us foreign policy in the cold war1

American foreign policy in the Cold war

Copyright © 2009 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Longman.

The world after World War II

Yalta Conference (1945)Potsdam Conference July 1945The US emerged as the most powerful country and monopoly on atomic bombThe world entered a new era


Question

Why did World War III not happen?


U.S. Goals

Allow for self-determination in all nations

Gain access to raw material and markets

Rebuild European gov. to create stability and new markets for U.S. goods

Reunite Germany

Soviet Goals

Encourage communism in other countries

Rebuild Eastern Europe using soviet labor and raw materials

Control Eastern Europe to create a buffer zone between Germany and balance U.S. Western European influence

Keep Germany weak and divided


U.S. ESTABLISHES THE STRATEGY OF CONTAINMENT

Faced with the Soviet threat, Truman decided it was time to “stop babying the Soviets”

In February 1946, George Kennan, an American diplomat in Moscow, proposed a policy of containment

Containment meant the U.S. would prevent any further extension of communist rule


Question

Why didn’t the US use atomic bomb against Soviet Union after the WWII?


CHURCHILL: “IRON CURTAIN” ACROSS

EUROPEEurope was now

divided into two political regions; a mostly democratic Western Europe and a communist Eastern Europe

In a 1946 speech, Churchill said, “An iron curtain has descended across the continent”

The phrase “iron curtain” came to stand for the division of Europe

Churchill, right, in Fulton,

Missouri delivering his

“iron curtain” speech,

1946


Iron Curtain

cartoon, 1946


THE TRUMAN DOCTRINE

The American policy of “containment” soon expanded into a policy known as the Truman Doctrine”

This doctrine, first used in Greece and Turkey in the late 1940s, vowed to provide aid (money & military supplies) to support “free peoples who are resisting outside pressures”

By 1950, the U.S. had given $400 million in aid to Greece and Turkey


THE MARSHALL PLAN

Post-war Europe was devastated economically

In June 1947, Secretary of State George Marshall proposed a U.S. aid package to European nations

Western Europe accepted the help, while Eastern Europe rejected the aid

Over the next four years 16 European countries received $13 billion in U.S. aid

By 1952 Western Europe’s economy was flourishing

The Marshall Plan helped

Western Europe recover

economically


Question

Why did the US help Europe to recover?


SUPERPOWERS STRUGGLE OVER GERMANY

At the end of the war, Germany was divided among the Allies into four zones for the purpose of occupation

The U.S, France, and Great Britain decided to combine their 3 zones into one zone – West Germany, or the federal Republic of Germany

The U.S.S.R. controlled East Germany, or the German Democratic Republic

Now the superpowers were occupying an area right next to each other – problems were bound to occur


BERLIN AIRLIFT – 1948

When the Soviets attempted to block the three Western powers from access to Berlin in 1948, the 2.1 million residents of West Berlin had only enough food for five weeks, resulting in a dire situation

Like the whole of Germany,

the city of Berlin was divided

into four zones


AMERICA & BRITAIN AIRLIFT SUPPLIES TO

WEST BERLINNot wanting to invade

and start a war with the Soviets, America and Britain started the Berlin airlift to fly supplies into West Berlin

For 327 days, planes took off and landed every few minutes, around the clock

In 277,000 flights, they brought in 2.3 million tons of food, fuel and medicine to the West Berliners


SOVIETS LIFT BLOCKADE

Realizing they were beaten and suffering a public relations nightmare, the Soviets lifted their blockade in May, 1949

On Christmas 1948, the plane crews

brought gifts to West Berlin


NATO FORMED

The Berlin blockade increased Western Europe’s fear of Soviet aggression

As a result, West European nations joined the U.S and Canada on April 4, 1949 to form a defensive alliance known as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization

After the fall of communism NATO has become a political force rather than a military force.

The NATO flag


Arm Race

17

• Cold War tensions increased in the US when the

USSR exploded its first atomic bomb in 1949.

• Cold War tensions increased in the USSR

when the US exploded its first hydrogen

bomb in 1952. It was 1000 times more

powerful than the Hiroshima atomic bomb.

Copyright © 2009 Pearson Education, Inc. Publishing as Longman. 18

Space Race

• Cold War tensions increased in the US when the USSR launched

Sputnik I, the first artificial satellite into geocentric orbit on October 4,

1957.

– The race to control space was on.

• April 12, 1961: Yuri Gagarin became first human in space and

first to orbit Earth.

• US felt a loss of prestige and increased funding for

space programs and science education.

• On May 25,1961, Kennedy gave a speech challenging

America to land a man on the moon and return him

safely by the end of the decade.

• Apollo 11 landed on the moon on July 16, 1969.


The U-2 Incident

USSR was aware of American U-2 spy missions but lacked technology to launch countermeasures until 1960.

–May 1, 1960: CIA agent Francis Gary Powers’ U-2, was shot down by Soviet missile.

Powers was unable to activate plane's self-destruct mechanism before he parachuted to the ground, right into the hands of the KGB.

When US learned of Powers' disappearance over USSR, it issued a cover statement claiming that a "weather plane" crashed after its pilot had "difficulties with his oxygen equipment." US officials did not realize:

– Plane crashed intact, – Soviets recovered its photography equipment– Captured Powers, whom they interrogated extensively for months before he made a "voluntary confession" and public apology for his part in US espionage


The Bay of Pigs Invasion

The Bay of Pigs Invasion was an unsuccessful attempt by US-backed Cuban exiles to overthrow the government of the Cuban dictator Fidel Castro.

Increasing friction between the US and Castro's communist regime led President Eisenhower to break off diplomatic relations with Cuba in January 1961.

Even before that, however, the CIA had been training anti-revolutionary Cuban exiles for a possible invasion of the island.

The invasion plan was approved by Eisenhower's successor, John F. Kennedy.


The Bay of Pigs Invasion…

On April 17, 1961 about 1300 exiles, armed with US weapons, landed at the Bahía de Cochinos (Bay of Pigs) on the southern coast of Cuba hoping for support from locals.

From the start, the exiles were likely to lose. Kennedy had the option of using the Air Force against the Cubans but decided against it.

Consequently, the invasion was stopped by Castro's army. The failure of the invasion seriously embarrassed the Kennedy administration.

–Some critics blamed Kennedy for not giving it adequate support–Others blamed Kennedy for allowing it to take place at all.

Additionally, the invasion made Castro wary of the US He was convinced that the Americans would try to take over the Cuba again.


Berlin Wall In the dark on August 13, 1961, a low, barbed-wire

barrier rose between East and West Berlin. Within days, workers cemented concrete blocks into a low wall, dividing neighborhoods and families, workers and employers, the free from the repressed.

The USSR called the wall a barrier to Western imperialism, but it also was meant to keep its people from going to the West where the standard of living was much higher and freedoms greater.

The West Germans called it Schandmaur, the "Wall of Shame." Over the years, it was rebuilt three times. Each version of the wall was higher, stronger, more repressive, and impregnable. Towers and guards with machine guns and dogs stood watch over a barren no man's land. Forbidden zones, miles wide, were created behind the wall. No one was allowed to enter the zones. Anyone trying to escape was shot on sight.


Cuban Missile CrisisThis was the closest the world ever came to nuclear war. The US armed forces were at their

highest state of readiness ever, and Soviets in Cuba were prepared to launch nuclear weapons to defend the island if it were invaded.

In 1962, the USSR lagged far behind the US in the arms race. Soviet missiles were only

powerful enough to be launched against Europe but US missiles were capable of striking the entire Soviet Union.

In April 1962, Soviet Premier Khrushchev deployed missiles in Cuba to provide a deterrent to a potential US attack against the

USSR. Meanwhile, Fidel Castro was looking for a way to defend his island nation from an attack by the US. Ever since the failed Bay of Pigs

invasion in 1961, Castro felt a second attack was inevitable. Consequently, he approved of Khrushchev's plan to place missiles on the island. In the summer of 1962 the USSR secretly installed the missiles.

CIA map showing range of Soviet supplied intermediate and

medium range missiles if launched from Cuba


Cuban Missile Crisis… The crisis began on October 15, 1962 when

reconnaissance revealed Soviet missiles under construction in Cuba.

After seven days of intense debate within the White House, Kennedy imposed a blockade around Cuba to stop the arrival of more Soviet missiles.

On October 22, Kennedy announced the discovery of the missiles and his decision to blockade Cuba and that any attack launched from Cuba would be regarded as an attack on the US by the USSR and demanded that the Soviets remove all of their offensive weapons from Cuba.

October 27 was the worst day of the crisis. A U-2 spy plane was shot down over Cuba.

Tensions finally began to ease on October 28 when Khrushchev announced that he would dismantle the installations and remove the missiles, expressing his trust that the US would not invade Cuba.

Further negotiations were held to implement the October 28 agreement, including a US demand that Soviet bombers be removed from Cuba, and specifying the exact form and conditions of US assurances not to invade Cuba.


The Thaw

Better relations between communists countries and the US began with one of the

most hard-lined anti-communist presidents, Richard Nixon. In his “only Nixon could go to China” trip, Nixon was

the first US president to visit that communist country.

Richard and Pat Nixon (in an

appropriately red coat) at the

Great Wall of ChinaA magazine cover about ping pong

diplomacy, so called because

better relations between the US

and China came after the two

countries’ ping pong teams played

each other.


Question

Why did Nixon visit China in 1972? What was his intention behind the visit?


The Thaw In 1969 Nixon began negotiations with USSR on SALT I,

common name for the Strategic Arms Limitation Talk. SALT I froze the number of ballistic missile launchers at

existing levels, and provided for the addition of submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) launchers only after the same number of intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and SLBM launchers had been dismantled.

It was the first effort between US/USSR to stop increase nuclear weapons.

SALT II was a second round of US/USSR talks (1972-1979), which sought to reduce manufacture of nuclear weapons. SALT II was the first nuclear treaty seeking real reductions in strategic forces to 2,250 of all categories on both sides.

Nixon and Brezhnev toast the SALT I treaty. Carter and Brezhnev sign the SALT II treaty.


Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan Interrupts Thaw

In 1978, the USSR invaded Afghanistan and tried to set up a friendly government.

It became the USSR’s Vietnam, a long war with no clear victory possible and many casualties and high costs.

The US supported the Afghani rebels known as the mujahideen.

In 1989 the Soviets finally withdrew. Islamic extremists used the opportunity to take over the country.

The defeat weakened the Soviet’s economy and morale.

Muhahideen celebrate the

downing of a Soviet helicopter


Reagan’s Star Wars Interrupts Thaw

The Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) was a proposal by President Reagan on in 1983 to use ground and space-based systems to protect the US from attack by nuclear ballistic missiles. It focused on strategic defense rather than doctrine of mutual assured destruction (MAD).

It was quickly nicknamed “Star Wars.”It starts a new arms race with the

Soviets.


Question

Why did Reagan step up the arm race with Soviet Union in 1983?


Cold War Thaw ContinuesGorbachev becomes Soviet

premier and understands that the Soviet economy cannot compete with the West, partly because of Afghanistan and partly because of the costs of keeping up militarily.

Gorbachev recognizes there is increasing unrest in the country.

He tries to reform the USSR with glasnost (= openness: think “glass” because you can see through it) and perestroika (=restructuring: think “structure/stroika”).

Gorbachev is further pressured to reform the USSR when Reagan gives his speech in Germany challenging Gorbachev to “tear down this wall.”President Reagan delivers his speech in Berlin.

Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev


The end of the Cold war

America- the last man standThe end of history: Capitalist liberalism


Question for discussion

How did the world war II end? How were the US-USSR relations at the end of the WW II?What is the Cold war? What were the origins of the Cold war?What was the grand strategy of the US during the Cold war?


Question for discussion

Why didn’t the US use atomic bomb against Soviet Union after the WWII?Why did the US help Europe to recover?Why did Nixon visit China? What was his intention behind the visit?Why did Reagan step up the arm race with Soviet Union in early 1980s? What was the international position of America after the end of the Cold war?

us foreign policy in the cold war1

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