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Yalta Conference
The Yalta conference took place in Yalta, Russia. U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet Prime Minister Joseph Stalin attended this meeting to discuss important decisions of the future progress of the war and the postwar. They also decided to include France in these decisions and that Germany should assume some responsibility for reparations following the war. -
Berlin Declaration
The Berlin declaration gave full supreme authority to the governments of the United States, Soviet Union, Britain, and France over the defeated Germany. It says in the declaration that the "Allied Representatives" would determine the boundaries of Germany or any part thereof and the status of Germany or any of any area at present being part of German territory. There was 15 articles or rules that Germany had to follow. One was that Germany had to hand over all its weapons to the Allies. -
Potsdam Conference
The three main leader of the Allies met in Potsdam, Germany, from July 17 to August 2 to talk about the terms for the ending of World War II. Germany surrendered on May 8, 1945. They decided to divide Germany up into four sections which the U.S., Britain, the Soviet Union, and France would control one of their own sections. -
North Vietnam
Hours after the surrender of Japan, Vietnamese communist Ho Chi Minh declares the independence of Vietnam from France. He even paraphrased a small part for the U.S. Declaration of Independence. He organized a Vietnamese guerrilla organization called the "Viet Minh" to fight for Vietnamese independence. Ho Chi Minh wanted to proclaim the independent Democratic Republic of Vietnam, but after Japan's surrender the French forces seized southern Vietnam and in 1946 attacked north Vietnam. -
Iron Curtain Speech
British Prime Minister Winston Churchill gave the Iron Curtain Speech and declared that "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the continent." This speech is considered one of the opening volleys announcing the beginning of the Cold War. In his speech he explained that the Soviets were trying to spread communism and that they were operating throughout western and Southern Europe. -
First Indochina War
The First Indochina war was fought between the French forces vs Viet Minh, Pathetic Lao, and Khmer Issarak Communist Rebels. The U.S. and Great Britain supported the French side while the Soviet Union and China supported the rebels. They even gave the rebels equipment and training. After the Communist victory in China the Vietnamese rebels were allowed use of Southern China as a staging point for attacks into northern Vietnam. The war resulted in the spilt of Vietnam. -
The Marshall Plan
The Marshall Plan was an American initiative to aid Europe, in which the United States gave $13 billion in economic support to help rebuild the European economies after the end of World War II. Secretary of State George C. Marshall issued a call for a comprehensive program to help rebuild Europe during a speech to the graduating class at Harvard University. -
Containment Policy
George F. Kennan, a career Foreign Service Officer, formulated the policy of "containment", the basic United States strategy for fighting the Cold War with the Soviet Union. Kennan hoped this would gradually mellow the power of the Soviet Union. This was announced in a issue of "Foreign Affairs" magazine. There was two approaches to this which one was military and other economic. George C. Marshall proposed a program to send American economic aid to Europe. -
Berlin Blockade
The Berlin Blockade was one of the first major moves that started the Cold War. It was an attempt by the Soviet Union to limit the ability of France, Great Britain and the U.S. to travel to their sectors of Berlin. The East side of Germany was the Russian-occupied side. The western powers did an airlift thought to help give supplies to West Berlin. The airlift last nearly a year. -
NATO
The United States and 11 other nations established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Which is a mutual defense pact that was aimed at containing possible Soviet aggression against Western Europe. NATO stood for the main U.S.-led military alliance against the Soviet Union throughout the duration of the Cold War. Problems between the U.S. and the Soviet Union began to rapidly rise in 1948 over arguments about postwar Germany. -
Soviet Union tests A-Bomb
On August 29, 1949 the Soviet Union successfully detonates its first atomic bomb. The test was at a remote site at Semipalatinsk in Kazakhstan. The code name for this test was "First Lightening". The atomic explosion which at 20 kilotons was roughly equal to "trinity", the first U.S. atomic explosion. Supposedly the Soviet physicists who worked on the bomb were honored for achievement based on the penalties they would have got of the test would have failed. -
People's Republic of China founded
On October 1, 1949 the People's Republic of China was formally established within the capital of China, Beijing. The people were divided up into four social groups which were the workers, the peasants, the petite bourgeoisie, and the national-capitalists. The four classes were led by the CCP, as the vanguard of the working class. The Soviet Union recognized the People's Republic on October 2, 1949. In February 1950 China and the USSR signed the Treaty of Friendship,Alliance, & Mutual Assistance. -
Second Red Scare
As the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union intensified in the late 1940s and early 1950s this lead to the hysteria of communism which became known as the Red Scare. Communists were referred to as the "Reds" since the Soviet flag was red. Federal employees were analyzed to determine whether they were loyal to the U.S. government and supervised the Hollywood film industry. -
Korean War - American involvement
On June 24 the North Koreans invaded South Korea. A few days later Truman ordered U.S. Troops to help aid the civilians in South Korea and he also tried to convince the United Nations to send military aid as well. The UN troops were mostly American and were under the control of General Douglas MacArthur. Since the attack was a surprise the U.S.troops and South Koreans were pushed far down south by the Korean Peninsula by September. But by November they managed to push them back into North Korea -
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
Julius and Ethel Rosenburg, a married couple, were accused and arrested on the charge of conspiracy to commit espionage. Which in simpler terms they were accused of heading a spy ring that passed top-secret information concerning the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union. On April 5, 1951, a judge sentenced them to death and the pair was taken to Sing Sing Prison in Ossing, New York. -
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev lived through 1894-1971 and was the leader of the Soviet Union during the height of the Cold War. He instigated the Cuban Missile Crisis by placing nuclear weapons 90 miles from Florida. He crushed a revolt in Hungary and approved the building of the Berlin Wall. And at home he initiated a process of " de-Stalinization" that made Soviet society less repressive. -
Eisenhower Presidency
President Dwight D.Eisenhower took office on Tuesday, January 20, 1954. And his presidency lasted from January 20, 1953 to January 20 1961. Before his presidency he was the general who led the brave D Day attack on Normandy beach in France and during his presidency he managed the tensions of the Cold War between the U.S. and Soviet Union, ended the Korean War, and authorized a number of covert anti-communist operations by the CIA around the world. -
Warsaw Pact
On May 14 the Soviet Union and seven of its European satellites sign a treaty establishing the Warsaw Pact. Which was a mutual defense organization that put the Soviets in command of the armed forces of the member states. The name comes from the city Warsaw since it was signed there. The member of the pact are the Soviet Union, Albania, Poland, Romania, Hungary, East Germany, Czechoslovakia and Bulgaria. The pact was for the defense of any member attacked by an outside force. -
Suez Crisis
On October 29, 1956, Israeli armed forces went into Egypt toward the Suez Canal after the Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalized the canal in July in the same year. The Israelis were joined by the French and British forces, which almost brought the Soviet Union into the mix and damaged their relationships with the United States. In the end the Israeli, French, and British governments removed their troops in late 1956 and early 1957. -
Hungarian Revolution
A surprise national uprising that began 12 days before in Hungary was crushed by Soviet tanks and troops on November 4, 1956. Thousands were killed and wounded and nearly a quarter-million Hungarians fled the country. The protesters demanded a more democratic political system and freedom from Soviet oppression. -
Sputnik
Sputnik was the worlds first artificial satellite that was sent to space by the Soviet Union. Sputnik is the Russian word for "satellite" and it was launched at 10:29 p.m. Moscow time from the Tyuratam launch base in the Kazakh Republic. It weighed 184 pounds and its diameter was 22 inches. It circled Earth once every hour and 36 minutes. Traveling at 18,000 miles per hour its elliptical orbit had an apogee of 584 miles and a perigee of 143 miles. It transmitted radio signals back to Earth. -
Cuban Revolution
Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista flees the island nation Cuba and Fidel Castro takes power. The U.S. supported Batista because he was American friendly but Castro was very anti-American. The U.S. feared he would attack U.S. investments and properties in Cuba. Cuban support for Castro's revolution, however, spread and grew in the late 1950s. It grew because of the increasingly rampant corruption, brutality, and inefficiency within the Batista government. -
Kennedy Presidency
U.S. President John F. Kennedy was elected into office January 20, 1960 as the youngest president at the age of 43 and the first Roman Catholic to hold that office. He was born into one of Americas wealthiest families and had an elite education and reputation as a military hero into a successful run for congress in 1946 and for the Senate in 1952. Kennedy confronted mounting Cold War tensions in Cuba, Vietnam and elsewhere. He also provides federal support for the growing civil rights movement. -
U2 Incident
An American U-2 spy plane was shot down while conducting espionage over the Soviet Union. It derailed an important meeting between U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev that was scheduled for later that month. Flights over the Soviet Union began in mid-1956 and the CIA assured the president that the Soviets did not have weapons sophisticated enough to shoot down the high-altitude plane. The pilot of this plane was Francis Gary Powers. -
First Man in Space
On April 12, 1961, aboard the spacecraft Vostok 1, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Alekseyevich Gagarin became the first human being to ever travel into space. He was also the first man to orbit the plan. A feat accomplished by his space capsule in 89 minutes. Vostok 1 orbited earth at a altitude of 187 miles and was guided entirely by an automatic control system. Gagarin was awarded the Order of Lenin and given the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Monuments were made after him and streets. -
Bay of Pigs
The Bay of Pigs invasion was a CIA-financed and trained group of Cuban refugees that landed in Cuba and attempted to topple the communist government of Fidel Castro. The attack was a failure. Castro's attacks on U.S. Companies, interests in Cuba, and his inflammatory anti-American rhetoric led U.S. Officials to believe he was a threat to U.S. interests in the Western Hemisphere. -
Berlin Wall
Two days after sealing off free passage between East and West Berlin with a barbed fence the Berlin Wall began to get built by East Germany. The Berlin Wall is a literal representation of the "Iron Curtain" for the Cold War. Between 1949 and 1961, about 2.5 million East Germans fled from East to West Germany because they did't like to live under communist rule and West Germany was under a democratic rule.By August 1961, an average of 2,000 East Germans were crossing into the West every day. -
Checkpoint Charlie
Checkpoint Charlie was the name given by the Western Allies to the well known Berlin Wall crossing point between East Berlin and West Berlin during the Cold War. Checkpoint Charlie became a symbol of the Cold War and Soviet and American tanks briefly faced each other at the location during the Berlin Crisis of 1961. After the dissolution of the Eastern Bloc and the reunification of Germany Checkpoint Charlie is now a tourist attraction. -
JFK Assassination
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated while traveling through Dallas, Texas, in an open-top convertible on November 22, 1963 around 12:30 p.m. His assasinator was Lee Harvey Oswald who shot JFK from the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depository Building. He was announced dead 30 minutes later and Governor Connally was also injured in the shooting. First lady Jacqueline Kennedy was by his side when he got shot, -
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution gave a broad congressional approval for expansion of the Vietnam War. During the spring of 1964 military planners came up with good plans on how to attack the north but President Lyndon B. Johnson didn't make any final decions to go through with them yet because him and his advisers were worried that the public would not support an expansion of the war. But after a vicous attack by the north he submitted a resolution that the congress passed to attack the north. -
Vietnam War - American involvement
The war began in 1954 and ended in 1975. More than 3 million people (including 58,000 Americans) were killed in the Vietnam War. More than half were Vietnamese civilians. It started after the rise to power of Ho Chi Minh and his communist Viet Minh party in North Vietnam, and continued against the backdrop of an intense Cold War between two global superpowers the United States and the Soviet Union. -
SALT I
In January 1967, President Lyndon Johnson announced that the Soviet Union had begun to construct a limited Anti-Ballistic defense system around Moscow. This would allow one side to launch a first strike and prevent the other from retaliating. So Johnson called for a strategic arms limitation talks called "SALTS". While trying to get rid of all nuclear weapons would be impossible this would limit the development of both offensive and defensive strategic systems between the U.S and Soviet Union. -
Prague Spring
On January 5, 1968, Antonjn Novotny, the Stalinist ruler of Czechoslovakia, is succeeded as first secretary by Alexander Dubcek, a Slovak who supports liberal reforms. In the first few months of his rule he introduced a series of far-reaching political and economic reforms like increasing of freedom of speech and the rehabilitation of political dissidents. The brief period of freedom became known as the "Prague Spring". -
Tet Offensive
On January 31, 1968, about 70,000 North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces launched the Tet offensive. Which was a coordinated series of fierce attacks on more than 100 cities and towns in South Vietnam. General Vo Nguyen Giap who was the leader of the north Vietnam army led the offensive in an attempt to foment rebellion among the south Vietnamese population. -
Nixon Presidency
President Richard Nixon was the 37th president and was elected in 1969. His presidency lasted between 1968 till 1974. He was previously a U.S. Representative and a U.S. Senator from California. He ended the war in Vietnam and improved relations between the Soviet Union and China. He has been the only president to resign office due to the Watergate scandal. -
Apollo 11
On July 20, 1969, American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin became the first human to ever land and walk on the moon. Armstrong was the first to actually walk on the moon after 6 hours of the landing. When he took his first step he said something that is now a famous quote which is " That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." The Apollo mission occurred eight years after President JFK announced a national goal of landing a man on the moon by the end of the 1960s. -
Tiananmen Square Massacre
On June 4, 1989 Chinese troops storm through Tiananmen Square in the center of Beijing and killer and arrested thousands of pro-democracy protesters. The protesters were mostly young students who were just there protesting peacefully. About a thousand or more protesters had been killed and as many as 10,000 were arrested. About three weeks later the U.S. Congress voted to impose economic sanctions against the People's Republic of China in response to the brutal violation of human rights. -
Fall of the Berlin Wall
The Berlin Wall had stood until November 9, 1989, once the head of the East German Communist Party that citizens of the GDR could cross the border whenever they wanted to. That night thousands of people swarmed the wall. Some people just crossed the border and other brought picks and hammers to try and break up the wall itself. To this day the Berlin Wall is one of the most powerful and enduring symbol of the Cold War. -
Dissolution of the Soviet Union
On Christmas Day of 1991 the Soviet Flag flew over Kremlin Moscow for the last time. A few days earlier representatives from 11 Soviet republics met in Kazakh city of Alma-Ata and announced that they would no longer be part of the Soviet Union. They declared they would establish a Commonwealth of Independent States. The Soviet Union had fell mainly because the great number of radical reforms that Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev had implemented during his 6 years as the leader of USSR.
