviet Union led to drastic emergency measures that affected the lives of the civilian population.
The city of Leningrad, for example, experienced 900 days of siege. Its inhabitants became so
desperate for food that they even ate dogs, cats, and mice. Probably 1.5 million people died in the
city. As the Germany army made its rapid advance into Soviet territory, Soviet workers
dismantled and shipped the factories in the western part of the Soviet Union to the interior – to
the Urals, western Siberia, and the Volga regions. Machines were placed on the bare ground. As
laborers began their work, walls went up around them.
The home front in the United States was quite different from that of the other major powers. The
United States was not fighting on its own territory. Eventually, the United states became the
arsenal of the Allied
Closure Question #2: How did World War II affect the world balance
of power? Which nations emerged from the conflict as world
powers? (At least 2 sentences)
Marshall Plan

(1948) Named for its creator, Secretary of State John C. Marshall,
through the Plan the United States gave about $13 billion in grants and
loans to nations in Western Europe to help them rebuild following
World War II & maintain democratic governments.

The containment policy’s first great success was in Western Europe. After World War II, people there
confronted severe shortages of food, fuel, and medical supplies, as well as brutally cold winters. In this
environment of desperate need, Secretary of State George C. Marshall unveiled a recovery plan for Europe. In
a speech at Harvard University he warned that without economic health, “there can be no political stability and
no assured peace.”
The Marshall Plan provided food to reduce famine, fuel to heat houses and factories, and money to jump-start
economic growth. Aid was also offered to the Soviet satellite states in Eastern Europe, but Stalin refused to let
them accept it. The Marshall Plan provided a vivid example of how U.S. aid could serve the ends of both
economic and foreign policy. The aid helped countries that desperately needed assistance. The prosperity it
stimulated then helped the American economy by increasing trade. Finally, the good relationships that the aid
created worked against the expansion of communism.
The front lines of the Cold War were located in Germany. The zones that were controlled by France, Britain,
and the United States were combined to form West Germany. West Germany was bordered on the east by the
Soviet controlled East Germany. The Allies also controlled the western part of Berlin, a city tucked deep inside
communist East Germany.


Cold War

Ideological conflict between the United States and the Soviet Union which
dominated world affairs from the end of World War II until the 1980s.

The Marshall Plan was not meant to exclude the Soviet Union or its economically and politically dependent Eastern
European satellite states. Those states refused to participate; however, According to the Soviet view, the Marshall Plan
guaranteed “American loans in return for the relinquishing by the European states of their economic and labor also
their political independence.” The Soviets saw the Marshall Plan as an attempt to buy the support of countries.
In 1949 the Soviet Union responded to the Marshall Plan by founding the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance
(COMECON) for the economic cooperation of the Eastern European states. COMECON largely failed, however,
because the Soviet Union was unable to provide much financial aid. By 1947, the split in Europe between the United
States and the Soviet Union had become a fact of life. In July 1947, George Kennan, a well-known U.S. diplomat with
much knowledge of Soviet affairs, argued for a policy of containment to keep communism within its existing
boundaries and prevent further Soviet aggressive moves. Containment became U.S. policy.
The fate of Germany also became a source of heated contention between the Soviets and the West. At the end of the
war, the Allied Powers had divided Germany into four zones, each occupied by one of the Allies – the United States,
the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and France. Berlin, located deep inside the Soviet zone, was also divided into four
zones. The foreign ministers of the four occupying powers met repeatedly in an attempt to arrive at a final peace treaty
with Germany but had little success. By February 1948, Great Britain, France, and the United States were making plans
to unify the three Western sections of Germany (and Berlin) and create a West German government.


Berlin Airlift

(June 1948 – May 1949) U.S. and British planes supplied Democratic
West Berlin with food, fuel, medical supplies, clothing, and other
necessities through airplane deliveries, thwarting Stalin’s attempt to
blockade the city, which was located in the middle of Communist East
Germany.

The front lines of the Cold War were located in Germany. The zones that were controlled by France, Britain,
and the United States were combined to form West Germany. West Germany was bordered on the east by the
Soviet controlled East Germany. The Allies also controlled the western part of Berlin, a city tucked deep inside
communist East Germany.
West Berlin was, as one Soviet leader later described it, “a bone in the throat” of the Soviet Union. Its relative
prosperity and freedom stood in contrast to the bleak life of East Berliners. Stalin was determined to capture
West Berlin or win other concessions from the Western allies. In June 1948, he stopped all highway, railway,
and waterway traffic from western Germany into West Berlin. Without any means of receiving aid, West Berlin
would fall to the communists.
Stalin was able to close roads, stop barges, and block railways, but he could not blockade the sky. For almost a
year, the United States and Britain supplied West Berlin, through a massive airlift. Everything the residents of
West Berlin needed was flown into the city. Even through rain and snow, goods arrived regularly. The Berlin
airlift demonstrated to West Berlin, the Soviet Union, and the world how far the United States would go to
protest noncommunist parts of Europe and contain communism.


North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) / Warsaw Pact





NATO – (1949) Military alliance of 12 Democratic
Western European and North American nations
which agreed to defend Western Europe from
Soviet expansion.
Warsaw Pact – (1955) Military alliance of the
Soviet Union and its satellite states which
pledged to defend one another if attacked.
In May 1949, Stalin was forced to acknowledge that his attempt to blockade
Berlin had failed. The Berlin airlift was a proud moment for Americans and
Berliners and a major success for the policy of containment. One Berlin
resident later recalled her feelings when the blockade was finally lifted:
“Sheer joy – nothing else. Nothing else. Joy, and the feeling that “We have
done it! And it works!... That was so very important. The West has won! I say
this quite deliberately in such a crass way because you wanted to know how I
felt emotionally. The West 0 well, we have succeeded. And the West has won
and the others have not!” –Ella Barowsky, CNN Interview, 1996
The Berlin airlift demonstrated that Stalin could be contained if Western
nations were prepared to take forceful action. The North Atlantic Treaty
Organization, formed in 1949, provided the military alliance to counter
Soviet expansion. Member nations agreed that “an armed attack against one
or more of them… shall be considered an attack against all of them.” This
principle of mutual military assistance is called collective security.
In 1955, West Germany became a member of NATO. In response, the
Soviet Union and its satellite states formed a rival military alliance, called the
Warsaw Pact. All the communist states of Eastern Europe, except
Yugoslavia, were members. Like members of NATO, nations of the Warsaw
Pact pledged to defend one another if attacked. Although members agreed
on paper not to interfere in one another’s internal affairs, the Soviet Union
continued to exert firm control over its Warsaw Pact allies.
Brinkmanship

John Foster Dulles served as Secretary of State under President
Eisenhower during the 1950s. Dulles helped organize the United Nations
after WWII and, as the nation’s chief diplomat, supported stockpiling
nuclear weapons to prevent endless U.S. involvement in minor conflicts,
such as the Korean War. Brinkmanship was Dulles’ approach to
diplomacy with the U.S.S.R., going to the brink of war in order to protect
allies, discourage communist aggression, and prevent war.

President Dwight Eisenhower knew firsthand the horrors of war and the need to defend democracy. He had led
the World War II Allied invasions of North Africa, Italy, and Normandy. Having worked with top military and
political leaders during the war, he was capable of speaking the language of both. Eisenhower accepted much of
Truman’s foreign policy. He believed strongly in a policy to actively contain communism. In the approach of
Dulles and Eisenhower toward foreign policy, they differed significantly from Truman and his Secretary of State,
Dean Acheson. Both teams of men considered the spread of communism the greatest threat to the free world.
But Eisenhower believed that Truman’s approach to foreign policy had dragged the United States into an endless
series of conflicts begun by the Soviet Union. These limited, regional conflicts threatened to drain the country’s
resources.
Closure Question #3: Do you think that the massive retaliation
policy favored by John Foster Dulles successfully deterred the
Soviet Union? Explain your answer in at least 1 sentence.
Closure Assignment #6

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have learned from
Chapter 33, Section 1:
In your opinion, why did the United States assume global
responsibility for containing communism? (At least 1
sentence)
How did World War II affect the world balance of power?
Which nations emerged from the conflict as world
powers? (At least 2 sentences)
Do you think that the massive retaliation policy
favored by John Foster Dulles successfully deterred
the Soviet Union? Explain your answer in at least 1
sentence.
Jiang Jieshi / Taiwan/ Mao Zedong




Jiang Jieshi – (AKA Chiang Kai-Shek) Nationalist leader of China who,
though supported by the U.S., was defeated in the Chinese Civil War and
forced to flee to Taiwan in 1949.
Mao Zedong – Chinese communist who, after nearly 20 years of war,
succeeded in establishing the People’s Republic of China in 1949, a
communist nation allied with the Soviet Union.
Before Japan invaded China in 1937, Nationalist leader Jiang Jieshi, known in the United States as Chiang Kai-Shek, had
been fighting a civil war against communists led by Mao Zedong. Although Jiang and Mao temporarily joined forces in
an uneasy alliance to fight Japan, the civil war resumed with a new fury after the war ended. The Soviet Union
supported Mao, while the United States sent several billion dollars in aid to Jiang. American leaders feared that Jiang’s
defeat would create a communist superpower spanning most of Asia.
Europe had been the first focus of the Cold War. But in the early 1950s, U.S. involvement in the Korean War made
East Asia the prime battleground in the long, hard Cold War struggle. The division between North and South Korea
remains a source of international tension today. Since the time of the Russian Revolution, the Soviets had hoped to
spread communism to every corner of the world, training foreigners in Marxist theory and revolutionary strategy. The
Soviets were confident that communism would reach worldwide influnce. Mao’s victory was an immense shock to
Americans. Not only was China under the control of sworn enemies of the United States, but communist regimes
controlled about one fourth of the world’s landmass and one third of its population. “Who lost China?” Americans
asked. Many critics blamed the Truman administration, saying that the United States had failed to give enough support
to Jiang.
Closure Question #1: Why did the United States support the Nationalists in the
civil war in China?
Commune

In 1958 Mao presented a program, known as the Great Leap Forward, to speed up
economic growth in China. This program combined over 700,000 existing, villagesized farms into 26,000 communes (vast community farms). It proved to be an
economic disaster, as bad weather combined with peasants’ hatred for the system
drove food production down, causing 15 million people to die of starvation.

To speed up economic growth, Mao began a more radical program, known as the Great Leap Forward, in 1958.
Under this program, over 700,000 existing collective farms, normally the size of a village, were combined into
26,000 vast communes. Each commune contained more than 30,000 people who lived and worked together. Since
they had communal child care, more than 500,000 Chinese mothers worked beside their husbands in the fields by
1958.
Mao hoped his Great Leap Forward program would enable China to reach the final stage of communism – the
classless society – before the end of the 20th century. The government’s official slogan promised the following to
the Chinese people: “Hard work for a few years, happiness for a thousand.” Despite such slogans, the Great Leap
Forward was an economic disaster. Bad weather, which resulted in droughts and floods, and the peasants’ hatred of
the new system drove food production down. As a result, nearly 15 million people died of starvation. In 1960 the
government began to break up the communes and return to collective farms and some private plots.

Closure Question #2: Explain how the Cold War affected relations between China and the
United States. (At least 1 sentence)
Red Guards

Revolutionary groups composed of young people who were assigned to
eliminate the “four olds” – old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old
habits. The Red Guards destroyed any object they found connected to
ancient Chinese culture and arrested anyone who opposed Mao’s plans
for Chinese communism.

Despite opposition within the Communist Party and the commune failure. Mao still dreamed of a classless
society. In Mao’s eyes, only permanent revolution could enable the Chinese to achieve the final stage of
communism. In 1966 Mao launched the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. The Chinese name literally
meant “great revolution to create a proletarian (working class) culture.” A collection of Mao’s thoughts, called
the Little Red Book, became a sort of bible for the Chinese Communists. It was hailed as the most important
source of knowledge in all areas. The book was in every hotel, in every school, and in factories, communes, and
universities. Few people conversed without first referring to the Little Red Book.
To further the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards were formed. These were revolutionary groups composed
largely of young people. Red Guards set out across the nation to eliminate the “Four Olds” – old ideas, old
culture, old customs, and old habits. The Red Guard destroyed temples, books written by foreigners, and
foreign music. They tore down street signs and replaced them with ones carrying revolutionary names. The city
of Shanghai even ordered that red (the revolutionary color) traffic lights would indicate that traffic could move,
not stop. Vicious attacks were made on individuals who had supposedly deviated from Mao’s plan. Intellectuals
and artists accused of being pro-Western were especially open to attack. One such person, Nien Cheng, worked
for the British-owned Shell Oil Company in Shanghai. She was imprisoned for seven years. She told of her
experience in Life and Death in Shanghai.

Cultural Revolution

“Great revolution to create a proletarian (working class) culture.”; In 1966 Mao
launched the revolution to encourage love for the new system of communism
and to eliminate the “old” traditions of China. The Red Guards executed or
imprisoned thousands of intellectuals, artists, and other who were viewed as
being anti-Communist, causing chaos in Chinese society. As a result,
agricultural and industrial production decreased leading to fears of starvation
and another civil war. By 1968, Mao himself admitted that the revolution needed
to stop and ordered the army to put down the Red Guards.

Key groups, including Communist Party members and many military officers, did not share Mao’s desire for permanent
revolution. People, disgusted by the actions of the Red Guards, began to turn against the movement. In September 1976,
Mao Zedong died at the age of 82. A group of practical minded reformers led by Deng Zioping seized power and brought
the Cultural Revolution to an end.
Deng Xiaoping called for Four Modernizations – new policies in industry, agriculture, technology, and national defense. For
over 20 years, China had been isolated from the technological advances taking place elsewhere in the world. To make up for
lost time, the government invited foreign investors to China. The government also sent thousands of students abroad to
study science, technology, and modern business techniques. A new agricultural policy was begun. Collective farms could
now lease land to peasant families who paid rent to the collective. Anything produced on the land above the amount of that
payment could be sold on the private market. Peasants were allowed to make goods they could sell to others.

Closure Question #3: Why did the Cultural Revolution fail? (At least 1 sentence)
Closure Assignment #7

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what
you have learned from Chapter 33, Section 2:
Why did the United States support the
Nationalists in the civil war in China?
Explain how the Cold War affected
relations between China and the United
States. (At least 1 sentence)
Why did the Cultural Revolution fail? (At
least 1 sentence)
th
38
Parallel

Latitude at which was set the dividing line between North and South Korea after World
War II by the U.S.A. and U.S.S.R. The line still forms the border between the two
independent nations today.

The focus of attention turned to the peninsula of Korea, separated from northeast China by the Yalu River. Once controlled
by Japan, Korea had been divided into two independent countries by the United States and the Soviet Union after World
War II. In North Korea, the Soviets installed a communist government and equipped its armed forces. The United States
provided smaller amounts of aid to noncommunist South Korea. American occupation troops remained in South Korea
until June 1949. Their departure coincided with the communist victory in China. Soon after, North Korea began a major
military buildup. On June 25, 1950, North Korean forces attacked across the 38 th parallel. The 90,000 North Korean troops
were armed with powerful tanks and other Soviet weapons. Within days, the northerners overtook the South Korean capital
city of Seoul and set out after the retreating South Korean army.
President Truman remembered how the policy of appeasement had failed to check the German aggression that sparked
World War II. Determined that history would not repeat itself, he announced that the United States would aid South Korea.
Within days, the UN Security Council unanimously voted to follow Truman’s lead, recommending that “the Members of the
United Nations furnish such assistance to the Republic of Korea as may be necessary to repel the armed attack and to
restore international peace and security in the area.” Undoubtedly, the Soviet Union would have used its veto power to block
the UN resolution if it had been present for the vote. However, it had been boycotting Security Council sessions because the
UN had refused to seat Mao’s People’s Republic of China.

Douglas MacArthur

General who led American troops in the Korean War. From September
to November 1950 MacArthur’s forces succeeded in pushing North
Korean troops to the Yulu River, its border with China, but then were
pushed back to the 38th parallel by the Chinese army in January 1951.

By September 1950, the UN forces were ready to counterattack. General MacArthur, the World War II hero,
had a bold plan to drive the invaders from South Korea. He suspected that the rapid advance of North
Korean troops had left North Korea with limited supply lines. He decided to strike at this weakness by
launching a surprise attack on the port city of Inchon, well behind enemy lines. Because Inchon was such a
poor landing site, with swift currents and treacherous tides, MacArthur knew that the enemy would not
expect an attack there. MacArthur’s bold gamble paid off handsomely. On the morning of September 15,
1950, U.S. Marines landed at Inchon and launched an attack into the rear guard of the North Koreans.
Communist forces began fleeing for the North Korean border. By October 1950, the North Koreans had
been driven north of the 38th parallel.
With the retreat of North Korean forces, U.S. officials had to decide what to do next. Should they declare
their UN mandate accomplished and end the war? Or should they send their forces north of the 38 th parallel
and punish the communists for the invasion? Truman was concerned about the action China would take if
the United States carried the war into North Korea. Chinese leaders publicly warned the Americans not to
advance near its borders. But MacArthur did not take this warning seriously. He assured Truman that China
would not intervene in the war. Based on this advice, the United States pushed a resolution through the UN,
calling for a “unified, independent, and democratic” Korea.

Closure Question #1: How did General MacArthur’s decision to advance toward
the Yalu River change the course of the Korean War? (At least 1 sentence)
Ho Chi Minh

Leader of the Communist Party in Vietnam; Minh led his
followers to overthrow French colonial rule in North Vietnam
in1954, then continued the fight against democratic South
Vietnam, and its allies from the United States, until 1975.

Dien Bien Phu was a French military base in northwest Vietnam in which Ho Chi Minh’s
army, known as the Vietminh, trapped a large French garrison in 1954. After suffering 15,000
casualties, the French surrendered. At a peace conference in Geneva in 1955 the Vietnamese
agreed that their country would be divided in two: North Vietnam was to be ruled by Ho Chi
Minh’s communists; South Vietnam, by an anti-communist government supported by the
United States.
During WWII, Japan had undermined French control over Vietnam. But when the conflict ended,
France reasserted its colonial aims there. France’s problem, however, was that colonialism was a
dying institution. World War II had strengthened nationalist movements while weakening the
economic and military positions of traditional European powers. In Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh clamored
for independence as France struggled to maintain its dwindling global power. Meanwhile, the United
States faced a difficult decision. On the one hand, it supported decolonialization. On the other hand,
America wanted France as an ally in its Cold War effort to contain the Soviet Union. President Harry
S. Truman believed that if he supported Vietnamese independence, he would weaken anticommunist
forces in France. So, to ensure a strong, anticommunist Western Europe, Truman sacrificed his own
anticolonial sentiments.

 Belief that if Communism were allowed to spread into one country, it
would then spread to many other countries; The United States fought
against Communists in Vietnam from 1964 to 1973 in attempt to keep
Communism out of Southeast Asia but failed to do so.

By 1963, the United States had been drawn into a new struggle that had an important impact on the Cold
War – the Vietnam War. In 1964, under President Lyndon B. Johnson, increasing numbers of U.S. troops
were sent to Vietnam. Their purpose was to keep the Communist regime of North Vietnam from invading
and gaining control of South Vietnam. U.S. policy makers saw the conflict in terms of a domino theory. If
the Communists succeeded in South Vietnam, the argument went, other countries in Asia would also fall (like
dominoes) to communism.

Despite the success of the North Vietnamese Communists, the domino theory proved unfounded. A split
between Communist China and the Soviet Union put an end to the Western idea that there was a single form
of communism directed by Moscow. Under President Nixon, American relations with China were resumed.
New nations in Southeast Asia managed to avoid Communist governments. Above all, Vietnam helped show
the limitations of American power. By the end of the Vietnam War, a new era in American-Soviet relations
had begun to emerge.
Ngo Dinh Diem

Dictator of the anti-Communist South Vietnamese government supported by the
United States. Many Vietnamese supported the communists due to their anger
with Diem’s actions. In 1963, a group of South Vietnamese generals had Diem
assassinated, but the new leaders of South Vietnam were no more popular than
Diem had been.

After his election in 1960, President John F. Kennedy took a more aggressive stand against the communists in Vietnam.
Beginning in 1961, he sent Special Forces troops to South Vietnam to advise the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN)
on more effective ways to fight the communist forces. By 1963, more than 15,000 American “advisers” were fighting in
Vietnam. Although U.S. advisers fought bravely and achieved some success, Diem continued to alienate South Vietnamese
citizens. By late 1963, his regime was in shambles. Buddhists protested his restrictive policies, occasionally by setting
themselves on fire. The Kennedy administration eventually concluded that South Vietnam needed new leadership. Working
behind the scenes, Americans plotted with anti-Diem generals to overthrow Diem’s government. On November 1, 1963,
Diem was removed from power and later assassinated.
Three weeks after Diem’s fall, an assassin’s bullet struck down President Kennedy. Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson was
sworn in as the new President. Johnson was a Cold War traditionalist who held a monolithic view of communism. For this
“Cold Warrior,” communism in the Soviet Union, China, and Vietnam were all the same. He did not recognize subtle
differences. He also knew that the American people expected victory in Vietnam. In 1964, President Johnson faced his first
crisis in Vietnam. On August 2, North Vietnamese torpedo boats fired on the American destroyer USS Maddox as it
patrolled the Gulf of Tonkin off the coast of North Vietnam. The Maddox was not hit, and it returned fire on the North
Vietnamese boat. Johnson promptly responded to the attack and to other North Vietnamese provocations. He announced
that “aggression by terror against peaceful villages of South Vietnam has now been joined by open aggression on the high
seas against an American ally, Johnson ordered an airstrike against North Vietnam.

Vietcong



Vietcong – Communist guerrilla fighters within South Vietnam that wanted
to unite Vietnam under a communist government. The Vietcong used
surprise hit-and-run tactics to assassinate government officials and destroy
roads and bridges, weakening support of the anti-communist government
led by Ngo Dinh Diem.
During the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, France appealed to the United States for military support. President Eisenhower
was willing to supply money but not soldiers. Ike would not commit American troops to defend colonialism in Asia.
Nevertheless, the President firmly supported the new anticommunist government of South Vietnam. America
channeled aid to South Vietnam in different ways. In 1954, the United States and seven other countries formed
SEATO. Similar to NATO, SEATO’s goal was to contain the spread of communism in Southeast Asia. The United
States provided economic and military aid to the South Vietnamese government led by Ngo Dinh Diem. Diem was
an ardent nationalist and anticommunist. Although he lacked popular appeal, his anticommunism guaranteed
American support. When it came time for the 1956 unification elections, American intelligence analysts predicted that
Diem refused to participate in the elections, a move made under the auspices of the United States government.
By 1957, a communist rebel group in the South, known as the National Liberation Front (NLF), had committed
themselves to undermining the Diem government and uniting Vietnam under a communist flag. NLF guerrilla
fighters, called Vietcong, launched an insurgency in which they assassinated government officials and destroyed roads
and bridges. Supplied by communists in North Vietnam, the Vietcong employed surprise hit-and-run tactics to
weaken Diem’s hold on South Vietnam. Diem’s own policies also weakened his position in South Vietnam. A devout
Roman Catholic in an overwhelmingly Buddhist nation, Diem did little to build a broad political base. Instead, he
signed anti-Buddhist legislation and refused to enact significant land reforms.
Closure Question #2: Explain how television coverage affected
the Vietnam War. (At least 1 sentence)
 Despite the massive superiority in equipment and firepower
of the American forces, the United States failed to defeat the
North Vietnamese. The growing number of American troops
in Vietnam soon produced an antiwar movement in the
United States, especially among college students of draft age.
The mounting destruction of the conflict, seen on television,
also turned American public opinion against the war.
President Johnson, condemned for his handling of the costly
and indecisive war, decided not to run for reelection. Former
vice president Richard M. Nixon won the election with his
pledge to stop the war and bring the American people
together. Ending the war was difficult, and Nixon’s
administration was besieged by antiwar forces. Finally, in
1973, President Nixon reached an agreement with North
Vietnam that allowed the United States to withdraw its forces.
Within two years after the American withdrawal, Vietnam had
been forcibly reunited by Communist armies from the North.
Vietnamization

Policy for withdrawal from Vietnam presented by President Nixon; U.S. forces
would withdraw as the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) assumed
more combat duties. Though the hope of the policy was that the ARVN would
be able to secure South Vietnam with aid from the U.S. behind the front lines,
the reality was that the ARVN troops were outnumbered and outgunned
without U.S. combat troops.

Nixon’s defenders argued that he was a hard-working patriot with a new vision for America. His critics charged that he was a
deceitful politician bent on acquiring power and punishing his enemies. There were elements of truth to both views. But defenders
and critics alike agreed that Richard Nixon was a determined man with abundant political talent. From his first day in office, the
new President realized that ending the Vietnam War was the key to everything else he hoped to achieve.
Though formal peace talks between the warring parties had begun in May 1968, they were bogged down from the outset by
disagreements and a lack of compromise . When Richard Nixon took office in January 1969, his peace delegation firmly believed
they could break the impasse. The Americans and South Vietnamese wanted all communist troops out of South Vietnam. They also
wanted prisoners of war (POWs) returned. Meanwhile, the North Vietnamese demanded an immediate American withdrawal from
Vietnam and the formation of a coalition government in South Vietnam that would include representatives from the Vietcong. Still
hoping to win the war in the field, North Vietnam refused to budge from its initial position. And South Vietnam refused to sign any
agreement that compromised its security.
President Nixon refused to accept the North Vietnamese peace terms. He was committed to a policy of “peace with honor” and
believed that there were still military options. He continued a gradual pullout of American troops, and expressed faith in the ability
of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam to assume the burden of war. To reduce the flow of communist supplies to the Vietcong,
Nixon ordered the secret bombing of the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Cambodia. This was a controversial move because it widened the
scope of the war and helped to undermine the neutral government in Cambodia.


Khmer Rouge

The Southeast Asian country of Cambodia, like Vietnam, was part of French
Indochina and ruled by the French. In 1975, Cambodia claimed its
independence and established a communist government known as the Khmer
Rouge under the leadership of Pol Pot. The Khmer Rouge carried out a
massacre of two million Cambodians who were accused of not supporting
communism.

The reunification of Vietnam under Communist rule had an immediate impact on the region. By the end of 1975, both Laos
and Cambodia had communist governments. In Cambodia, Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge, massacred more than a
million Cambodians. However, the Communist triumph in Indochina did not lead to the “falling dominoes” that many U.S.
policy makers had feared. At first, many new leaders in Southeast Asia hoped to set up democratic states. By the end of the
1950s, however, hopes for rapid economic growth had failed. This failure and internal disputes led to military or one-party
regimes. In recent years, some Southeast Asian societies have once against moved toward democracy. However, serious
obstacles remain for these peoples.
The Vietnamese invaded Cambodia in 1978. They overthrew the Khmer Rouge and installed a less repressive government.
But fighting continued. The Vietnamese withdrew in 1989. In 1993, under the supervision of UN peacekeepers, Cambodia
adopted a democratic constitution and held free elections.

Closure Question #3: Why do you think that the United Nations and the United States did
not take military action to prevent the communist takeover of Cambodia and the genocide
that followed?
Closure Assignment #8

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 33, Section 3:
How did General MacArthur’s decision to advance toward
the Yalu River change the course of the Korean War? (At
least 1 sentence)
Explain how television coverage affected the Vietnam
War. (At least 1 sentence)
Why do you think that the United Nations and the United
States did not take military action to prevent the
communist takeover of Cambodia and the genocide that
followed?
Third World

Developing nations, many of which were newly independent, who were
not aligned with either the United States or the Soviet Union during the
Cold War. These countries became locations for competition between
the United States and the Soviet Union.

Following WWII, the world’s nations were grouped politically into three “worlds”. The first was the
industrialized capitalist nations, including the United States and its allies. The second was the Communist
nations led by the Soviet Union. The Third World nations were located in Latin America, Asia, and Africa.
They were economically poor and politically unstable. This was largely due to a long history of colonialism.
They also suffered from ethnic conflicts and lack of technology and education. Each needed a political and
economic system around which to build its society. Soviet-style communism and U.S.-style free-market
democracy were the main choices.
The United States has long played a major role in Latin America. Business investment by U.S. companies was
one of the reasons the United States often intervened in Latin American affairs. U.S. investors would often
pressure the U.S. government to prevent social and political change in Latin America – even if that meant
backing dictators. For years, the United States had sent troops into Latin American countries to protect U.S.
interests. Then in the 1930s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt began a Good Neighbor policy, an effort to end
such intervention. In 1948, the states of the Western Hemisphere formed the Organization of American States
(OAS). The OAS emphasized the need for Latin American independence. It passed a resolution calling for an
end to military action by one state in the affairs of another. The formation of the OAS however, did not end
U.S. involvement in Latin American affairs.

Nonaligned Nations

Countries which hoped to avoid involvement in the Cold War by refusing to
ally themselves with the Soviet Union or the United States. In 1955 a group
of the leaders of third-world nations in Africa and Asia met at the Bandung
Conference in Indonesia to form what they called a “third force” of
independent countries. Some nations, such as India and Indonesia, were
able to maintain their neutrality. Bt others took sides with the superpowers
or played competing sides against each other.

After World War II, most states in Southeast Asia gained independence from their colonial rulers. The Philippines
became independent of the United States in 1946. Great Britain also ended its colonial rule in Southeast Asia. In
1948, Burma became independent. Malaya’s turn came in 1957. France refused, however, to let go of Indochina. This
led to a long war in Vietnam. In Southeast Asia, the Netherlands was unwilling to give up its colonies and tried to
suppress the Indonesian republic proclaimed by Sukarno. When the Indonesian Communist Party attempted to seize
power, the United States pressured the Netherlands to grant independence to Sukarno and his non-Communist
Nationalist Party. In 1949 the Netherlands recognized the new Republic of Indonesia.
As British rule ended in India, India’s Muslims and Hindus were bitterly divided. India’s leaders decided to create two
countries, one Hindu (India) and one Muslim (Pakistan). Pakistan would have two regions: West Pakistan and East
Pakistan. When India and Pakistan became independent on August 15, 1947, Hindus moved toward India; Muslims,
toward Pakistan. More than one million people were killed in the mass migrations. One of the dead was well known.
On January 30, 1948, a Hindu militant assassinated Mohandas Gandhi as he was going to morning prayer.

Fidel Castro

The Cuban Revolution (1953-1959) was a popular uprising which led by Fidel
Castro to overthrow the U.S. supported, dictatorial government of Cuba and to
establish a communist government. As a young law student in Havana, Castro
came to resent the dictatorial government of Fulgencio Batista which was
supported by the United States. Angered by the social inequality which left the
majority of Cubans in uneducated and impoverished, Castro became a
revolutionary. After leading a failed attack on a Cuban military base in 1953,
Castro fled to Mexico where he organized a stronger revolutionary force. In 1958
Castro returned to Cuba and gained popular support, finally seizing Havana in
1959.

In the 1950s, an opposition movement arose in Cuba. It aimed to overthrow the government of the dictator Fulgencio
Batista, who had controlled Cuba since 1934. The leader of the movement was a man named Fidel Castro. While a law
student at the University of Havana, he had become a revolutionary. On July 26, 1953, Castro and his brother Raul led a
band of 165 young people in an attack on the Moncada army camp at Santiago de Cuba. The attack was a disaster. While
Fidel and Raul escaped, they were later captured and sentenced to prison for 15 years. Batista released Fidel and Raul after
11 months. After their release, the Castro brothers fled to the Sierra Maestra mountains in Mexico. There they teamed up
with a small band of revolutionaries. Castro poured out a stream of propaganda with a small radio station and printing press.
As the rebels gained more support, the Batista regime collapsed. Castro’s revolutionaries seized Havana on January 3, 1959.
Many Cubans who disagreed with Castro fled to the United States.
Relations between Cuba and the United States quickly deteriorated when Castro’s Communist regime began to receive aid
from the Soviet Union. Arms from Eastern Europe also began to arrive in Cuba. In October 1960, the United States
declared a trade embargo. Just three months later all diplomatic relations with Cuba were broken. Soon after that, in April
1961, U.S. President John F. Kennedy supported an attempt to overthrow Castro’s government. When the invasion at the
Bay of Pigs failed the Soviets made an even greater commitment to Cuba. In December, 1961, Castro declared himself a
Marxist, drawing even closer to the Soviet Union. The Soviets began placing nuclear missiles in Cuba in 1962, leading to a
showdown with the United States.

 During the administration of John F. Kennedy, the Cold War confrontation between the United States
and the Soviet Union reached frightening levels. In 1959 a left-wing revolutionary named Fidel Castro
overthrew the Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista and set up a Soviet-supported totalitarian regime in
Cuba. Having a socialist regime with Communist contacts so close to the mainland was considered a
threat to the security of the United States. President Kennedy feared that if he moved openly against
Castro, then the Soviets might retaliate by moving against Berlin. As a result, the stage might be set for
the two superpowers to engage in a nuclear war.
 For months, Kennedy had considered alternatives. He finally approved a plan that the CIA had
proposed. Exiled Cuban fighters would invade Cuba at the Bay of Pigs, on the Playa Giron and Playa
Larga beaches. The purpose of the invasion was to cause a revolt against Castro. The invasion was a
disaster. It began on Sunday, April 16, 1961. By Wednesday, the exiled fighters began surrendering.
One hundred fourteen died; the rest were captured by Castro’s troops.
 After the Bay of Pigs, the Soviet Union sent advisers to Cuba. Then, in 1962, Khrushchev began to
place nuclear missiles in Cuba. The missiles were meant to counteract U.S. nuclear weapons in Turkey,
a country within easy range of the Soviet Union. Khrushchev said: “Your rockets are in Turkey. You
are worried by Cuba… because it is 90 miles from the American coast. But Turkey is next to us.”
 The United States was not willing to allow nuclear weapons within such close striking distance of its
mainland. In October 1962, Kennedy found out that Soviet ships carrying missiles were heading to
Cuba. He decided to blockade Cuba to prevent the fleet from reaching its destination. This approach
gave each side time to find a peaceful solution. Khrushchev agreed to turn back the fleet and remove
Soviet missiles from Cuba if Kennedy pledged not to invade Cuba. Kennedy quickly agreed.
Cuban Missile Crisis

(October 1962) U.S. intelligence discovered that the Soviets were building
nuclear missiles sites in Cuba, threatening major East Coast cities.
Kennedy demanded the removal of the missiles, and approved a naval
blockade of Cuba to prevent the Soviets from completing the bases. Behind
the scenes, Kennedy promised to remove U.S. missiles in Turkey and Italy.
After 6 tense days, the Soviets agreed to the compromise.

After breaking diplomatic relations with Cuba in 1961, the Eisenhower administration authorized the Central
Intelligence Agency to plan an invasion of Cuba to overthrow Castro. The CIA recruited Cuban exiles and trained
them in Guatemala. But when Eisenhower left office, the invasion plan was still that – an unexecuted, untried plan.
Pressured by members of the CIA and his own aides, Kennedy decided to implement the plan. On April 17, 1961, a
CIA-led force of Cuban exiles attacked Cuba. The invasion was badly mismanaged. The poorly equipped forces
landed at the site with no protective cover. Not only did the Bay of Pigs invasion fail, it probably strengthened
Castro’s position in Cuba.
Closure Question #2: Which of the 3 political leaders involved in the Cuban
Missile Crisis should receive the most blame for what very nearly was a nuclear
holocaust? Explain your answer.
Anastasio Somoza

In Nicaragua, the Somoza family seized control of the government in 1937
and maintained control for the next 45 years. It began with Anastasio
Somoza Garcia’s introduction as president, followed by his two sons. Over
most of this period, the Somoza regime had the support of the United
States. The Somozas enriched themselves at the expense of the Nicaraguan
people and used murder and torture to silence opposition.

After World War II, the wealthy elite and the military controlled the government in El Salvador. The rise of an urban
middle class led to hope for a more democratic government. The army, however, refused to accept the results of free
elections that were held in 1972. World attention focused on El Salvador in the late 1970s and the 1980s, when the
country was rocked by a bitter civil war. Marxist-led, leftist guerrillas and right-wing groups battled one another. The
Catholic Church became a main target, and a number of priests were killed or tortured, among them Archbishop
Oscar Romero. Death squads killed anyone they thought a threat to their interests.
When U.S. president Ronald Reagan claimed evidence of “communist interference in El Salvador,” the United States
began to provide weapons and training to the Salvadoran army to defeat the guerrillas. The hope was to bring
stability to the country, but the killings continued. In 1984, a moderate, Jose Duarte, was elected president. The
unrest in El Salvador cut short Duarte’s efforts at political, social, and economic reforms. Nor could Duarte stop the
savage killing. By the early 1990s, at least 75,000 people were dead. A 1992 peace settlement ended the war. Duarte
did not live to see his hope for peace fulfilled. After transferring power to his successor, Duarte said that his
government had “laid the foundation for democracy in this country.” Duarte died in 1990.

Daniel Ortega

Leader of Marxist guerrilla forces in Nicaragua known as the Sandinista
National Liberation Front. In 1979, the Sandinistas won a number of
military victories against Somoza’s government forces and gained control of
the country. Soon, a group opposed to the Sandinistas’ polices, called the
contras, began to try to overthrow the new government. Worried by the
Sandinistas’ alignment with the Soviet Union, the United States supported
the contras. The war waged by the contras undermined support for the
Sandinistas. In 1990, the Sandinistas, led by Daniel Ortega, agreed to free
elections and lost to a coalition headed by Violeta Barrios de Chamorro,
who became Nicaragua’s first female president. After 16 years out of power,
the Sandinistas won new elections in 2006 and Daniel Ortega became
president in January 2007.

A wealthy oligarchy ruled Panama with U.S. support. After 1968, military leaders of Panama’s National Guard were in
control. One of these, Manuel Noriega, became so involved in the drug trade that President George H. W. Bush sent
U.S. troops to Panama in 1989. Noriega was later sent to prison in the United States for drug trafficking. A major
issue for Panamanians was finally settled in 1999 when Panama took control of the Panama Canal. The terms for this
change of control had been set in a 1977 treaty with the United States.
Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini

Fundamentalist Islamic Clerk who, in 1979, led a revolt to overthrow the
Shah (Emperor) of Iran who had been supported by the United States.
The Khomeini government held the U.S. Embassy and the 52 Americans
inside hostage for over a year. President Carter’s inability to free the
hostages combined with continuing economic problems turned American
public opinion against him.

President Jimmy Carter hoped that the Camp David Accords would usher in a new era of cooperation in the
Middle East. Yet, events in Iran showed that troubles in the region were far from over. Since the 1950s, the United
States had supported the rule of the Shah, or emperor, of Iran. In the 1970s, however, opposition to the Shah
began to grow within Iran. Dying of cancer, the Shah fled from Iran in January 1979. Fundamentalist Islamic
clerics took power. Carter allowed the Shah to enter the United States to seek medical treatment. Enraged Iranian
radical students invaded the U.S. Embassy and took 66 Americans as hostages. The Khomeini government then
took control of both the embassy and the hostages to defy the United States.
The hostage crisis consumed the attention of Carter during the last year of his presidency. To many Americans,
Carter’s failure to win all of the hostages’ release was evidence of American weakness. As Peter Bourne put it in
his biography of Jimmy Carter, “Because people felt that Carter had not been tough enough in foreign policy…
some bunch of students could seize American diplomatic officials and hold them prisoner and thumb their nose at
the United States.”

Closure Question #3: What similarities do you see among U.S. actions in Nicaragua, Cuba,
and Iran? (Give at least 2 similarities in 2 complete sentences)
Closure Assignment #9

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 33, Section 4:
How did the Cold War confrontations affect the decision of
the United States to move against Fidel Castro in Cuba?
What was the outcome of that decision? (At least 2
sentences)
Which of the 3 political leaders involved in the Cuban
Missile Crisis should receive the most blame for what very
nearly was a nuclear holocaust? Explain your answer.
What similarities do you see among U.S. actions in
Nicaragua, Cuba, and Iran? (Give at least 2 similarities in 2
complete sentences)
 New leader of the Soviet Union following the death of Joseph Stalin in
1953; Khrushchev was a communist and a determined opponent of the
U.S.A., but he was not as suspicious or cruel as Stalin. In 1955
Khrushchev met with President Eisenhower in Geneva, giving both the
Soviet Union and the United States hope that the two powers could
peacefully co-exist.

Khrushchev realized the need to stop the flow of refugees from East Germany through West Berlin. In August
1961, the East German government began to build a wall separating West Berlin from East Berlin. Eventually it
became a massive barrier guarded by barbed wire, flood-lights, machine-gun towers, minefields, and vicious dog
patrols. The Berlin Wall became a striking symbol of the division between the two superpowers.

The Cuban missile crisis seemed to bring the world frighteningly close to nuclear war. Indeed, in 1992 a highranking Soviet officer revealed that short-range rockets armed with nuclear devices would have been used
against U.S. troops if the United States had invaded Cuba, an option that Kennedy fortunately had rejected.
The realization that the world might have been destroyed in a few days had a profound influence on both sides.
A hotline communications system between Moscow and Washington D.C., was installed in 1963. The two
superpowers could now communicate quickly in times of crisis.
Sputnik

The first man-made satellite; The Soviet Union launched
Sputnik into orbit in October of 1957, sparking a space-race
between the United States and U.S.S.R., with each side trying
to stay ahead of the other in space exploration.

Yuri Gagarin was the first human to orbit the earth; On April 12th, 1961 Gagarin was launched into
orbit aboard the Vostok 3KA-3. After the flight Gagarin became an international celebrity, touring
throughout Europe to promote the Soviet achievement. The Soviet Union launched Sputnik, the
first successful artificial space satellite, on October 4, 1957. as it circled the earth every 96 minutes,
Premier Nikita Khrushchev boated that his country would soon be “turning out long-range missiles
like sausages.” The United States accelerated its space program. After early failures, a U.S. satellite
was launched in 1958.
Beginning in the late 1950s, the United States and the Soviet Union competed for influence not
only among the nations of the world, but in the skies as well. Once the superpowers had ICBMs
(intercontinental ballistic missiles) to deliver nuclear warheads and aircraft for spying missions, they
both began to develop technology that could be used to explore – and ultimately control – space.
However, after nearly two decades of costly competition, the two superpowers began to cooperate
in space exploration.

Closure Question #1: Why was achieving victory in the Space Race viewed as
being essential by both the Soviet Union and the United States?
Leonid Brezhnev

Leader of the Soviet Union during the late 1960s and 1970s; Brezhnev was
determined to keep Eastern Europe in Soviet control and continue the arms race
with the United States by focusing the Soviet economy on heavy industry.
However, under his leadership the Soviet ruling class (government and military
leaders) became increasingly corrupt and complacent.

Between 1964 and 1982, drastic change in the Soviet Union had seemed highly unlikely. What happened to create such a
dramatic turnaround in the late 1980s? Alexei Kosygin and Leonid Brezhnev replaced Nikita Khrushchev when he was
removed from office in 1964. Brezhnev emerged as the dominant leader in the 1970s. Determined to keep Eastern Europe in
Communist hands, he was not interested in reform. He also insisted on the Soviet Union’s right to intervene if communism
was threatened in another Communist state. At the same time, Brezhnev benefited from détente. Roughly equal to the United
States in nuclear arms, the Soviet Union felt more secure. As a result its leaders relaxed their authoritarian rule. Brezhnev
allowed more access to Western styles of music, dress, and art.
In his economic policies, Brezhnev continued to emphasize heavy industry. Two problems, however, weakened the Soviet
economy. First, the central government was a huge, complex, but inefficient bureaucracy that led to indifference. Second,
many collective farmers preferred working their own small private plots to laboring in the collective work brigades. By the
1970s, the Communist ruling class in the Soviet Union had become complacent and corrupt. Party and state leaders, as well
as army leaders and secret police (KGB), enjoyed a high standard of living. Regardless of the government’s inefficiency and
corruption, Brezhnev did not want to tamper with the party leadership and state bureaucracy.

Closure Question #2: According to the Brezhnev Doctrine, the Soviet Union should have
used military force in Vietnam to aid the Vietcong. Why do you think they did not do so?
John F. Kennedy

U.S. President from 1961 to 1963; A Democrat, JFK was the youngest
President ever elected. A Harvard graduate from a prominent New
England family (His father was US Ambassador to England during
WWII), Kennedy won over the American people with his energy, charming
personality, and model family, despite being a Catholic.

Flexible Response was JFK’s military policy, which emphasized the importance of preparing the United States to
fight any type of conflict. During the Kennedy administration, government funding for all military corps increased.
As the first President born in the 20th century, Kennedy proclaimed that a “new generation of Americans” was
ready to meet any challenge. In his Inaugural Address, Kennedy warned his country’s enemies: “Let every nation
know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any
friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” Kennedy issued a challenge to Americans:
“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country.”
During his first two and a half years in office, Kennedy made the transition from politician to national leader. In
foreign affairs he confronted Soviet challenges, made hard decisions, and won the respect of Soviet leaders and
American citizens. He also spoke eloquently about the need to move toward a peaceful future. In domestic affairs
he finally came to the conclusion that the federal government had to lead the struggle for civil rights. Added to his
new maturity was his ability to inspire Americans to dream noble dreams and work toward lofty ends.

Lyndon B. Johnson

JFK’s Vice President, Johnson served as U.S. President from 1963 to 1968. A
Texan Democrat, Johnson worked as a teacher during the depression in a
segregated school for Mexican Americans. In 1937 he began his political career
and became known for his abilities of persuasion. Following Kennedy’s
assassination, Johnson used his political talents to continue Kennedy’s policies
in support of civil rights and aid for the poverty-stricken. These two goals were
key to Johnson’s vision for America, which he called the Great Society.

Born in Stonewall, Texas, Lyndon B. Johnson was raised in the Hill Country town of Johnson City. He attended Southwest
Texas State College and then taught for several years in Cotulla, Texas. There, at a tiny segregated school for Mexican
Americans, he confronted firsthand the challenges faced by poverty-stricken minority students, and the lessons he learned
remained with him for the rest of his life. After teaching for several years, Johnson entered politics – first as a Texas
congressman’s secretary and then as the head of the Texas National Youth Administration.
In 1937, Johnson was elected to Congress, and during the next several decades he became the most powerful person on
Capitol Hill. Elected to the Senate in 1948, Johnson proved himself a master of party politics and rose to the position of
Senate majority leader in 1955. In the Senate, he was adept at avoiding conflict, building political coalitions, and working out
compromises. His sill was instrumental in pushing the 1957 Civil Rights Act through Congress. In 1960, he hoped to be
chosen the Democratic Party to run for President, but when Kennedy got the nomination Johnson agreed to join him on the
ticket as the vice presidential nominee. A New Englander and a Catholic, Kennedy needed Johnson to help carry the heavilyProtestant South. Johnson was also popular both with Mexican American voters and in the Southwest. He was an important
part of Kennedy’s victory in 1960.

Closure Question #3: Did the student revolts of this period contribute
positively or negatively to society? Explain in at least 1 sentence.


Before WWII, it was mostly members of Europe’s wealthier class who went to
universities. After the war, European states encouraged more people to gain
higher education by eliminating fees. As a result, enrollments from middle and
lower classes grew dramatically. In France, 4.5% of young people went to
universities in 1950. By 1965, the figure had increased to 14.5%. There were
problems, however. Many European university classrooms were overcrowded,
and many professors paid little attention to their students. Growing discontent
led to an outburst of student revolts in the late 1960s.
This student radicalism had several causes. Many protests were an extension of
the revolts in American universities, often sparked by student opposition to the
Vietnam War. Some students, particularly in Europe, believed that universities
failed to respond to their needs or to realities of the modern world. Others
believed they were becoming small cogs in the large and impersonal
bureaucratic wheels of the modern world. Students protests in the late 1960s and
early 1970s caused many people to rethink basic assumptions. Student
upheavals, however, were not a turning point in the history of postwar Europe,
as some people thought at the time. As student rebels became middle-class
professionals, revolutionary politics became mostly a memory.
Closure Assignment #10

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 33, Section 5:
Why was achieving victory in the Space Race viewed as
being essential by both the Soviet Union and the United
States?
According to the Brezhnev Doctrine, the Soviet Union
should have used military force in Vietnam to aid the
Vietcong. Why do you think they did not do so?
Did the student revolts of this period contribute positively
or negatively to society? Explain in at least 1 sentence.
Apollo 11 / Neil Armstrong

The first manned-mission to the moon; In 1969, American Astronaut
Armstrong became the first man to set foot on the moon. As he did so
he made the following statement: “This is one small step for man; One
giant leap for mankind.”

Global transportation and communication systems are transforming the world community. People are
connected and “online” throughout the world as they have never been before. Space exploration and orbiting
satellites have increased our understanding of our world and of solar systems beyond our world. Since the 1970s,
jumbo jet airlines have moved millions of people around the world each year. A flight between London and
New York took half a day in 1945. Now, that trip takes only five or six hours. The Internet – the world’s largest
computer network – provides quick access to vast quantities of information. The World Wide Web, developed
in the 1990s, has made the Internet even more accessible to people everywhere. Satellites, cable television,
facsimile (fax) machines, cellular telephones, and computers enable people to communicate with one another
practically everywhere in the world. Communication and transportation systems have made the world a truly
global village.
The computer may be the most revolutionary of all technological inventions of the 20th century. The first
computer was really a product of World War II. British mathematician Alan Turing designed the first electronic
computer to crack enemy codes. Turing’s machine did calculations faster than any human. IBM of the United
States made the first computer with stored memory in 1948. The IBM 1401, marketed in 1959, was the first
computer used in large numbers in business and industry. These early computers used thousands of vacuum
tubes to function. These machines took up considerable space. The development of the transistor and the
silicon chip produced a revolutionary new approach to computers.

Détente

A relaxation of tension and improved relations between two superpowers;
During the late 1960s and 1970s the United States and Soviet Union, with
roughly equal strength militarily, felt more secure and engaged in a more
peaceful relationship.

By the 1970s, détente allowed U.S. grain and consumer goods to be sold to the Soviet Union. However, détente
collapsed in 1979 when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. A new period of East-West confrontation began.
The Soviet Union wanted to restore a pro-Soviet regime in Afghanistan. The United States viewed this as an act of
expansion. To show his disapproval, President Jimmy Carter canceled U.S. participation in the 1980 Olympic
Games to be held in Moscow. He also placed an embargo on the shipment of U.S. grain to the Soviets. Relations
became even chillier when Ronald Reagan became president. He called the Soviet Union an “evil empire” and
began a military buildup and a new arms race. Regan also gave military aid to the Afghan rebels.
By 1980, the Soviet Union was ailing. It had a declining economy, a rise in infant mortality rates, a dramatic surge
in alcoholism, and poor working conditions. Within the Communist Party, a small group of reformers emerged.
One was Mikhail Gorbachev. When the party chose him as leader in March 1985, a new era began. From the start
Gorbachev preached the need for radical reforms based on perestroika, or restructuring. At first, this meant
restructuring economic policy. Gorbachev wanted to start a market economy more responsive to consumers. It
was to have limited free enterprise so that some businesses would be privately owned and operated.

Richard M. Nixon

President of the United States from 1968 to 1974; Nixon’s conservative politics
won him the support of southern white Americans, and during his presidency
the United States improved is relationship with China. However, Nixon used
illegal methods to gain political information about his opponents and maintain
power.

Richard Nixon’s political career had more ups and downs than a roller coaster ride. Brought up in hard times, he worked his
way through college and law school. After service in the navy during World War II, Nixon was elected to the House of
Representatives in 1946 and then to the Senate in 1950. As Dwight Eisenhower’s running mate in 1952, he became Vice
President with Eisenhower’s victory, Nixon was not yet 40 years old. Then came the defeats. In 1960, Nixon narrowly lost
to John F. Kennedy in the race for the White House. Two years later, Nixon’s career hit bottom when he lost an election to
become governor of California. In 1968, however, Nixon made a dramatic comeback, narrowly defeating Democrat Hubert
Humphrey to win the presidency.
During the campaign for President, Nixon cast himself as the spokesperson for those he called Middle Americans, or the
silent majority. Winning the support of Middle Americans proved a tricky task. Nixon believed that Americans had tired of
the “big” government of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. However, he also believed that the American people still wanted
the government to address various social ills, ranging from crime to pollution. Nixon’s solution was to call for the
establishment of a “new federalism.” As he explained in his 1971 State of the Union address, the nation needed “to reverse
the flow of power and resources from the State and communities to Washington and start power and resources flowing back
from Washington to the States and communities.

Closure Question #1: Do you think it was a wise political move for Nixon to visit
Communist China and the Soviet Union? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Henry Kissinger

A German-born Jewish man, Kissinger and his family immigrated to the U.S. in
1938 at the age of 15 to escape Hitler’s persecution of Jews. Kissinger earned a
Ph.D. at Harvard in 4 years and became Richard Nixon’s leading adviser on
national security and international affairs, becoming Secretary of State in 1973.

Zhou Enlai was the Chinese Premier who worked behind the scenes with Henry Kissinger to iron out sensitive issues in
establishing a peaceful relationship between China and the United States. Zhou and Kissinger’s work culminated in a visit by
President Richard Nixon to China in 1972 and the establishment of full diplomatic relations between the two countries in
1979. As a presidential candidate, Richard Nixon had promised to end U.S. military involvement in the Vietnam War.
Recognizing the potency of Soviet power and the increasing unwillingness of many Americans to pay the costs of containing
communism everywhere, Nixon developed a new approach to the Cold War. His bold program redefined American relations
wit the two titans of global communism, China and the Soviet Union.
During his years in office, Nixon fundamentally reshaped the way the United States approached the world. Before Nixon
took office, most American leaders shared a common Cold War ideology. They stressed that there existed a basic conflict
between democratic capitalist countries and totalitarian, communist ones. They divided the world into “us” and “them”, and
they established policies based on an assumption common held that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Therefore, a
country opposed to communism was, by this definition, a friend of the United States. Nixon and Henry Kissinger altered this
Cold War policy approach. At first glance, Richard Nixon’s partnership with Henry Kissinger seemed improbable. Nixon was
a conservative California Republican, suspicious of the more liberal East Coast Republicans and exhausted with the political
and strategic theories of Ivy League intellectuals. Kissinger was a Harvard-educated Jewish émigré from Germany and a
prominent figure in East Coast intellectual circles. In several prior presidential campaigns, Kissinger had actually worked
against Nixon. However, both men were outsiders equipped with an outsider’s readiness to question accepted orthodoxy.

Closure Question #1: Do you think it was a wise political move for Nixon to visit
Communist China and the Soviet Union? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Watergate

Scandal which culminated in the resignation of President Richard Nixon
in 1974; Nixon ordered members of his reelection committee to break-in
to the Democratic National Headquarters in the Watergate Hotel in
Washington D.C. in 1972 to install wireless listening devices. The
burglars were caught, leading to a 2 year investigation.

25th Amendment – Part of the U.S. Constitution which states that if the Vice-President
resigns, the President must nominate a replacement. V.P. Spiro Agnew resigned in the face of
a corruption scandal in 1973, leading Nixon to nominate Gerald Ford as his new V.P.
Executive Privilege – Principle that the President has the right to keep certain information
confidential; Nixon attempted to use this reasoning in refusing to turn over taped recordings
of his phone calls from the oval office. In United States v. Nixon (1974) the Supreme Court
ruled that Nixon was required to turn over the tapes, which revealed Nixon’s involvement in
Watergate. Rather than face impeachment, Nixon resigned on August 8th, 1974.

Closure Question #2: Did Richard Nixon position the United States to win the Cold
War? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
SALT

Otherwise known as SALT I, the treaty, agreed to by the U.S.
and U.S.S.R. in 1972, froze the deployment of Intercontinental
Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) and placed limits on antiballistic
missiles (ABMs). Though the agreement did not end the arms
race between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., it was a giant step
toward that goal.

Nixon’s trip to the People’s Republic of China prompted an immediate reaction from the Soviet
Union, which had strained relations with both countries. Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev feared that
improved U.S. – Chinese relations would isolate Russia. Therefore, he invited Nixon to visit
Moscow. Nixon made the trip in May 1972. Afterward, the President reported to Congress that he
and Brezhnev had reached agreements in a wide variety of areas. Nixon also announced plans to
conduct a joint U.S.-Soviet space mission.
However, by far the high point of the summit was the signing of the first Strategic Arms Limitation
Treaty. The treaty froze the deployment of intercontinental ballistic missiles and placed limits on
antiballistic missiles, but it did not alter the stockpiling of the more dangerous multiple independent
reentry vehicles. SALT I did not end the arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union,
but it was a giant step toward that goal. Realpolitik (German for “real politics”) was Nixon and
Kissinger’s shared belief that political goals should be defined by concrete nationalist interests
instead of abstract ideologies. Both argued that America needed to move past the Cold War
stereotype of communism vs. democracy as evil vs. good, but instead recognize that communist
nations could prove loyal allies while democratic nations could become enemies.

Closure Question #3: Why did Americans elect Ronald Reagan to the presidency in
1980? (At least 1 sentence)
Ronald Reagan

A movie actor and General Electric spokesperson, Reagan entered politics as a
conservative Republican in the 1960s. After serving two terms as governor of
California, Reagan defeated Jimmy Carter in the election of 1980 and served as
President from 1981 to 1989. Reagan’s 3 key goals were to reduce the size of
government, strengthen the military, and support traditional values.



The growing conservative movement swept Ronald Reagan to victory in the 1980s election. Much more charismatic and polished than Barry
Goldwater, Reagan made clear his opposition to big government, his support for a strong military, and his faith in traditional values. Just as
importantly, he radiated optimism, convincing Americans that he would usher in a new era of prosperity and patriotism. Born in Tampico,
Illinois, in 1911, Reagan suffered the hardships of the Great Depression as a young adult before landing a job in Hollywood as a movie actor.
Never a big star, Reagan appeared in many “B” or low-budget films. His most famous starring role was in Knute Rockne, a film based on the life of
Notre Dame’s legendary football coach.
When his acting career began to wane, Reagan became a spokesperson for General Electric and toured the nation giving speeches. Although once
a staunch New Dealer, Reagan had become a Goldwater conservative. In these speeches he began to criticize big government and high taxes and
warned of the dangers of communism. In 1964, near the end of Goldwater’s presidential campaign, Reagan delivered a nationally televised
address in which he spelled out these views. While the speech failed to bolster Goldwater’s campaign, it won the admiration of many
conservatives. Two years later, Reagan won the governorship of California. He served for two terms as governor and nearly won the Republican
presidential nomination in 1976. In 1980, he won the nomination by a landslide. His opponent was Jimmy Carter, the Democratic incumbent.
As the election approached, Carter looked like a lame duck. Persistent inflation, the Iran hostage crisis, and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan
made it easy for Reagan to cast the Carter presidency in a negative light. “Are you better off than you were four years ago?” Reagan asked
audiences on the campaign trail, knowing that most Americans would say “No.” The race remained close until about one week before the
election, when Reagan and Carter held their only presidential debate. In this debate, Reagan’s gifts as a communicator shone. He appeared
friendly and even-tempered and calmed fears that he did not have enough experience to serve as President. On Election Day, Reagan won 50.6%
of the popular vote.
Closure Assignment #11

1.
2.
3.
Answer the following questions based on what you have
learned from Chapter 33, Section 5:
Do you think it was a wise political move for Nixon to visit
Communist China and the Soviet Union? Why or Why not?
(At least 1 sentence)
Did Richard Nixon position the United States to win the
Cold War? Why or Why not? (At least 1 sentence)
Why did Americans elect Ronald Reagan to the presidency
in 1980? (At least 1 sentence)