Transcript President Dwight D. Eisenhower 1952-1960

President Dwight D. Eisenhower
1952-1960
What were the Cold War fears faced
by the American People, and how
successfully did the Eisenhower
Presidency address them?
Communist Fears @ Home
•Soviets detonate their
first atomic bomb…..
•The question is raised,
where did they get the
technology the bomb?
•Ethel and Julius
Rosenberg would be
accused of giving away
atomic bomb secrets.
•Charged with
espionage they would
be found guilty and
executed in 1953.
NATO
•House Committee
for Un-American
Activities
red scare3
McCarran Act
Internal Security Act
of 1950
All communists were
to register and
groups to give lists of
members
•1950–77,
Congress and FBI
investigated
Americans
suspected as
communists
•HUAC committee warned of civil rights violations.
•Witnesses who refused to answer were cited for contempt of
Congress.
red scare3
Alger Hiss
Whitaker Chambers
Richard Nixon
•In 1948, Whittaker Chambers made accusations of Soviet espionage against
former State Dept. official Alger Hiss
•Hiss found guilty of spying & sentenced to 10 yrs in prison
•Richard Nixon, Congressmen from California was part of the HUAC that
investigated Alger Hiss.
red scare3
•1947 investigation led to prison sentences for
contempt known as the Hollywood Ten.
•Blacklisted: a list of persons who are under suspicion, disfavor, or
censure, or who are not to be hired, served, or otherwise accepted.
•Red Scare was Americans
response to the fear of
Communism
•Senator Joseph McCarthy
accused 205 US Govt. officials
of being Communist.
•McCarthyism to destroy or
assassinate one’s character
without proof and it ruined the
careers of many Americans.
Became a witch hunt that led to Americans
pledging a “loyalty oath” to the United States…….
red scare
Communist Fears Abroad
Containment Policy
•Developed by State Department assistant, George
Keenan, NSC-68
•Argued that the SU was trying to do two things:
defeat capitalism, & expand the Soviet sphere of
influence.
•US would stand firm, restrict and halt Soviet and
Communist expansion.
•How? Help countries who were threatened by Communism with
financial and economic assistance, propaganda, politically and
militarily.
•Adopted by President Truman in 1946.
•Opposite of Appeasement…..
•Confront dictators
1946
• March
• Churchill’s Iron curtain speech
Mao Tse Tung
•Mao Tse Tung, defeats Chang Kai
Shek in the Chinese Civil War…..
•China became a communistic country.
•Chang Kai Shak is exiled to Taiwan.
•Mao Tse Tung becomes the
Communistic leader of China.
•US believed there was a communistic
plot to rule the world
NATO
Chang Kai Shek
•1950 to 1953, North
Korea invades South
Korea.
•North Korea was a
communist nation and
South Korea was a
democracy.
•First war of
“containment” policy to
stop communism
•“Police Action” not a
declared war
•President Truman leads
United Nations.
•General Douglas
MacArthur commands US
and UN troops.
•Called “forgotten war”.
Berlin Blockade & Airlift
June 24, 1948 – May 12, 1949
• immediate cause of the blockade was
the introduction of a new currency to
the Western zones
• the real issue was the reunification of
Germany
• especially vulnerable-deep within the
Soviet zone
Background
to the War
 The French lost control to
Ho Chi Minh’s Viet Minh
forces in 1954 at Dien Bien
Phu
 President Eisenhower declined to
intervene on behalf of France.
Formation of NATO
• Europeans became increasingly wary of
Soviet intentions after the Berlin Blockade
• April 4th, 1949 the NATO treaty was signed.
• The United States, Canada, Britain, France,
Belgium, Denmark, Iceland, Italy, Norway,
Portugal and the Netherlands signed.
• Greece and Turkey joined in 1952 and West
Germany in 1955.
Nukes and the Space Race
•1949
•Soviets detonate their
first atomic bomb…..
•1950
•Soviets detonate their
first Hydrogen bomb
NATO
Sputnik I (1957)
The Russians have beaten America in
space—they have the technological edge!
1957 Russians launch SPUTNIK I
Facts on Sputnik
•Aluminum sphere, 23 inches in diameter
weighing 184 pounds with four steel antennae
emitting radio signals.
•Launched Oct. 4, 1957
•Stayed in orbit 92 days, until Jan. 4, 1958
1957 Russians launch SPUTNIK I
Effects on the
United States
•Americans fear a
Soviet attack with
missile technology
•Americans resolved to regain technological
superiority over the Soviet Union
•In July 1958, President Eisenhower created
NASA or National Space and Aeronautics
Agency
Effects of Sputnik on United States
Atomic Anxieties:
•“Duck-and-Cover Generation”
Atomic Testing:
•Between July 16, 1945 and Sept. 23, 1992, the
United States conducted 1,054 official nuclear tests,
most of them at the Nevada Test Site.
Americans began building
underground bomb shelters
and cities had underground
fallout shelters.
Missile Gap
• the presumed strategic disparity between the Soviet Union
and the United States believed to have been created by the
USSR's technological achievements in the late 1950s.
• The missile gap became an important political issue, with
critics charging that President Dwight D. Eisenhower had
allowed the Soviets to gain a dangerous military advantage
over the United States by refusing to spend enough money on
missile programs.
• The missile gap was a myth. Eisenhower had explained that
there was no gap, but many doubted the president's claims.
• Concerns over the missile gap did not recede until after
October 1961, when members of the Kennedy administration
declared that the United States possessed overwhelming
military strength.
Economic Concerns
• Agricultural overproduction, low prices
• Older industrial areas decline
• 1957-1958--recession slows decade’s
economic growth
Eisenhowers Responses
Communist Fears @ Home
• Ike was privately critical but did little to
destroy McCarthy
• Republicans used McCarthy in 1952
election
• McCarthy brought himself down
• Continued loyalty program
Communist Fears Abroad
“Brinksmanship”
[John Foster Dulles]
Eisenhower & Dulles
1.
Mutual security
agreements.
2.
Massive retaliation.
3.
M. A. D.
4.
“Domino Theory”
5.
CIA & covert operations
6.
Eisenhower Doctrine
• Stalin’s Death (1953)
– Khrushchev (1956): “peaceful
coexistence”
•
•
•
•
Hungarian Revolt (1956)
Suez Canal Crisis (1956 to 57)
Sputnik (1957)
Second Berlin Crisis (1958)
– Khrushchev: “We will bury capitalism”
• U-2 Incident (1960)
• Support for Castro in Cuba (1959)
The Suez Crisis: 1956-1957
Cold War continues with propaganda
radio broadcasts
Cold War continues with the Soviets also
using propaganda radio broadcasts
•Mad Magazine makes fun of the Cold War with
their Spy vs. Spy column.
•CIA vs. KGB
The Hungarian Uprising: 1956
Imre Nagy, Hungarian
Prime Minister
}
Promised free
elections.
}
This could lead to the
end of communist rule
in Hungary.
U-2 Spy Incident (1960)
Col. Francis Gary
Powers’ plane was
shot down over Soviet
airspace.
•U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower admitted on May 7 that the unarmed
reconnaissance aircraft was indeed on a spy mission.
•In response, Khrushchev cancelled a long-awaited summit meeting in Paris,
•Powers was sentenced to ten years in a Soviet prison for his confessed espionage.
•year-and-a-half later, on February 10, 1962, the Soviets released him in exchange
for Rudolph Abel,
•Led to the Berlin Wall being built and the Cold War “heating up again”
Ikes Responses
• Ike moderate support for space race
• Huge impact of Sputnik forced hand
• Federal program to build bomb
shelters/ Duck and Cover program for
schools
• US supplying missiles to Britain and
NATO allies
• NASA (1958) and Explorer I
• MAD . Mutually Assured Destruction
Responses to the Economy
Domestic Policy
Balanced, moderate
“Bland leading the bland”
Overall, a time of prosperity
New Deal a part of modern life
Expands farm aid, Social Security, housing,
health services
Highway Act of 1956
42,000 miles of interstate highways linking
major cities
Improve national defense
Good for jobs, trucking
Bad for the poor, public transportation
Eisenhower's Farewell Address
• We now stand ten years past the midpoint of a
century that has witnessed four major wars among
great nations. Three of these involved our own
country. Despite these holocausts America is today
the strongest, the most influential and most
productive nation in the world. Understandably
proud of this pre-eminence, we yet realize that
America's leadership and prestige depend, not
merely upon our unmatched material progress,
riches and military strength, but on how we use our
power in the interests of world peace and human
betterment.
Eisenhower's Farewell Address
• A vital element in
keeping the peace is
our military
establishment. Our
arms must be mighty,
ready for instant
action, so that no
potential aggressor
may be tempted to risk
his own destruction.
Eisenhower's Farewell Address
• American makers of
plowshares could, with time
and as required, make
swords as well. But now we
can no longer risk
emergency improvisation of
national defense; we have
been compelled to create
a permanent armaments
industry of vast proportions.
Eisenhower's Farewell Address
• In the councils of government, we
must guard against the acquisition of
unwarranted influence, whether
sought or unsought, by the militaryindustrial complex. The potential for
the disastrous rise of misplaced power
exists and will persist.
Eisenhower's Farewell Address
• As we peer into society's future, we – you
and I, and our government – must avoid the
impulse to live only for today, plundering for,
for our own ease and convenience, the
precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot
mortgage the material assets of our
grandchildren without asking the loss also of
their political and spiritual heritage. We want
democracy to survive for all generations to
come, not to become the insolvent
phantom of tomorrow.
• We pray that peoples of all faiths, all
races, all nations, may have their great
human needs satisfied; that those now
denied opportunity shall come to
enjoy it to the full; that all who yearn
for freedom may experience its
spiritual blessings; that those who have
freedom will understand, also, its
heavy responsibilities …
• all peoples will
come to live
together in a peace
guaranteed by the
binding force of
mutual respect and
love.
• Now, on Friday
noon, I am to
become a private
citizen. I am proud
to do so. I look
forward to it.
• Thank you, and
good night.
Death DBQ
• You will have one hour to complete
this DBQ.