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Yalta Conference
The Yalta Conference was a meeting of British prime minister Winston Churchill, Soviet premier Joseph Stalin, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt early in February 1945 as World War II was winding down. -
Soviet Union's Atomic Bomb
At a remote test site at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, the USSR successfully detonates its first atomic bomb, code name “First Lightning -
North Korea and The United States
U.S. and other U.N. members fight North Korean forces. -
Red Army crushes the Hungarian Revolution
Following nearly two weeks of protest and political instability in Hungary, Soviet tanks and troops viciously crush the protests. Thousands were killed and wounded, and nearly a quarter-million Hungarians fled the country. -
Soviets launch first man‑made satellite
The Sputnik launch changed everything. As a technical achievement, Sputnik caught the world's attention and the American public off-guard. -
Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba
On April 17, 1961, 1400 Cuban exiles launched what became a botched invasion at the Bay of Pigs on the south coast of Cuba. In 1959, Fidel Castro came to power in an armed revolt that overthrew Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista. -
Berlin Wall
Two 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. -
China's Atomic Bomb
The atomic test also concerned the Soviet Union; the split between the USSR and communist China over ideological and strategic issues had widened considerably by 1964. The Chinese acquisition of nuclear capabilities only heightened the tensions between the two nations. -
Sino‑Soviet Conflict begins
The Sino-Soviet border conflict was a seven-month undeclared military conflict between the Soviet Union and China at the height of the Sino-Soviet split in 1969. The most serious of these border clashes—which brought the two communist-lead countries to the brink of war—occurred in March 1969 in the vicinity of Zhenbao Island on the Ussuri River, also known as Damanskii Island in Russia. Chinese historians most commonly refer to the conflict as the Zhenbao Island -
Chilean Governement Overthrown
The 1973 Chilean coup d'état was a watershed event in both the history of Chile and the Cold War. Following an extended period of social and political unrest between the center-right dominated Congress of Chile and the elected socialist President Salvador Allende, as well as economic warfare ordered by US President Richard Nixon, Allende was overthrown by the armed forces and national police. -
South Vietnam falls to Communist forces
By dawn, communist forces move into Saigon, where they meet only sporadic resistance. The South Vietnamese forces had collapsed under the rapid advancement of the North Vietnamese. The most recent fighting had begun in December 1974, when the North Vietnamese had launched a major attack against the lightly defended province of Phuoc Long, located due north of Saigon along the Cambodian border, overrunning the provincial capital at Phuoc Binh on January 6, 1975. -
U.S. invades Grenada
the invasion resulted in that resulted in a U.S. victory within a matter of weeks. Triggered by the house arrest on 12 October 1983 and murder of the leader (19 October 1983) of the coup which had brought a revolutionary government to power for the preceding four years, the invasion resulted in the appointment of an interim government, followed by democratic elections in 1984. -
George Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev
On December 25, 1991, U.S. president George Bush (1924–; served 1989–1993) proclaimed the end of the Cold War, calling the occasion a "victory for democracy and freedom." Bush credited Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev (1931–) for his "intellect, vision, and courage" in ending the rivalry and seeking much-needed economic and political reforms as the Soviet Union's empire dwindled -
Hard-line Communists stage unsuccessful coup against Mikhail Gorbachev.
Hard-line elements of the Soviet government and military begin a coup attempt against President Mikhail Gorbachev. The coup attempt signified a decline in Gorbachev’s power and influence, while one of his most ardent opponents, Boris Yeltsin, came out of the event with more power than ever. -
Soviet Union Break Up
For most western commentators the Soviet breakup was an unambiguously positive turning point in Russian and world history. It quickly became the defining moment in a new American triumphalist narrative,
