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Cold War Starts
The cold war had no actual known "start," it began after years of tension and disagreement between the USA and the USSR. Americans had long been wary of Soviet communism and concerned about Russian leader Joseph Stalin’s tyrannical, blood-thirsty rule of his own country. The Soviet Union was a threat to all nations in which lead to the cold war; Communism vs. Capitalism. -
Churchill's Iron Curtain Speech
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered his Iron Curtain Speech on March 5, 1946 in which he condemned the Soviet Union in Europe and declared that from Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an Iron Curtain was descended isolating the Soviet Union politically, militarily, and ideologically from other nations in Europe. -
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was an American strategy to aid Western Europe, in which the United States gave over $12 billion in economic support to help rebuild Western European economies after the end of World War ll. -
Berlin Blockade
One of the first major international crisis's of the Cold War was the Berlin Blockade. This was the attempt by the USSR to block road, railway, and canal access from the WEST into their designated sectors of Berlin in which they were aiding to. The United States acted fast sending a massive airlift with food, medicine, and supplies into Berlin 2 days after the blockade began; "One of the greatest logistical efforts in history." -
NATO Founded
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is an intergovernmental military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty. This was an agreement/ alliance that the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations were to provide collective security against the Soviet Union. NATO was the first peacetime military alliance the United States entered into that was outside of the Western Hemisphere. -
Korean War Starts
The start of the Korean war was the invasion of non-Communist South Korea by North Korean Communist army across the 38th parallel. The Americans and the Soviets did not see eye to eye and chose to respectively recognized the governments in their zone as having authority for the whole country in which both withdrew. Still, North Korean forces invaded the south with Stalin's foreknowledge and approval pushing American forces, with President Truman's command, to fight back. -
Rosenberg Trial
The Rosenberg trial was a court case involving Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, an American couple accused of being spies for the Soviet Union who were executed in 1953. -
Hydrogen Bomb Exploded in Pacific
The hydrogen bomb exploded in the pacific was the worlds first thermonuclear weapon and was detonated on Eniwetok atoll in the Pacific. This new weapon was approximately 1,000 times more powerful than conventional nuclear devices which gave the United Sates a short-lived advantage to the nuclear arms race against the Soviet Union. One year later the USSR acquired the same technology and built a hydrogen bomb as well, causing the nuclear arms race to take a huge step forward. -
Stalin Dies
Joseph Stalin died at 73 years of age do to a cerebral hemorrhage and changed the face of communism in the East forever. This lead to a temporary thaw in Cold War tensions because Stalin was a major reason for the war and caused many problems. Without Stalin the USSR was lost and Georgi Malenkov took over and was named premier and first secretary transition, however, competed for power w Malenkov and Nikita Khruschev. -
Khrushchev becomes Soviet Premier
Six months after the death of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev became the first secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. -
Warsaw Pact Formed
The Warsaw Pact was a mutual defense organization that put the Soviets in command of the armed forces of the member states in which the Soviet Union and seven of its European satellites signed off on in agreement. The pact included the Soviet Union, Albania, Poland, Romania, Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Bulgaria as members. The Warsaw Pact was created in response to the threatening NATO. -
Suez Canal Crisis
After Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the Suez canal in July 1956 initiating the Suez Crisis, Israeli armed forces pushed into Egypt toward the Suez Canal. The Israelis soon were joined by French and British forces, which nearly brought the Soviet Union into the conflict, and damaged their relationships with the United States. -
Sputnik Launched
The world's first artificial satellite made by the Soviet Union launched on October 4, 1957 and was about the size of a beach ball. Sputnik took about 98 minutes to orbit the Earth on its elliptical path and changed history. Sputnik transmitted radio signals back to Earth strong enough to be picked up by amateur radio operators and those in the US with access to such equipment tuned in and listened in awe as the beeping Soviet spacecraft passed over America several times a day. -
Explorer 1 Launched
Explorer 1 was launched as part of the United Sates participation in the International Geophysical Year and was the first satellite of the U.S. -
Khrushchev Visits the United States
September 25, 1959 Nikita Khrushchev became the first Soviet Leader to visit the United States and meet with a U.S. president. He met with President Dwight Eisenhower at Camp David and observed American culture and ways. -
U-2 Incident
The U-2 Incident happened when a U.S. spy plane was shot down while in Soviet Airspace, and the pilot, Francis Gary Powers, was captured and forced to admit to the USSR that the United Sates had been flying spy planes in soviet airspace for several years. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison, but was released after only 2 years in exchange for a captured Soviet agent in the first U.S.-USSR "spy swap." This is a big deal because it brought nations together to discuss important problems. -
Bay of Pigs
The Bay of Pigs was an unsuccessful invasion of Cuba by Cuban Exiles, an armed force of about 1,500 landed in the Bahía de Cochinos on the South coast of Cuba. The plan was to overthrow Fidel Castro and his revolution, but instead, it turned into a humiliating defeat which pushed Cuba into the arms of the Soviet Union and has soured US-Cuban relations to this day. -
Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall was constructed over night, separating East and West Berlin. Eastern Berlin citizens were forbidden to go into Communist West Berlin in order to isolate the thriving communist city from anything that could distract them from being communist. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
The Cuban Missile Crisis was a confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States regarding the presence of missile sites in Cuba. This was the closest the United States or even the world, had/ has ever gotten to total nuclear war which would have resulted in tens of millions of casualties all across the world. October 14, 1962-October 28, 1962 -
Kennedy's Assassination
John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas on November 23, 1963. From the time he was elected to the time he was assassinated he was deeply involved with the cold war, and his assassination changed the world. He created the Civil Rights act, in which was passed after his death as an act of honor, and his passing aided to the election of President Lyndon Johnson who supported and honored Kennedy's Civil Rights act, Space Program, and slowing the spread of communism.
