Chapter 25 - Cold War America, 1945-1963 Flashcards
Yalta Conference
meeting in Yalta of Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin in February 1945 to discuss the treatment of Germany, the status of Poland, the creation of the United Nations, and Russian entry into the war against Japan
United Nations
international body agreed upon at the Yalta Conference, consisting of a General Assembly of all nations and a Security Council of the five major allied powers (U.S., Britain, France, China, Soviet Union) plus seven other rotating nations
Potsdam Conference
July 1945 conference in which American officials convinced Joseph Stalin to accept German reparations only from the Soviet zone - paved the way for division of Germany into East and West
containment
U.S. Cold War policy to contain communism within its existing geographic boundaries
Truman Doctrine
Truman’s commitment to “support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures”
Marshall Plan
aid program begun in 1948 to help European economies recover from WWII
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
military alliance formed in 1949 among the United States, Canada, and Western European nations to counter any possible Soviet threat
Warsaw Pact
military alliance of communist entities to counter NATO alliance
NSC-68
top-secret government report of April 1950 warning that national survival in the face of Soviet communism required a massive military buildup
Cold War liberalism
combination of moderate liberal policies that preserved the programs of the New Deal welfare state and forthright anticommunism
Taft-Hartley Act (1947)
law passed by the Republican-controlled Congress in 1947 that overhauled the 1935 National Labor Relations Act - placed restrictions on organized labor that made it more difficult to form unions
Fair Deal
Truman’s domestic policy agenda - civil rights, healthcare, education reform
Loyalty-Security Program
program created in 1947 by Truman that permitted officials to investigate any employee of the federal government for “subversive” activities
House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)
committee especially prominent in the early years of the Cold War that investigated Americans who might be disloyal or associated with communism/radicalism
“New Look”
defense policy of the Eisenhower administration that stepped up production of the hydrogen bomb and developed long-range bombing capabilities
domino theory
Eisenhower’s theory of containment - the fall of a non-Communist government to communism in Southeast Asia would trigger the spread of communism to neighboring countries
Eisenhower Doctrine
Eisenhower’s 1957 declaration that the U.S. would actively combat communism in the Middle East
Bay of Pigs
failed U.S.-spnsored invasion of Cuba in 1961 by anti-Castro forces who planned to overthrow Fidel Castro’s government
Cuban missile crisis
1962 nuclear standoff between the Soviet Union and the U.S. when the Soviets attempted to deploy nuclear missiles in Cuba
Peace Corps
program launched by Kennedy in 1961 through which young American volunteers helped with education, health, and other projects in developing countries around the world
Joseph Stalin
leader of the Soviet Union during WWII and the Cold War
George F. Kennan
American diplomat who advocated for the containment policy
Joseph McCarthy
Wisconsin senator who sought attention by accusing people of communism
Nikita Krushchev
leader of the Soviet Union after the death of Stalin
John F. Kennedy
Democratic 35th president
Fidel Castro
Marxist Cuban political leader
Ho Chi Minh
Vietnamese Communist revolutionary leader
