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Yalta Conference
This was the final meeting of Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin. The “Big Three” Allied leaders discussed the post-war fate of Germany and the rest of Europe, Soviet entry into the ongoing war in the Pacific against Japan, and the formation of the new United Nations. Later, many promises were broken and the conference caused controversy. -
Nuremberg War Crimes Trial
Allies joined in trying twenty-two top Nazi leaders for war crimes. Justice Nuremberg-style was extremely harsh. Lasted from November 20, 1945 to October 1, 1946. -
Operation Dixie
The CIO‘s Operation Dixie aimed at unionizing southern textile workers and steel workers. It failed miserably in 1948 to overcome white workers’ lingering fears of racial mixing. Anti-communist purges removed from laboring some of its most active organizers and the workers in the rapidly growing service sector of the economy proved much more difficult to organize. -
Truman Doctrine
This doctrine was an American American foreign policy whose purpose was to contain Soviet expansion during the Cold War. Truman told Congress that "it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures." -
Taft-Hartley Act
This act outlawed “closed” (all union) shop, made unions liable for damages that resulted from jurisdictional disputes among themselves, and required union leaders to take a non-communist oath. -
National Security Act
The National Security Act of 1947 mandated a major reorganization of the foreign policy and military establishments of the U.S. Government. The act created many institutions including the National Security Council (NSC), Department of Defense, and the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). -
Selective Service System
Congress resurrected the military draft, providing for the conscription of selected young men from 19 to 25 years of age. This draft shaped millions of young peoples educational, marital, and career plans of the following quarter-century. -
Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was a U.S. program providing aid to Western Europe following the devastation of World War II. It provided more than $15 billion to help finance rebuilding efforts on the continent. U.S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall crafted it as a four-year plan to reconstruct cities, industries, and infrastructure heavily damaged during the war and to remove trade barriers between European neighbors. It also fostered commerce between those countries and the United States. -
Berlin Blockade and Airlift
The Berlin Blockade (June 24, 1948 to May 12, 1949) was one of the first major international crises of the Cold War. The Soviets choked off all railways, highways, and canal access into Berlin. The Americans organized a massive airlift (June 26, 1948 to September 30, 1949) of food, water, and medicine to the citizens of the city. -
Executive Order 9981
Truman issued this executive order to abolish segregation in the armed forces and order full integration of all the services. Executive Order 9981 stated that "there shall be equality of treatment and opportunity for all persons in the armed forces without regard to race, color, religion, or national origin." The order also established an advisory committee to examine the rules, practices, and procedures of the armed services and recommend ways to make desegregation a reality. -
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created in 1949 by the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations to provide security for each other against the Soviet Union. It marked a departure from American diplomatic prevention, a boost for European unification, and a significant step in the militarization of the Cold War. -
First Development of the H-bomb
Truman ordered the development of the H-bomb to outpace the Soviets in nuclear weaponry. This hydrogen bomb was a city smashing thermal nuclear weapon that was 1000 times more powerful than the atomic bomb -
The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)
Established in 1938 to investigate “subversion.” In 1948 committee member Richard Nixon led the chase after Alger Hiss, a prominent ex-New Dealer and a distinguished member of the eastern establishment. Accused of being communist agent in the 1930s, he demanded the right to defend himself. He met his chief accuser before HUAC in August 1948. He denied everything but was caught in embarrassing falsehoods, convicted of perjury in 1950, and sentenced to five years in prison. -
NSC-68
The National Security Council Memorandum Number 68 was one of the most important American policy statements of the Cold War. NSC-68 advocated a large expansion in the military budget of the United States, the development of a hydrogen bomb, and increased military aid to allies of the United States. It made the rollback of global Communist expansion a high priority. -
Korean War
Korean War was a war between North Korea and South Korea that started when North Korea invaded South Korea. The U.S. provided 88% of the U.N. contingents to aid South Korea. -
Dennis v. United States
In 1949, eleven Communists were brought before a New York jury for violating the Smith Act of 1940, the first peacetime anti-sedition law since 1798. Convicted of advocating the overthrow of the American government by force, the defendants were sent to prison. Their convictions were held in the Supreme Court case. -
Army-McCarthy Hearings
The Army-McCarthy hearings were a series of hearings in the spring of 1954 held by the United States Senate's Subcommittee on Investigations to investigate conflicting accusations between the United States Army and U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy. The Senate formally condemned McCarthy for “conduct unbecoming a member.” -
Vietnam War
The Vietnam War was fought between communist North Vietnam and the Viet Cong against South Vietnam and the United States. The conflict was intensified from the Cold War. The war ended in April 1975 after U.S. forces withdrew in 1973 and Vietnam unified under Communist control two years later. -
Federal Highway Act of 1956
This act authorized a $27 billion plan to build 42,000 miles of motor ways. The president believed that the roads were essential to national defense, allowing US troops to mobilize everywhere in the country in the event of a Soviet invasion. -
Bay of Pigs Invasion
President Kennedy had inherited a CIA-backed scheme to topple Fidel Castro from power by invading Cuba with anti-communist exiles. About 1,400 exiles landed at Cuba’s Bay of Pigs but it was a failed attacked as they were badly outnumbered. -
Berlin Wall
This wall separated East and West Berlin and stood for nearly 30 years as a hated symbol of the division of Europe into a democratic and communist camps. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
The Cuban Missile Crisis was a time of heightened confrontation between the Soviet Union, the United States, and Cuba during the Cold War. -
Apollo
The Apollo program was designed to land humans on the Moon and bring them safely back to Earth. In July 1969, to NASA astronauts planted their footprints and the American flag on the moon surface. -
Nixon Doctrine
Also known as the Guam Doctrine, it proclaimed that the United States would honor its existing defense commitments but that in the future, allies would have to fight their own wars without the support of large bodies of American ground troops. -
Iranian Hostage Crisis
A group of Iranian students stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, taking more than 60 American hostages. The students set their hostages free on January 21, 1981, 444 days after the crisis began. -
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI)
Popularly known as Star Wars, the plan called for orbiting battle stations in space they could fire laser beams or other forms of concentrated energy to vaporize intercontinental missiles on lift off. -
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty
The INF Treaty was an arms control treaty between the United States and the Soviet Union. US President Ronald Reagan and Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev signed the treaty banning all of the two nations' land-based ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and missile launchers with ranges of 500–1,000 km and 1,000–5,500 km. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
Citizens were finally allowed to cross the border that the Berlin Wall created as the war came to a close. On this day the war was officially over.
