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At the end of WW2, nations were destroyed, and many people were hoping for peace. As a result of this worldwide need, representatives of 50 countries gathered together and drafted and signed the UN charter. This created the United Nations, which would hopefully prevent another war like WW2. -
The Hollywood 10 were Alvah Bessie, Herbert Biberman, Lester Cole, Edward Dmytryk, Ring Lardner Jr, John Howard Lawson, Albert Maltz, Samuel Ornitz, Adrian Scott, and Dalton Trumbo. They were motion-picture producers, directors, and screenwriters that appeared before the HUAC. They refused to answer questions about their views and whether they were communists. After spending time in prison for contempt of Congress, they were mostly blacklisted by the Hollywood studios. -
The Truman doctrine was first expressed by US president Harry Truman. He spoke to congress about seeking aid for Greece and Turkey. The main idea of it was that the US should give support to countries or people threatened by Soviet forces or Communist insurrection. -
The Marshall Plan was a U.S. program that aided Western Europe after World War II. It provided more than $15 billion to help finance rebuilding efforts on the continent. It was crafted as a four-year plan to reconstruct cities, industries and infrastructure heavily damaged during the war and to remove trade barriers between European neighbors, as well as foster commerce between those countries and the United States. -
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created in 1949 to provide collective security against the Soviet Union. It included the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations. -
The Korean war began when around 75,000 soldiers from the North Korean People’s Army crossed the 38th parallel, the boundary between the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea and the Republic of Korea. This invasion was the first military action of the Cold War. In July 1953, the Korean War came to an end. In all, some 5 million soldiers and civilians lost their lives and the Korean peninsula remains divided today.
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The United States entered Vietnam with the principal purpose of preventing a communist takeover of the region. -
Beginning in the late 1950s, space became another dramatic arena for the competition between the US and Soviet Union, as each side sought to prove the superiority of its technology, its military firepower and–by extension–its political-economic system. The Soviets were able to launch Sputnik 1 and have it in orbit, which suggested that the Soviet Union had made a substantial leap forward in technology and was leading in the Space Race. -
The Bay of Pigs Invasion was a failed attack launched by the CIA during the Kennedy administration to push the Cuban leader Fidel Castro from power. During the invasion, the CIA launched a full-scale invasion of Cuba by many American-trained Cubans who had fled their homes when Castro took over (they also were unhappy with Castro’s power). However, the invaders were badly outnumbered by Castro’s troops, and they surrendered after less than 24 hours of fighting. -
Around the 1950s/60s, East Germans were getting nervous of the communist regime that was appearing leading to many emigrating to West Germany. However, the GDR leaders were not happy with this, as this led to a flight of workers in the East and caused an issue in trafficking goods between the East and West. This had the potential to cause an economic problem, so they decided to build a wall to separate the groups. -
During December, The Soviet Union set out to invade Afghanistan and take control of the country. The Soviets sent thousands of troops to Afghanistan and immediately assumed complete military and political control of Kabul and large portions of the country. -
Before the borders came down, many in East Berlin had gathered for a mass protest, which led to this outcome. East and West Berliners flocked to the wall and flooded through the checkpoints. People from East Berlin visited West Berlin that weekend to participate in the celebration. Soon the wall was gone and Berlin was united. Originally, the goal of East German leaders was to calm protest by only loosening the borders. They had not intended for the wall to be torn down completely.