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Yalta Conference
Roosevelt (USA), Stalin (USSR) and Churchill (UK) met here to make post-war arrangements: respect democracy throughout Europe (but also recognise a Soviet Sphere of influence in Eastern Europe, an also finalise plans to divide Germany into separate zones of occupation. -
Death of Roosevelt (USA)
Harry S. Truman assumes presidency of USA -
Potsdam Conference
Truman (USA), Stalin (USSR) and Churchill (UK) meet here to discuss the plans established in Yalta Conference, creating a military administration for Germany and agreements to put Nazi leaders on trial for war crimes -
George Kennan writes his Long Telegram
Diplomat George Kennan writes the "Long telegram" from the US embassy in Moscow, supporting a policy of containment, especially in: "It is clear..main element of any United States policy towards the Soviet Union must be...a long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies...that the United States cannot expect in the foreseeable future to enjoy political intimacy with the Soviet regime..continue to regard the Soviet Union as..rival, not a partner" -
Churchill's Iron Curtain speech
Speech is given at a college graduatoon in Fulton, Missouri: "an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe...all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a...high...increasing measure of control from Moscow" -
Truman Doctrine
Truman pledges American assisstance to any nation in th eworld threatened by Communism, establishing the worldwide containment of communism as a vital American natuional security interest. -
Marshall Plan
George Marshall proposes 13 billion foreign aid package designed to help Europe recover from the WW2 devastation -
Berlin Blockade
USA, Britain and France introduces the Deutsche-Mark currency for their 3 zones of occupation in West Germany, Soviets impose the BB, cutting off all rail and road access to the capital city, in the middle of the Soviet zone of East Germany -
Berlin Airlift
USA begins Operation Vittles (11-month Berlin Airlift) --> to bring necessary supplies into the city by plane -
Establishment of COMECON
the Council for Mutual and Economic Cooperation, is formed as a Soviet reponse to the Marshall Plan. The Soviets recognise the popularity of the MP and want to prevent their own satellite nations from supporting the West -
Establishment of NATO
10 Western Europea Nations join USA and Canada to form the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, an anti-military alliance that extebds the deterrent threat of America's nuclear weapons to cover Western Europe -
Warsaw Pact
Soviet Union forms the Warsaw Pact, a Communist military alliance to counter the threat posed by the West's NATO -
NSC-68
American official Paul Nitze issues this National Security Council report predicting a Soviet nuclear attack, thus calling for greater defense spending -
U2 spy plane developed
Americans fly the first U2 spy plane over Moscow (U2 planes to fly at high altitudes, remaining out of range of Soviet weapons and undetectable to Soviet radar