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History > Cold War: Early Events and Crisis > Flashcards

Cold War: Early Events and Crisis Flashcards

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1
Q

Denente

A

the easing of hostility or strained relations, especially between countries

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2
Q

Brinkmanship

A

practice of pursuing a dangerous policy to the limits of safety before stopping, especially in politics

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3
Q

Containment

A

the action or policy of preventing the expansion of a hostile country or influence

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4
Q

Glasnost

A

(in the former Soviet Union) the policy or practice of more open consultative government and wider dissemination of information, initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985

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5
Q

Perestroika

A

(in the former Soviet Union) the policy or practice of reconstructing or reforming the economic and political system. Originally referred to increased automation and labour efficiency, but came to entail greater awareness of economic markets and the ending of central planning

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6
Q

Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD)

A

a doctrine of military strategy and national security policy in which a full-scale use of nuclear weapons by two or more opposing sides would cause the complete annihilation of both the attacker and the defender

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7
Q

Arms Race

A

a competition between nations for superiority in the development and accumulation of weapons

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8
Q

Space Race

A

the competition between nations regarding achievements in to field of space exploration

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9
Q

Missile Gap

A

was the Cold War tern used in the US for the perceived superiority of the number and power of the USSR’s missiles in comparison with its own

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10
Q

Peaceful Coexistence

A

a theory developed and applied by the Soviet Union at various points during the Cold War in the context of primarily Marxist-Leninist foreign policy so that they could peacefully coexist with non-socialist states

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11
Q

De-Stalinization

A

an effort after the death of Soviet premier Joseph Stalin to soften some of the repressive measures used by his government

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12
Q

Thaw

A

to make less tense or hostile

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13
Q

Democratic Capitalism

A

is a political, economic and social ideology that involves the combination of a democratic political system with a capitalist economic system

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14
Q

Iron Curtain

A

a national barrier separating the former Soviet bloc and the West prior to the decline of communism

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15
Q

Superpower

A

a very powerful and influential nation

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16
Q

Cold War

A

A period of conflict, tension, suspicion and rivalry between the Soviet Union and the United States from 1947-1991
There was no direct conflict between the USSR and the US
There was other conflict:
> fought between proxies (allies) of the two superpowers (US and USSR)
> between one of the superpowers and a proxy of the other
Direct conflict between the US and USSR would have involved the use of nuclear weapons which would have ended civilisation, hence the reason the Cold War remained ‘cold’

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17
Q

European Integration

A

Refers to a push among a group of Western European nations to take steps towards political and economic integration so as to prevent the possibility of war in Europe ever breaking out again

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18
Q

Ideology

A

Europe was separated by 2 mutually exclusive ideologies
Soviet Union = Marxism- Leninism
US and West Europe = Democratic Capitalism
Conflicted because:
- Communism sought the violent overthrowing of democratic capitalism
> put the west on edge
- Soviets believe the west would want the destruction of communism (bourgeoisie)
> put the Soviets on edge
- Each ideology was mutually exclusive and had conflicting values

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19
Q

Soviet Fear of Invasion

A

Russia had been the subject of invasion many times
This contributed to an ingrained desire on the part of the communist regime to take all steps necessary to secure the Soviet Union from being invaded

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20
Q

Five Periods of the Cold War: First Cold War (1946-49)

A

Tensions arise between the US and USSR over control of Eastern Europe and Germany and the development of and ‘Arms Race’ in nuclear weapons

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21
Q

Five Periods of the Cold War: Fluctuating Relations (1950-68)

A

Relations arise between the US and USSR go through periods of antagonism and ‘peaceful coexistence’

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22
Q

Five Periods of the Cold War: Detente (1969-79)

A

The US and USSR build common ground in an attempt to avoid conflict

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23
Q

Five Periods of the Cold War: Second Cold War (1979-85)

A

Tensions re-escalate due to developments outside Europe and nuclear weapons issues

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24
Q

Five Periods of the Cold War: Termination of the Cold War (1985-91)

A

Progressive leadership change in the USSR significantly reduces tension with the US and sets into motion the collapse of communism in Europe, ultimately causing the break-up of the Soviet Union and an end to the Cold War

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25
Q

Open Door Policy

A

Idea of the best way to prevent war = world based on free trade and equal access to raw materials

  • Increased economic prosperity
  • Increased interdependence between countries
  • Decrease possibilities for war as countries are reliant on each other

Stalin felt the US would be dominant economic power post-war and therefore exert most influence over world trade and have the chance to economically subject the Soviet Union

26
Q

Percentages Agreement

A
  • An informal agreement between Stalin and Churchill
  • Agreement outlines British and Soviet ‘spheres of influence’ in five east European countries Percentages agreed on by Stalin and Churchill
    (British:Soviet)
    Romania (10:90)
    Greece (90:10)
    Bulgaria (25:75)
    Hungary (25:75)
    Yugoslavia (50:50)
  • Soviets eventually assumed control over all countries except Greece and Yugoslavia
  • Idea that Europe would be divided endured, underpinning the Cold War and possibly contributing to the stability between the 2 superpower rivals
27
Q

Yalta Conference

A

FEBRUARY 1945
- USSR agreed to join the United Nations
- The five powers (US, USSR, UK, France and China) would have veto power in the UN Security Council
- Germany would be divided temporarily into Zones of British, American and Soviet occupation
- Austria would also be divided into zones of occupation
- Soviets wanted Germany to pay reparations ($20 billion)
- Poland’s boarders were readjusted and Soviets promised free elections
> Poland had been used as a corridor to attack Russia
> Stalin wanted to ensure this never happened again
> established a communist government in Poland and other European states
> acted as ‘buffer states’ between the democratic west and the Soviet Union
- Churchill and FDR accused of signing away Europe to Stalin, the the Soviets had paid the highest price of any nation in the war

28
Q

Potsdam Conference

A
  • Formalize issues raised in the Yalta Conference
  • Germany, separated into 4 zones (and Berlin) and split between USSR, US, Britain and France
  • Reparations also settled
  • Poland’s new borders agreed on
  • US wanted free elections to be held in Poland
  • the ‘Big Three’ established a Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) to continue discussions
    > peace with Italy
    > other German allies
29
Q

Nuclear Age Begins

A

1945

  • Nuclear arms race began as soon as the US exploded the first bomb at Alamagaro
  • Nuclear weapons forced people to thin differently about warfare and how to control the spread of destructive weapons
  • After the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, two nuclear weapons theories developing in the Truman administration
30
Q

Nuclear Age Begins: Share Technology

A

STIMSON

  • Argued that atomic bomb ‘secrets’ were scientifically in nature and could not be monopolized by the US forever
  • Given the ideological differences and rivalry between the USSR and US, the Soviets would work frantically to restore the ‘balance of power’ by developing their own nuclear weapons
  • Keeping the bomb a secret would only make the Soviets more suspicious of the US
31
Q

Nuclear Age Begins: Keep Technology

A

BYRNES

  • Argued that since the US had developed nuclear weapons itself, it had a right to keep the manufacture a secret
  • Believed that the Soviets could no be negotiated with honestly, that all they understood was power
  • The US should not be afraid to keep the nuclear advantage as a bargaining chip against the Soviets
32
Q

United Nations Atomic Energy Commission

Acheson Report

A
  • Control of atomic energy through inspections and policing was unlikely to succeed
  • Ownership of all fissile material, including mines, to be given to the AEC who would give small quantities to countries for the peaceful development of nuclear energy
  • US to reveal secrets to Soviets in exchange for an agreement to limit the production of nuclear weapons
33
Q

Long Telegram

A
  • George Kennen was deputy chief at the US embassy in the Soviet Union between 1944 and 1946
  • in 1946 the embasy was asked by the US whey the Soviets hadn’t joined the International Monetry Fund
  • Kennen replied with the ‘Long Telegram’, an analysis of the Soviet Union helped to inform the US policy and later policies of containment
34
Q

Potsdam Conference: Poland

A

Arguments over the political future of Poland

  • Soviets wanted large parts of East Germany incorporated into Poland
  • West parts of Poland went to Soviet Union
  • New West boarder the Oder-Niesse River
  • Administration given to Communist Government
  • Poland strategically important to Soviets
  • Soviet ‘ethnic cleansing’, move all ethnic Germans from Soviet zones (5 million)
35
Q

Origins of Containment

A 
The US policy towards the USSR
(1) George Kennen
     > Long Telegram
     > Article X
(2) Policies
     > Truman Article
     > Marshall Plan
36
Q

Long Telegram: Main Points

A
  • Soviet Communism ‘… greatest task our diplomacy has ever faced and probably greatest it will ever have to face.’
  • USSR believed it was at a perpetual war with capitalism
  • Would use Communist countries as allies
  • Soviet aggression, to the view of the people or economic reality, rooted in historic nationalism
  • USSR government structure restricts their ability to see the reality of a situation = blinded by ideology
  • Don’t see the possibility for long term coexistence with the capitalist world
  • Believed the capitalists couldn’t be trusted or allowed to influence the Soviet people
  • Won’t get into direct conflict with the Soviet people
  • Kennen proposed that the US needs to assert itself in the face of Soviet hostility
37
Q

Long Telegram: Overall

A

Soviets believe:

West is a threat
> Ideology
> Fear of Invasion
= there will never be peaceful coexistence with America and her allies

38
Q

Article X

A

JULY 1947

  • Written by George Kennen
  • Called ‘Article X’ because it was anonymous, the author being cited a ‘X’
  • Repeated much from the ‘Long Telegram’
  • Arguing that any further expansion west of the Soviet Union in Europe had to be resisted preferably by political means
  • Containing Soviet ambitions was a present necessity
39
Q

Iron Curtain

A

5 MARCH 1946

  • A speech by Winston Churchill
  • First use of the expression ‘Iron Curtain’

Iron Curtain = describes the totalitarian control the USSR was imposing on the Eastern European countries it occupied after the war

  • First public speech that acknowledged the divide between totalitarian communist Europe and Democratic Europe
  • Acknowledge the beginning of the Cold War
40
Q

Truman Doctrine

A

12 MARCH 1947

  • The change in the US’s attitude towards the Soviet Union
  • It warned the Congress of the consequences should the Soviets extend their influence
41
Q

Truman Doctrine: Causes

A
  1. The creeping Soviet expansionism
  2. Britain’s removal of support for Greece and Turkey who had suffered greatly in WW2 and were susceptible to communist influence
42
Q

Truman Doctrine: Main Points

A
  • Requested that congress approve $400 million in aid for both Greece and Turkey
  • Greece had been utterly destroyed by the war and communist terrorists engaged in a brutal civil war and were exploiting the situation to topple the democracy
  • Democratic countries must be actively supported by the US to prevent communist threats
  • ‘Misery and want’ provide the preconditions for totalitarian takeover (totalitarianism can’t hold in prosperous countries)
43
Q

Truman Doctrine: Importance

A
  • Marked the formal abandonment of America’s traditional policy of ‘isolationism’
  • Communism needed to be actively countered to prevent its spread
  • US now prepared to involve itself in conflicts in other countries if communism was threatening to take over
44
Q

Marshall Plan

A
  • After WW2 poverty and unemployment were high
  • By mid-1947 the US frustration with Soviet apathy over developing plans for Europe’s economic reconstruction compelled the US to plan their own response
45
Q

Marshall Plan: Why Soviets were Unwilling to Help

A
  • They were in the process of stripping east European countries of economic resources as reparations for war damage
  • Believed that economically weak European countries would be less of a threat to the Soviet Union
  • US aid to Soviet controlled countries in European would compromise Soviet influence
46
Q

Marshall Plan: US Anxious for Economic Reconstruction

A
  • ‘Misery and Want’ created the conditions for totalitarianism taking control, economic prosperity vital to prevent this
  • US needed to move from a wartime economy to a peacetime economy where military spending would decrease, consumer goods would become a large bulk of economic production so the US needed prosperous countries to trade with
    > European economic reconstruction essential to American economic prosperity
  • George C. Marshall placed in charge of developing a proposal for the US led economic reconstruction of Europe
  • Kennen predicted that the Soviets should be invited to be included, but they would turn it down as they were worried that US economic influence would undermine Soviet influence
47
Q

Marshall Plan: European Recovery Program

A
  • Marshall plan committed the US to ‘nothing less than the reconstruction of Europe’
  • didn’t officially distinguish between Soviet and democratic Europe
  • crafted to contain the spread of communism by bringing economic prosperity to western Europe
48
Q

Marshall Plan: Statistics

A
  • Us gave $13 billion (approx. $130 billion today)
  • In operation for 4 years starting April 1947
  • UK received 26%, France 18%, West Germany 11%
  • 18 European counties received plan benefits
49
Q

Marshall Plan: US goals

A
  • to rebuild war-devastated regions, remove trade barriers, modernise industry, make Europe prosperous again, and prevent the spread of communism
50
Q

Marshall Plan: Stalin’s Response

A
  • Stalin was caught off guard
  • It forced him to choose whether Soviet occupied Europe accepted the aid, and risk US influence, or reject the aid, isolating East Europe from the West and making it clear he wanted a divided Europe
  • In September 1947 the Cominform was established, a successor to the old Comintern
  • Their job was to enforce ideological conformity in communist nations
51
Q

Berlin Blockade/ Berlin Airlift

A

24 June 1948 - 12 May 1949
– The Soviets cut all road, rail and freight traffic from West Germany to West Berlin to fore them out of Berlin or to negotiate a weak unified German state

52
Q

Berlin Blockade: Causes

A
    • The Yalta conference caused the Western powers to revise their views about the future of Germany
    • They planned to unify the 3 Western zones and create a economically/militarily strong West Germany
      • > merge the zones, US and Britain (Bizonia, 1946) and France (Trizonia, 1948)
      • > Soviet couldn’t conceive the capitalist democracies being able to work together
    • The following step was to establish a new currency
    • This was because the Soviets had been purposefully printing large amounts of Germany currency, causing hyper inflation and keeping the Germans economically weak
53
Q

Berlin Blockade: West’s Opinion

A
    • LEAVE WEST BERLIN
      • > leaving would indicate Western weakness and embolden Stalin to take further expansionist measures and betray the people of West Berlin
    • BREAK THROUGH BLOCKADE USING MILITARY FORCE
      • > military action would lead to war, this being risky as nuclear weapons were a possibility. The Soviets also had 10:1 land superiority
    • LAUNCH AN AIRLIFT USING DESIGNATED AIR CONDITIONS
      • > there were designated corridors already agreed on
54
Q

Berlin Blockade: In Effect

A
    • To successfully continue supplying West Germany, they would need to airlift 5000 tonnes of supplies a day
    • Transport planes could only carry 11 tonnes
    • A British or American plane left for Berlin every 30 seconds
    • By winter they were delivering 9000 tonnes a day
    • 200000 flights were made in total
    • Estimated cost of 200-500 million US dollars
    • Nearly a total 2.5 million tonnes were flown in
55
Q

Berlin Blockade: Ended

A
    • The West had shown their determination
    • The more the airlift went on the more embarrassing it was for Stalin
    • It made the West more determined to form a new democratic West German state
56
Q

Formation of NATO

A

4 APRIL 1949

NATO –> North Atlantic Treaty Organisation

  • Formed from the BTO (Brussels Treaty Organisation) after the Berlin Crisis and BTO realized that the US needed to be apart of any European democracy alliance
  • This was because the US had the political, economic and military power to maintain the ‘balance of power’ between East and West
  • The US were receptive to this, it would make the Soviets think twice before attempting any actions in Europe that might threaten the West
  • Treaty included the BTO members (Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, France and UK) plus the US, Canada, Portugal, Italy, Norway, Denmark and Iceland
57
Q

Formation of NATO: Treaty Ideas

A
  • Collective self defence/ mutual defence
    - > attack one NATO member, considered an attack on all members
  • Required all members to respond, not necessarily in a military situation
    - > freedom to respond as they see fit
    - > limited the possibility of military conflict, especially with nuclear war a possibility
58
Q

Formation of the Federal Republic of Germany

A

23 MAY 1949

  • Four days after the end to the blockade of West Berlin, the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) came into being
  • The capital was the city of Bonn and the new constitution was drafted, elections held in September 1949
59
Q

Formation of the German Democratic Republic

A

OCTOBER 1949

  • In response to the formation of West Berlin (FRG) the USSR created the German Democratic Republic (east Germany)
  • The Soviets refused to recognize the FTG
  • The West refused to recognize the GDR
60
Q

Comecon

A

JANUARY 1949

  • Soviets concerned with the steps the US and West European nations were taking towards economic revival and integration
  • Soviets formed the Comecon
    Comecon –> Council for mutual economic assistance
  • Sought to bind the countries in the Soviet Bloc economically tightly to the USSR
  • Intended to coordinate industrial development in the Soviet Bloc and prevent trade with the US
  • Enforced preferential trade agreements on the satellites, especially raw materials Stalin needed for reconstruction
61
Q

Arms Race

A

AUGUST 1949

  • Soviets exploded their first atomic bomb ending the US monopoly on nuclear weapons, instigating an arms race
  • US –> determined to stay ahead
  • Soviets –> determined to catch up
62
Q

Security Dilemma

A

When a country decides to enhance its security for defensive reasons (making alliances, increasing military), this will always lead to other countries (where there’s a lack of trust) to regard this as an offensive rather than a defensive action and respond with equivalent measures which will produce increased tensions even tough neither side wants it

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