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Potsdam Conference
From July 17 to August 2, 1945 President Harry Truman of the United States, Prime Minister of England, and Joseph Stalin gathered to demand the surrender of Japan and set up a framework for postwar Europe. Each leader was trying to get the strongest position and the most influence for his own country, but the countries fell into two camps.The Potsdam Conference set up a competition between capitalist Western powers and the communist-controlled Soviet Union. This rivalry grew into the Cold War. -
NATO/Warsaw Pact
NATO was created on April 4, 1949 for defense against the soviet union and eastern European alliances. In the beginning there were 12 countries. The countries that were a part of NATO planned, financed and infrastructure such as bases and pipelines. They also focused on defense, nuclear weapons.
The Warsaw pact was signed on may 14, 1955. The warsaw pact was created in response to NATO and to protect themselves from any threats from the west. -
Korean War
IN June of 1950 the north Koreans attacked south Korea crossing the 38th parallel dividing north and south Korea. China later got mad at south Korea and their alliances because they went north of the 38th parallel. This war affected and impacted a lot of people across the world. The Korean war took the lives of 3.1 million south Koreans, 1 million Chinese, 500,000 north Koreans, and 37,000 Americans. -
Vietnam War
The war started in 1954 and ended in 1975. There was a civil war between the north and south parts of vietnam. The north side of vietnam wanted the country to become communist, the viet mihn was in control. While the south side of vietnam did not want that to happen. The south was lead by Ngo dinh diem. China and The SOviet Union supported the south. The U.S.A.supported the south. In 1974 when the USA cut back the military aid to south vietnam they fell quickly. -
Sputnik/Space Race
On october 4 1957 the soviet launched the earth's first satellite. The USA was generally behind in technology compared to the soviet union overall. The reason they did this was to raise cold war tensions. The space race was a competition between soviet union and the USA to see whose space exploration achievements are better. -
Suez Crisis
America and britain changed their minds and did not pay for the dam even though they said they would at an earlier date. Egypt nationalized the dam making people pay for it whenever crossed. This made britain and france mad so they took over the canal. The United nations didn't like their decisions and on december 22 1957 they evacuated the french and british troops . -
Cuban Missile Crisis
An american spy plane saw a soviet ss-4 being built. Cuba is 90 miles from the usa so this started a lot of commotion between russian and american. In october of 1962 there was a 13 day standoff, and John F Kennedy addressed the citizens about it on the 22nd of october. The reason the USSR put the missiles in cuba was because the usa has many missiles pointed toward them so they wanted one pointing at the USA. They later agreed to take the missiles out of cuba if the USA did not attack cuba -
Glastnost/Perestroika
In the mid 1980s the soviet union started reconstruction of the soviet union. They opened it up to the public and allowed the press to cover more things about the government so the citizens arent that clueless.In the late 1980s they began the democratization of the soviet union. They modernized russia and allowed more freedom to the citizens.