Cold War timeline

By Andre4
  • Yalta conference

    Yalta conference
    source' >source</a>The Yalta Conference was a meeting of British prime minister Winston Churchill, Soviet premier Joseph Stalin, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt in February 1945 as World War II was going down. The leaders agreed to require Germany’s surrender and to set up four zones of occupation to be run by their three countries and France.They met to discuss what would happen to Germany and Europe after victory had been achieved. The Yalta conference would foreshadow the Cold War.
  • Iron Curtain Speech

    Iron Curtain Speech
    sourceWinston Churchill gave a speech in which the term "iron curtain" is used to describe the postwar boundary in Europe between the West and those in Eastern Europe. Churchill acknowledges America's power in the world, and then offers an assessment of Communism from Russia. This eventually led to the cold war and the red scare.
  • Berlin Declaration

    Berlin Declaration
    sourceBy the authority of the allies, Germany was taken full control and the third reich was dissoluted. It is similar to the Potsdam conference only different by terms of consequences and relations with outside authorities. This Declaration effected Germany by territorial punishment.
  • North Vietnam

    North Vietnam
    sourceIn Vietnam severe famine strook areas in the north eventually resulting in two million deaths from starvation from a population of ten million. Vietnam is considered a minor threat so In order to neutralize the Japanese in Vietnam, the Allies divided the country in half. This led to Vietnam proclaiming independence.
  • Potsdam Conference

    Potsdam Conference
    sourceThe Big Three met in Potsdam, Germany, on July 17 to negotiate terms for the end of World War II. The conference discussed the procedures of the peace settlements in Europe but did not write peace treaties. Germnay eventually surrendered, but Japan did not and that led to Japan being bombed by two devastating nuclear weapons.
  • Marshall Plan

    Marshall Plan
    sourceThe Marshall Plan channeled over $13 billion to finance the economic recovery of Europe. The Marshall Plan successfully sparked economic recovery, meeting its objective of restoring the confidence of the European people in the economic future of their own countries and of Europe as a whole. It effected Germany because it stopped West Germany from going communist, because after the war, they were devastated by the destruction and high reparations.
  • Berlin Blockade

    Berlin Blockade
    sourceThe Berlin Blockade was an act by the Soviet Union to limit the ability of France, Great Britain and the U.S to travel to their sectors of Berlin, which lay within Russian-occupied East Germany. Eventually, the western powers made an airlift that lasted nearly a year and delivered supplies and relief to West Berlin.
  • Berlin Airlift

    Berlin Airlift
    source The Russians wanted Berlin all for themselves so they closed all highways, railroads and canals from western occupied Germany into western occupied Berlin. However, the U.S. and its allies decided to supply their sectors of the city from the air.The Berlin Airlift lasted for more than a year and carried more than 2.3 million tons of cargo into West Berlin.
  • Containment Policy

    Containment Policy
    sourceGeorge F. Kennan created the policy of “containment,” the basic United States strategy for fighting the cold war with the Soviet Union.Containment of blocking the expansion of Soviet influence remained the basic strategy of the United States throughout the cold war.negative effect was the extremely high costs of military expenditure and the military ventures around the globe from Korea, through Indochina to the Granadines.
  • NATO

    NATO
    sourceNATO was aimed to create a counterweight to Soviet armies stationed in central and eastern Europe after World War II. It was initially made to counter the communist East and has searched for a new identity in the post-Cold War world. NATO although required a large amount of funding.
  • Korean war-American involvement

    Korean war-American involvement
    source President Truman announces that he is ordering U.S air and naval forces to South Korea to aid the nation in repulsing an invasion by North Korea. The United States was venturing the major military operation to enforce a United Nations resolution, calling for an end to hostiles, and to stop the spread of communism in Asia. North and South Korea are still separated today.
  • Julius and Ethel Rosenberg

    Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
    sourceJulius and Ethel Rosenberg were convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage in 1951, they were put to death in the electric chair. Specifically, they were accused of heading a spy ring that had top secret information about the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union. The Rosenbergs protested their innocence, but after a trial in they were convicted.
  • Eisenhower presidency

    Eisenhower presidency
    sourceDwight D Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States. He was a five-star general in the United States Army during World War II and served as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe. He had responsibility for planning and supervising the invasion of North Africa in Operation Torch and the invasion of France and Germany.
  • Nikita Khrushchev

    Nikita Khrushchev
    sourceNikita Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during the Cold War, serving as premier. Though he tried to pursue a policy of peacefullness with the West, he instigated the Cuban Missile Crisis by placing nuclear weapons 90 miles from Florida. Khruschev wanted the Soviet hold on Berlin. Placing missiles in Cuba would give him a better position.
  • Warsaw Pact

    Warsaw Pact
    sourceThe Warsaw Pact was a defense treaty among eight communist states of Central and Eastern Europe in existence during the Cold War. The Warsaw Pact was in part a Soviet military reaction to maintain control over military forces in Central and Eastern Europe. If the Warsaw Pact hadn't been formed chances are the USA and NATO would've become more likely to use force in East Europe to cause more countries to adopt Capitalism.
  • Sputnik

    Sputnik
    sourceThe Soviet Union lauches Sputnik, the world’s first artificial satellite. Sputnik was launched to correspond with the International Geophysical Year, a solar period that the International Council of Scientific Unions said would be good for the launching of artificial satellites to study Earth and the solar system. Many Americans feared more uses of the Soviets’ new rocket and satellite technology, which was strides ahead of the U.S. space effort.
  • Cuban Revolution

    Cuban Revolution
    sourceThe Cuban Revolution was a revolt conducted by Fidel Castro and his allies against the US government of Cuban President Fulgencio Batista. The revolution began in July and continued until the rebels finally ousted Batista on 1 January 1959, replacing his government with a socialist government. The Movement later formed along communist lines, becoming the Communist Party.
  • U2 Incident

    U2 Incident
    SourceOn May 1, 1960 th U.S sent a CIA pilot named FRancis Powers to fly a U-2 spy plane over Sverdlovsk, Russia. The pilto had taken significant and important top secret photos of defensive installations. That was all lost when a surface-to-air missle struck the plane and shot it down. This led to various atempts of assinations and effects of government.
  • Kennedy Presidency

    Kennedy Presidency
    sourceJohn F. Kennedy pledged to strengthen American military forces and promised a tough stance against the Soviet Union and international communism. Kennedy warned of the Soviet's growing arsenal of missies and pledged to revive American nuclear forces. Russian forces wanted J.F.K exterminated because of growing forces.
  • Bay of Pigs

    Bay of Pigs
    sourceOfficials at the U.S. State Department and the Central Intelligence Agency attempted to push Castro from power. Finally, in April 1961, the CIA launched the definitive strike. It was a full-scale invasion of Cuba by 1,400 American-trained Cubans.The invasion did not go well.The invaders were badly outnumbered by Castro’s troops, and they surrendered after less than 24 hours of fighting. This led to the future problems between the two.
  • Berlin Wall

    Berlin Wall
    sourceOn August 1961, East Germany began to build a barbed wire and concrete fence between East and West Berlin. The purpose of the Wall was to keep Western “fascists” from entering East Germany and weaken the socialist state, but it primarily served the objective of stemming mass defections from East to West.
  • JFK Assassination

    JFK Assassination
    sourcePresident JFK was drving through Dallas, Texas with an open top convertible. As their vehicle passed the Texas School Book Depository Building at 12:30 p.m., Lee Harvey Oswald fired three shots from the sixth floor, fatally wounding President Kennedy and seriously injuring Governor Connally. Kennedy was dead 30 minutes later at Dallas’ Parkland Hospital.
  • Gulf of Tonkin Resolution

    Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
    sourceIn early 1964, two U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin in Vietnam said that they had been fired upon by North Vietnamese forces. In response to these incidents, President Johnson requested permission from the U.S. Congress to increase the U.S. military presence in Indochina. The U.S Congress approves the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, giving President Johnson nearly unlimited powers to prevent “communist aggression” in Southeast Asia.
  • Salt I

    Salt I
    sourceDuring the late 1960s, the U.S learned that the Soviet Union had entered upon a massive ICBM buildup designed to reach the United States. In January 1967, President Johnson announced that the Soviet Union had begun to construct a limited ABM defense system around Moscow. The development of an ABM system could allow one side to launch a first strike and then prevent the other from retaliating by shooting down incoming missiles.
  • Vietnam War-American Involvement

    Vietnam War-American Involvement
    sourceIn late January, 1968, North Vietnamese and communist Viet Cong forces launched an attack against a number of targets in South Vietnam. The U.S. and South Vietnamese militaries sustained heavy losses before finally pushing away the communist assault. The Tet Offensive played an important role in weakening U.S. public support for the war in Vietnam.
  • Nixon Presidency

    Nixon Presidency
    sourceThe Nixon Doctrine marked the announcement of the president’s “Vietnamization” plan, where American troops would be slowly taken from Southeast Asia and be replaced by South Vietnamese troops. Over the course of his first term, Nixon supported his doctrine by withdrawing a large portion of America’s forces from Vietnam. In 1973, the U.S and North Vietnam signed a peace treaty bringing the Vietnam War to a conclusion.
  • Apollo 11

    Apollo 11
    sourceOn July 1969, American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin became the first humans ever to land on the moon. About six-and-a-half hours later, Armstrong became the first person to walk on the moon. The Apollo 11 mission occurred eight years after President John Kennedy announced a national goal of landing a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s. Apollo 17, the final manned moon mission, took place in 1972. These missions foreshadowed many great ventures in space exploration.
  • Tiananmen Square Massacre

    Tiananmen Square Massacre
    sourceIn May 1989, nearly a million Chinese, crowded into central Beijing to protest for the resignations of Chinese Communist Party leaders. For nearly three weeks, the protesters kept up daily vigils, and marched and chanted. On June 4, 1989, however, Chinese troops and security police stormed through Tiananmen Square, firing indiscriminately into the crowds of protesters. Chaos occured, as tens of thousands of the young students tried to escape the rampaging Chinese forces.
  • Fall of the Berlin Wall

    Fall of the Berlin Wall
    sourceOn November 9, 1989, as the Cold War decreasedacross Eastern Europe, the spokesman for East Berlin’s Communist Party announced a change in his city’s relations with the West. Starting at midnight that day, citizens of the GDR were free to cross the country’s borders. East and West Berliners went to the wall.At midnight, they flooded through the checkpoints.
    More than 2 million people from East Berlin visited West Berlin that weekend to participate in a celebration.
  • Dissolution of the Soviet Union

    Dissolution of the Soviet Union
    sourceOn Christmas Day 1991, the Soviet flag flew over the Kremlin in Moscow for the last time. Several countries declared they would be independent countries. The fall was mainly due to the many reforms the Soviet President made.However, the President was disappointed in the dissolution of his nation and resigned from his job on December 25. It was a peaceful end to a long, terrifying and sometimes bloody epoch in world history.