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The Russian Revolution
The Russian Revolution was the frist successful commusim revolution to happen and this brought tension between The U.S. and Russia which begin the Cold War. -
Potsdam Conference
The Potsdam Conference lasted from July 17 through August 2, 1945. It was an Allied conference held at Potsdam. The chief participants were Harry S. Truman, Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin.The conference discussed the procedures of the peace settlements in Europe+.The four occupation zones of Germany were set up, each to be administered by the commander-in-chief of the Soviet, British, U.S., and French. -
Atomic bomb - Hiroshima/Nagasaki
During World War II, an B-29 bomber dropped the world's first deployed atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later a second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on August 9, leading to Japan surrendering to the U.S. ending the war on Japan. -
Iron Curtain Speech
It was Churchill who first used the term Iron Curtain in a speech he delivered in Missouri. It refers to the fact that Eastern Europe was controlled by the Soviet Union. Churchill compared the threat of communism to a higher degree pushing both sides into conflict. -
Truman Doctrine
With the Truman Doctrine, President Harry S. Truman established that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from communism. This would create greater tension between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. -
Marshall Plan
President Truman signed the Economic Recovery Act. It became known as the Marshall Plan. George Marshall. who it was named after, proposed that the United States provide economic assistance to postwar Europe in 1947. This later resulted in the Soviet Union to do a similar plan called the Molotov Plan. -
Molotov Plan
The Molotov Plan was the system created by the Soviet Union in 1947 that was the opposite from the U.S "Marshall Plan" in order to provide aid to rebuild the countries in Eastern Europe that were aligned to the Soviet Union. -
Hollywood 10
The Hollywood Ten were motion-picture producers, directors, and screenwriters who appeared before the House American Activities Committee and refused to answer questions regarding their possible communist affiliations. This resulted in them bring sent to jail. The effect of these questionings were that movie executives were blacklisted because they thought some entertainers were alleged communists. This also resulted in Hollywood creating more American themed movies. -
Alger Hiss Case
Alger Hiss was an American government official who was accused of being a Soviet spy in 1948 and convicted of perjury in connection with this charge in 1950. This wouldn't be the last person to be convicted for connections of the Soviet Union. -
Berlin Blockade
The Cold War was just beginning making it a main cause why Stalin put a blockade in Berlin.The reason behind this was to pressure the Allies to withdraw from West Berlin to prevent the U.S. aiding anti-communist rebels in Germany. -
Berlin Airlift
A military operation that brought food and other needed goods into West Berlin by air after the government of East Germany had cut off its supply routes.The Berlin Airlift could be called the first battle of the Cold War. -
NATO
NATO created in 1949 by the United State and several Western European nations provided collective security against the Soviet Union. NATO was the first peacetime military alliance the United States entered into outside of the Western Hemisphere. -
Soviet bomb test
The Soviet Union exploded its first successful atomic bomb. The U.S. were shocked because they were not expecting the Soviet Union to possess nuclear weapons so fast after them. -
Korean War
The Korean War began when the North Korean Communist army crossed the 38th Parallel and invaded non-Communist South Korea. The United States came to South Korea's aid.This invasion was the first military action of the Cold War and it was from June 25, 1950 to
July 27, 1953. -
Rosenberg trial
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, a married couple convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage, accused of selling nuclear secrets to the Russians in 1951, were put to death in the electric chair on June 19, 1953. Their dual execution marked the most controversial espionage case of the Cold War. -
Army-McCarthy Hearings
The Army McCarthy hearings were hearings 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. This later result in the end of McCarthyism. -
Battle of Dien Bien Phu
The Battle of Dien Bien Phu was the confrontation of the First Indochina War between the French and the Viet Minh communist revolutionaries. This would later result in the U.S. involvement causing the Vietnam War. -
Geneva Conference
The Geneva Conference was from April 26, 1954 to July 21, 1954 resulting in the French agreeing to withdraw their troops from northern Vietnam. Vietnam would be temporarily divided at the 17th parallel, pending elections within two years to choose a president and reunite the country. The U.S. did not agree with this and stayed in Vietnam causing more problems. -
Warsaw Pact
The Warsaw Pact was a collective defense treaty signed in Warsaw, Poland between the Soviet Union and seven Eastern Bloc satellite states of Central and Eastern Europe in May 1955, during the Cold War. It was the Communist version to NATO. The Warsaw Pact came to be seen as quite a potential threat. -
Hungarian Revolution
The Hungarian Revolution, is considered by many as the nation's greatest tragedy. The Uprising was an almost spontaneous revolt by the Hungarian people against the ruling Communist Party of the time and the Soviet policies which were crippling post-war Hungary. It lasted from October 23, 1956 to November 10, 1956 and resulted in Nagy withdrawing Hungary from the Warsaw Pact and declaring neutrality. -
U-2 Incident
U-2 Incident confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union that began with the shooting down of a U.S. U-2 plane over the Soviet Union and that caused the collapse of a summit conference in Paris between the United States, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and France. -
Bay of Pig Invasion
In 1961 the United States sent trained Cuban exiles to Cuba to try and overthrow Fidel Castro's government. They failed miserably. The United States was trying to prevent communism from taking hold in the Americas. It lasted from April 17, 1961 to April 19, 1961 it would also lead to the Cuba missile crisis later. -
Berlin Wall
In an effort to stop the refugees attempting to leave East Berlin, The Soviet Union begins building the Berlin Wall to divide East and West Berlin. The wall itself came to symbolize the Cold War and would last up to the end of the Cold War. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
The Soviet Union began building missile sites in Cuba in 1962. It may have been the moment when the Cold War came closest to a nuclear war.The Cuban Missile crisis ended in October 29, 1962 when Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev agreed to remove Russian missiles from Cuba in exchange for a promise from the United States to respect Cuba's territorial sovereignty. -
Assassination of Diem
Ngo Dinh Diem as assassinated in November 2, 1963 in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. This would result in the loss of supporters in Vietnam. -
Assassination of JFK
On November 22, 1963 President JFK was assassinated by Lee Harvey Oswald shocking the world. This would later result in Lyndon B. Johnson becoming president and sending troops to Vietnam. -
Tonkin Gulf Resolution
Congress would passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, authorizing President Johnson to take any measures he believed were necessary to do in Vietnam resulting in more troops being sent to Vietnam. -
Operation Rolling Thunder
Operation Rolling Thunder was a bombing campaign that began on February 24 1965 and lasted until the end of October 1968. This bombing campaign was designed to force Ho Chi Minh to abandon his ambition to take over South Vietnam. This would fail as Ho Chi Minh did not stop his ambition resulting in great losses. -
Tet Offensive
During the lunar new year holiday, North Vietnamese and communist Viet Cong forces launched a coordinated attack against a number of targets in South Vietnam. Even though the U.S. won this battle it loss a great deal of supporters for the Vietnam War. -
Assassination of MLK
Martin Luther King Jr. was fatally shot at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee, on April 4, 1968. The Trenton Riots of 1968 soon happened because of this and would be a major civil disturbance. -
Assassination of RFK
Robert Kennedy was shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles after winning the California presidential primary, Kennedy was shot several times by Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan. It may have been one of the reasons Nixon was elected President. -
Invasion of Czechoslovakia
The Soviet Union led troops in an invasion of Czechoslovakia to crack down on reformist in Prague On August 20, 1968. Although the Soviet Union's action successfully halted the pace of reform in Czechoslovakia, it had consequences for the unity of the communist bloc. -
Riots of Democratic convention
As delegates flowed into the International Amphitheatre to nominate a Democratic Party presidential candidate, tens of thousands of protesters swarmed the streets to rally against the Vietnam War resulting in riots. -
Election of Nixon
Richard Nixon won the election and was the 46th president. Nixon promised to start pulling back troop in Vietnam to end this war. -
Kent State
Four Kent State University students were killed and nine were injured on May 4, 1970, when members of the Ohio National Guard opened fire on a crowd who gathered to protest the Vietnam War. This would be the movement U.S. would lose what was most of their support for the war. -
Nixon visits China
President Richard Nixon visited China on July 15, 1971 and it was an important strategic and diplomatic overture that marked good relations between the United States and China. -
Ceasefire in Vietnam
President Richard Nixon ordered a ceasefire of the aerial bombings in North Vietnam. This would be the start of the end of the Vietnam War as Nixon pulled back troops from Vietnam. -
Fall of Saigon
The Communist North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces captured the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon, forcing South Vietnam to surrender and it marked the end to the Vietnam War and it was the beginning of the formal reunification of Vietnam under Communist Rule. -
Reagan elected
Ronald Reagan won the presidential election and was the 49th president. Reagan would make bold moves in the Cold War like increasing defense spending. -
SDI announced
President Reagan proposed the creation of the Strategic Defense Initiative, an ambitious project that would construct a space-based anti-missile system. This would cause the Soviets to spend all of their resources to create that same defense system. -
Geneva Conference with Gorbachev
The Geneva Summit was held on November 19 and 20, 1985. Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev met to discuss the Cold War arms race, on the possibility of reducing the number of nuclear weapons and ending the Cold War. -
‘Tear down this wall’ speech
President Ronald Reagan challenged Mikhail Gorbachev to “tear down” the wall and this resulted in a civil uproar that would later result in the wall being teared down. -
Fall of Berlin Wall
The Berlin wall fell around in the 1990s when more and more people showed up near the wall which resulted in the fall of the Berlin Wall ending the Cold War.
