-
Russia disolves Comintern
Vladimir Ilich Lenin called the first congress of the Comintern to undermine efforts to revive the Second International. To join, parties were required to model their structure in conformity with the Soviet pattern and to expel socialists and pacifists. Though the Comintern's stated purpose was the promotion of world revolution, it functioned chiefly as an organ of Soviet control over the international communist movement. In 1943during World War II, Joseph Stalin dissolved the Comintern to allay -
Hungarian Revolution
Joseph Stalin's rule was encouraged by the new freedom of debate and criticism, a rising tide of unrest and discontent in Hungary broke out into active fighting in October 1956. Rebels won the first phase of the revolution, and Nagy Imre became premier, agreeing to establish a multiparty system. He declared Hungarian neutrality and appealed to the UN. Western powers faied to respond, on November 4 the Soviet Unioned to respond, invaded Hungary to stop the revolution. -
Soviet Union sends first ever man-made satellite, Sputnik, into space
It was named Sputnik after the Russian word for "satellite," was launched at 10:29 p.m from the Tyuratam launch base in the Kazakh Republic. Sputnik had a diameter of 22 inches and weighed 184 pounds and circled Earth once every hour and 36 minutes. Traveling at 18,000 miles an hour. Sputnik was some 10 times the size of the first planned U.S. satellite, which was not scheduled to be launched until the next year. -
USA forms NASA and launches Explorer 1 satellite
The first space satellite orbited by the United States and it discovered the innermost of the Van Allen radiation belts, two zones of charged particles that surround Earth. Explorer 1’s discovery of the Van Allen belts was the first scientific discovery made by an artificial satellite. -
U-2 Spy Plane Incident
The U-2 flight piloted by Francis Gary Powers disappeared while on a flight over Russia. The CIA reassured the president that, even if the plane had been shot down, it was equipped with self-destruct mechanisms that would render any wreckage unrecognizable. The U.S. government issued a cover statement indicating that a weather plane had veered off course and supposedly crashed somewhere in the Soviet Union. Khrushchev captured the pilot alive. -
Paris Conference
Designed to resolve the "Berlin Question" but it outright failed due to the downing of a U2 Spy Plane the USSR had shot down over its Sovereign Territory. Kruschev demanded an apology from Eisenhower and Ike refused to give one. Kruschev walked out of the Summit and relations with the USSR deteriorated further from this point. Soon there after the USSR would build the Berlin Wall. -
Soviet Yuri Gagarin, first man in space.
Yuri Gagarin flew only one space mission. First human to orbit Earth. Gagarin's spacecraft, Vostok 1, circled Earth at a speed of 27,400 kilometers per hour. At the highest point, Gagarin was about 327 kilometers above Earth. Once in orbit, Yuri Gagarin had no control over his spacecraft. Vostok's reentry was controlled by a computer program sending radio commands to the space capsule. Although the controls were locked, a key had been in a sealed envelope. He died on March 27, 1968. -
Khrushchev & Kennedy indulge in Brinkmanship
John F. Kennedy met with Khrushchev in Vienna in order to try to find a solution regarding the problem of Berlin. Kennedy suggested Khrushchev to remove the Soviet troops, after which the United States would remove their troops. The conference ended with Khrushchev issuing another ultimatum to the United States, giving them six months to get out of Berlin. -
Building of the Berlin Wall
It was a barrier constructed by the German Democratic Republic starting on 13 August 1961, that completely cut off West Berlin from surrounding East Germany and from East Berlin. The physical Wall itself was primarily destroyed in 1990. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
It was also known as the October crisis in Cuba and the Caribbean crisis in the USSR. It was a 13-day confrontation between the Soviet Union and Cuba on one side, and the United States on the otherone , on October 1962. One of the major confrontations of the Cold War, and is generally regarded as the moment in which the Cold War came closest to turning into a nuclear conflict. -
Kennedy sets up Apollo program
The Apollo program was the third human spaceflight program carried out by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the United States' civilian space agency. First conceived during the Presidency of Dwight. Apollo was later dedicated to President John F. Kennedy's national goal of "landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth". -
Nuclear test ban theory
On August 5, 1963, after more than eight years of difficult negotiations, the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union signed the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. The United Nations Disarmament Commission brought together the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, and the Soviet Union to began negotiations on ending nuclear weapons testing. -
Hotline Established
Between USA & USSR... The Moscow–Washington hotline was a system that allows direct communication between the leaders of the United States and Russia. This hotline was established in 1963 and linked the White House with the National Military Command Center. In popular culture known as the "red telephone", the hotline was never a telephone line, and no red phones were used. -
Czechoslovakia uprising 68
Troops from Russia, Hungary, Bulgaria, East Germany, and Poland occupied Czechoslovakia on that night. The Czechoslovakian government immediately declared that the “invasion was a violation of socialist principals, international law, and the United Nations Charter”. Those who initiated and supported the liberal reforms were forcibly removed to the Soviet Union in secrete and were compelled to sign a treaty. -
Brezhnev Doctrine
The Brezhnev Doctrine was a Soviet Union foreign policy, first and most clearly outlined by S. Kovalev in a September 26, 1968 Pravda article, entitled "Sovereignty and the International Obligations of Socialist Countries." This doctrine was announced to retroactively justify the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in August 1968 that ended the Prague Spring, along with earlier Soviet military interventions, such as the invasion of Hungary in 1956.