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End of World War II
Political and military tension grew between the US/UN and it's allies and the Soviets and it's allies. The launch of the Cold War began sometime around this time and was coined "cold" because there was no actual fighting taking place. -
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is established
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is established by 12 Western nations: the United States, Great Britain, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark, Italy, Luxembourg, Norway, Iceland, Canada, and Portugal. The military alliance, which provided for a collective self-defense against Soviet aggression, greatly increased American influence in Europe. -
Soviet Union explodes their first atomic bomb
At a remote test site at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan, the USSR successfully detonates its first atomic bomb, code name “First Lightning.” The atomic explosion, which at 20 kilotons was roughly equal to “Trinity,” the first U.S. atomic explosion, destroyed those structures and incinerated the animals. The Soviets are now a nuclear power. -
U.S. and UN fight North Korean Forces
The Korean War from 1950 to 1953 was the most severe test the United Nations had to face since its inception in 1945. As part of the whole Cold War scenario, the Korean War was a complicated issue with which the United Nations had to successfully deal with or lose credibility just five years after it had come into being. -
Red Army stops 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 Soviet Union inaugurates the “Space Age” with its launch of Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite. The spacecraft, named Sputnik after the Russian word for “satellite,” was launched at 10:29 p.m. Moscow. Visible with binoculars before sunrise or after sunset, Sputnik transmitted radio signals back to Earth strong enough to be picked up by amateur radio operators. Those in the United States with access to such equipment tuned in. -
Fidel Castro becomes Prime Minister of Cuba, installs communist government
On February 16, 1959, Fidel Castro is sworn in as prime minister of Cuba after leading a guerrilla campaign that forced right-wing dictator Fulgencio Batista into exile. -
John F Kennedy becomes President
John F. Kennedy becomes the youngest man ever to be elected president of the United States, narrowly beating Republican Vice President Richard Nixon. -
Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba
In April 1961, with training and support by the CIA, the Cuban exiles launched an ill-fated and unsuccessful invasion of Cuba known as the “Bay of Pigs.” The Soviet Union reacted to the attack by escalating its support to Castro’s communist government and in 1962 placed offensive nuclear missiles in Cuba. The discovery of the missiles by U.S. intelligence led to the tense “Cuban Missile Crisis,” which ended after the Soviets agreed to remove the weapons in exchange for a U.S. pledge not to invad -
East Germany builds Berlin Wall
On August 13, 1961, the Communist government of the German Democratic Republic (GDR, or East Germany) began to build a barbed wire and concrete “Antifascistischer Schutzwall,” or “antifascist bulwark,” between East and West Berlin. The official purpose of this Berlin Wall was to keep Western “fascists” from entering East Germany and undermining the socialist state, but it primarily served the objective of stemming mass defections from East to West. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
During the Cuban Missile Crisis, leaders of the U.S. and the Soviet Union engaged in a tense, 13-day political and military standoff in October 1962 over the installation of nuclear-armed Soviet missiles on Cuba, just 90 miles from U.S. shores. In a TV address on October 22, 1962, President John Kennedy (1917-63) notified Americans about the presence of the missiles, explained his decision to enact a naval blockade around Cuba and made it clear the U.S. was prepared to use military force if nece -
Kennedy assassination
President John F. Kennedy is assassinated during a visit to Dallas, Texas. His death caused intense mourning in the United States and brought Vice President Lyndon Johnson to the presidency. Kennedy’s untimely death also left future generations with a great many “what if” questions concerning the subsequent history of the Cold War.In the years since Kennedy’s death, a number of supporters argued that had he lived he would have done much to bring the Cold War to a close. Some have suggested that -
US commits troops to South Vietnam
President Kennedy approves sending 400 Special Forces troops and 100 other U.S. military advisers to South Vietnam. On the same day, he orders the start of clandestine warfare against North Vietnam to be conducted by South Vietnamese agents under the direction and training of the CIA and U.S. Special Forces troops. Kennedy’s orders also called for South Vietnamese forces to infiltrate Laos to locate and disrupt communist bases and supply lines there. -
US Invades Grenada
President Ronald Reagan, citing the threat posed to American nationals on the Caribbean nation of Grenada by that nation’s Marxist regime, orders the Marines to invade and secure their safety. There were nearly 1,000 Americans in Grenada at the time, many of them students at the island’s medical school. In little more than a week, Grenada’s government was overthrown. -
Berlin Wall falls
November 9 1989 marks the infamous fall of the Berlin Wall. On midnight of that day, East Germany's Communist rulers gave permission for gates along the Wall to be opened as a result of days of mass protest. After decades of partition, East Berliners surged through cheering and shouting and were greeted by West Berliners on the other side. Ecstatic crowds immediately began to climb on top of the Wall and destroy segments of the concrete fort. -
Soviet Union abolished; Boris Yeltsin becomes President of Russia
The Soviet breakup was an unambiguously positive turning point in Russian and world history. As it quickly became the defining moment in a new American triumphalist narrative, the hope that Mikhail Gorbachev's pro-Soviet democratic and market reforms of 1985-91 would succeed was forgotten. Soviet history was now presented as "Russia's seven decades as a rigid and ruthless police state".
