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Yalta Conference
SourceIt was the second meeting between the world's three superpowers; the Soviet Union's leader Joseph Stalin, British prime-minister Winston Churchill and the American presidnet Franklin D. Roosevelt. During the Conference they discussed about the tactices and strategies the will be used to make Nazi Germany surrender. Also Stalin agreed to permit free elections in Eastern Europe and to enter the Asian war against Japan. -
Berlin Airlift
SourceThe Berlin Blockade (1 April 1948 – 12 May 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under Western control. -
Berlin Declaration
SourceThe declaration confirmed the division of Allied-occupied Germany according to the Yalta Conference and the continued existence of the German Reich as a whole, which would include its eastern territories as of 31 December 1937.Upon the implementation of the Oder-Neisse line in the course of the Potsdam Agreement on 2 August 1945, the eastern territories came under Polish and Soviet (Kaliningrad Oblast) administration. -
Potsdam Conference
SourceIt was the last of the World War II meetings held by the “Big Three”. American President Harry S. Truman, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin, the talks established a Council of Foreign Ministers and a central Allied Control Council for administration of Germany. -
North Vietnam
Souce
British forces arrive in Saigon, South Vietnam. In North Vietnam, 150,000 Chinese Nationalist soldiers, consisting mainly of poor peasants, arrive in Hanoi after looting Vietnamese villages during their entire march down from China. They then proceed to loot Hanoi. The National Liberation Front is established by Hanoi as its Communist political organization for Viet Cong guerrillas in South Vietnam. -
Iron Curtain Speech
Source.In this speech, Churchill gave the very descriptive phrase that surprised the United States and Britain, "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent." Before this speech, the U.S. and Britain had been concerned with their own post-war economies and had remained extremely grateful for the Soviet Union. -
First Indochina War
SourceThe First Indochina War, fought, was a struggle between the Viet Minh and the French for control of the country. In the West this conflict is usually referred to as the First Indochina War; in Vietnam it is called the Anti-French War.the French had 50,000 troops in Vietnam and had regained control of Saigon. In November, French naval vessels bombarded the northern port city of Haiphong, killing large numbers of civilians. -
Containment Policy
SourceThe article's author, George Kennan, who set up the U.S. embassy in Moscow in 1943, called on the United States to take steps to prevent Soviet expansion. He was convinced that if the Soviet Union failed to expand, its social system would eventually break down. The U.S. proposed a program of direct economic aid. -
Marshall Plan
Source. The Marshall Plan, also known as the European Recovery Program, channeled over $13 billion to finance the economic recovery of Europe between 1948 and 1951.The Marshall Plan successfully sparked economic recovery, meeting its objective of ‘restoring the confidence of the European people in the economic future of their own countries and of Europe as a whole.This reorganization provided more environment for investmens. -
Berlin Blockade
Source. The Berlin Blockade was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. During the multinational occupation of post–World War II Germany, the Soviet Union blocked the Western Allies' railway, road, and canal access to the sectors of Berlin under Western control.By September, the airlift was carrying 4,500 tons of supplies a day. -
Berlin Airlift
SourceOutraged by Western plans to create an independent West Germany, Soviet forces imposed a blockade cutting off rail, highway, and water traffic between West Germany and West Berlin.Over the next 11 months, 277,000 flights brought in 2.5 million tons of supplies until the Soviet Union lifted the blockade. -
NATO
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created in 1949 by the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations to provide collective security against the Soviet Union. The U.S. stationed troops in Western Europe, assuring its Allies that it would use its nuclear deterrent to protect Western Europeans against a Soviet attack.The admission of West Germany into NATO in 1955 led the Soviet Union and its Eastern European satellites to form a competing military alliance called the Wars. -
Soviet Union tests A-Bomb
SourceThe USSR successfully detonates its first atomic bomb, code name “First Lightning.” In order to measure the effects of the blast, the Soviet scientists constructed buildings, bridges, and other civilian structures in the vicinity of the bomb.They also placed animals in cages nearby so that they could test the effects of nuclear radiation on human-like mammals. The atomic explosion, which at 20 kilotons was roughly equal to “Trinity,” destroyed those structures and incinerated the animals. -
Korean War - American involvement
SourceNorth Korean forces surprised the South Korean army (and the small U.S. force stationed in the country), and quickly headed toward the capital city of Seoul. The United States responded by pushing a resolution through the U.N.’s Security Council calling for military assistance to South Korea.The cease-fire agreement also resulted in the continued division of North and South Korea at just about the same geographical point as before the conflict. -
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
Source Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, a married couple convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage in 1951, are put to death in the electric chair. Ethel in August of that same year, on the charge of conspiracy to commit espionage.Both refused to admit any wrongdoing and proclaimed their innocence right up to the time of their deaths. -
Nikita Khrushchev
Source Six months after the death of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev succeeds him with his election as first secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Khrushchev denounced Stalin and his totalitarian policies at the 20th Party Congress. The Cuban Missile Crisis came to an end when he agreed to withdraw the offensive weapons in exchange for a secret U.S pledge not to invade Cuba. -
Eisenhower Presidency
SourceBringing to the Presidency his prestige as commanding general of the victorious forces in Europe during World War II, Dwight D. Eisenhower obtained a truce in Korea and worked incessantly during his two terms to ease the tensions of the Cold War. Eisenhower concentrated on maintaining world peace.he urged the necessity of maintaining an adequate military strength, but cautioned that vast, long-continued military expenditures could breed potential dangers to our way of life. -
Warsaw Pact
Source The Soviet Union and seven of its European satellites sign a treaty establishing the Warsaw Pact, a mutual defense organization that put the Soviets in command of the armed forces of the member states.The Warsaw Pact included the Soviet Union, Albania, Poland, Romania, Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria as members. The Soviets saw NATO as a direct threat and responded with the Warsaw Pact. -
Sputnik
SourceFirst Sputnik was about the size of a beach ball took about 98 minutes to orbit the Earth on its elliptical path by the Soviets. Officially, Sputnik was launched to correspond with the International Geophysical Year, a solar period that the International Council of Scientific Unions declared would be ideal for the launching of artificial satellites to study Earth and the solar system. Sputnik transmitted radio signals back to Earth strong enough to be picked up by amateur radio operators. -
Cuban Revolution
Source Tens of thousands of Cubans (and thousands of Cuban-Americans in the United States) joyously celebrated the end of the dictator’s regime. Castro’s supporters moved quickly to establish their power. Judge Manuel Urrutia was named as provisional president. Castro and his band of guerrilla fighters triumphantly entered Havana on January 7. -
U2 Incident
SourceAn American U-2 spy plane is shot down while conducting espionage over the Soviet Union. The incident derailed an important summit meeting between President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev that was scheduled for later that month.On May 16, a major summit between the United States, the Soviet Union, Great Britain, and France began in Paris. -
Kennedy Presidency
SourceKennedy responded by portraying foreign policy during the Eisenhower years as stagnant and reactionary. Kennedy promised to reinvigorate America’s foreign policy, relying on a flexible response to changing situations and exploring options..Kennedy claimed that he looked forward to meeting the challenges facing the strongest nation in the Free World. During the first few months of the Kennedy presidency, Nixon’s criticisms seemed to have some validity. -
Bay of Pigs
SourceThe Bay of Pigs invasion begins when a CIA-financed and -trained group of Cuban refugees lands in Cuba and attempts to topple the communist government of Fidel Castro. Around 1,200 exiles, armed with American weapons and using American landing craft, waded ashore at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba. The failure at the Bay of Pigs cost the United States dearly. Over 100 of the attackers were killed, and more than 1,100 were captured. -
Berlin Wall
Source wo days after sealing off free passage between East and West Berlin with barbed wire, East German authorities begin building a wall–the Berlin Wall–to permanently close off access to the West. About 5,000 East Germans managed to escape across the Berlin Wall to the West, but the frequency of successful escapes dwindled as the wall was increasingly fortified. East German border guards opened the borders. -
JFK Assassination
John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, is assassinated while traveling through Dallas, Texas, in an open-top convertible. The official Warren Commission report of 1964 concluded that neither Oswald nor Ruby were part of a larger conspiracy, either domestic or international, to assassinate President Kennedy.The committee’s findings, as with those of the Warren Commission, continue to be widely disputed. -
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
SourceThe Gulf of Tonkin Resolution gave broad congressional approval for expansion of the Vietnam War. During the spring of 1964, military planners had developed a detailed design for major attacks on the North, but at that time President Lyndon B. Johnson and his advisers feared that the public would not support an expansion of the war. By summer, however, rebel forces had established control over nearly half of South Vietnam, and Senator Barry Goldwater, the Republican nominee for president. -
Vietnam War - American Involvement
SourceThe Vietnam War pitted America against communism and was a classic example of Cold War conflict. The western allies had been victorious in Berlin, but communism had taken root in China. American involvement in Vietnam was at its peak from 1965 to 1969 when a maximum of 500,000 American troops were in Vietnam. A number of the front line troops were conscripts and not professional troops. The war had cost her one billion dollars a day at its peak; she had dropped 7 million tons of bombs. -
SALT I
Sourcehe United States learned that the Soviet Union had embarked upon a massive Intercontinental Ballistic Missile (ICBM) buildup designed to reach parity with the United States. The development of an ABM system could allow one side to launch a first strike and then prevent the other from retaliating by shooting down incoming missiles. Johnson therefore called for strategic arms limitations talks (SALT), and in 1967, he and Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin met at Glassboro State College in New Jersey. -
Nixon Presidency
SourceRichard Nixon was elected the 37th President of the United States after previously serving as a U.S. Representative and a U.S. Senator from California. After successfully ending American fighting in Vietnam and improving international relations with the U.S.S.R. and China, he became the only President to ever resign the office, as a result of the Watergate scandal.His accomplishments while in office included revenue sharing, the end of the draft,anticrime laws, and a broad environmental program. -
Apollo 11
SourceThe primary objective of Apollo 11 was to complete a national goal set by President John F. Kennedy: perform a crewed lunar landing and return to Earth. Additional flight objectives included scientific exploration by the lunar module, or LM, crew; deployment of a television camera to transmit signals to Earth; and deployment of a solar wind composition experiment, seismic experiment package and a Laser Ranging Retroreflector. Apollo 11 landed 13 degrees,19 minutes north latitude and 169 degrees. -
Nixon Visits China
SourceOn his visit to China, Nixon met with Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai. The two leaders agreed to expand cultural contacts between their two nations. Nixon also established plans for a permanent U.S. trade mission in China.The U.S. had become first interested in having political and economic ties with China in the 19th century. -
SALT II
SourceAmidst the Cold War, a series of treaties was issued under the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty to curtail the build up of nuclear weapons.In late 1972, negotiations began for SALT II and continued for seven years. Finally on June 18, 1979, in Vienna, Brezhnev and President Jimmy Carter signed the SALT II treaty.Tensions continued up until the end of the Cold War, but war never broke out again and the race to stockpile weapons finally ended in the early 1990’s. -
Détente
SourceDétente is the name given to a period of improved relations between the United States and the Soviet Union that began tentatively in 1971 and took decisive form when President Richard M. Nixon visited the secretary-general of the Soviet Communist party, Leonid I. Brezhnev, in Moscow. Both countries stood to gain if trade could be increased and the danger of nuclear warfare reduced.With the election of Ronald Reagan, détente as Nixon had envisioned it came to an end. -
Yom Kippur War
SourceOn Yom Kipor War Egyptian and Syrian military forces launched an attack knowing that the military of Israel would be participating in the religious celebrations associated with Yom Kippur. Therefore, their guard would temporarily be dropped.The combined forces of Egypt and Syria totalled the same number of men as NATO had in Western Europe. On the Golan Heights alone, 150 Israeli tanks faced 1,400 Syria tanks and in the Suez region just 500 Israeli soldiers faced 80,000 Egyptian soldiers. -
Fall of Saigon
SourceAfter many years of brutal fighting in Vietnam and the continued lack of public support in the U.S. along with a multitude of other domestic issues, President Richard Nixon was ready to negotiate peace in Vietnam. The peace accords in 1973 called a ceasefire and put in place provisions for the protection of the freedom of South Vietnam.The troops cornered South Vietnam’s last president Duong Van Minh and he told his captives that he wanted to surrender. -
Korean Air Lines Flight 007
SourceSoviet jet fighters intercept a Korean Airlines passenger flight in Russian airspace and shoot the plane down, killing 269 passengers and crewmembers. The incident dramatically increased tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States. As it approached its final destination, the plane began to veer far off its normal course. In just a short time, the plane flew into Russian airspace and crossed over the Kamchatka Peninsula. -
Reagan and Gorbachev meet
SourceFor the first time in eight years, the leaders of the Soviet Union and the United States hold a summit conference. Meeting in Geneva, President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev produced no earth-shattering agreements. For Gorbachev, the meeting was another clear signal of his desire to obtain better relations with the United States so that he could better pursue his domestic reforms.Little of substance was accomplished. -
Reykjavik Summit
SourceHalfway between Moscow and Washington,D.C.,the leaders of the world’s two superpowers met at the stark and pictures of Hofdi House in Reykjavik,Iceland.Secretary General Mikhail Gorbachev had proposed the meeting to President Ronald Reagan less than thirty days before. Gorbachev agreed that human rights issues were a legitimate topic of discussion.None of this progress would have been possible without the courage of two leaders to look beyond past hostilities and forge new and lasting relations. -
Tiananmen Square Massacre
SourceChinese troops storm through Tiananmen Square in the center of Beijing, killing and arresting thousands of pro-democracy protesters. The brutal Chinese government assault on the protesters shocked the West and brought denunciations and sanctions from the United States. A little more than three weeks later, the U.S. Congress voted to impose economic sanctions against the People’s Republic of China in response to the brutal violation of human rights. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
SourceOn midnight of that day, East Germany's Communist rulers gave permission for gates along the Wall to be opened as a result of days of mass protest. After decades of partition, East Berliners surged through cheering and shouting and were greeted by West Berliners on the other side. Ecstatic crowds immediately began to climb on top of the Wall and destroy segments of the concrete fort. -
Gulf War
SourceIraqi leader Saddam Hussein accused Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates of flooding the world oil market. Specifically, he accused Kuwait for stealing oil from a disputed supply, the Rumaila oil field which ran beneath both countries, and thus waging "economic war" against Iraq.The Gulf reunited the American people and the military, helping to mend the wounds from the Vietnam War. Returning service members were welcomed back and faith in the military's effectiveness was restored. -
Dissolution of the Soviet Union
SourceThe disintegration of the Soviet Union began on the peripheries, in the non-Russian areas. The first region to produce mass, organized dissent was the Baltic region, where, in 1987, the government of Estonia demanded autonomy. This move was later followed by similar moves in Lithuania and Latvia, the other two Baltic republics.Massive demonstrations were held in Armenia in solidarity with the secessionists in Nagorno-Karabagh. the situation developed into a violent territorial dispute and war.
