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Formation of Socialist Ideology
Thomas Paine proposed a detailed plan to tax property owners to pay for the needs of the poor (1797). Charles Hall wrote The Effects of Civilization on the People in European States denouncing capitalism's effect on the poor of his time (1805). -
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish The Communist Manifesto
The Communist Manifesto is a political pamphlet written by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels that presents an analytical approach to the class strugle and problems of capitalism. -
Russian Revolution
A pair of revolutions in Russia that removed the Tsars from power, replacing them with a provisional government. The provisional government was then replaced with a communist state. -
Lenin as leader of USSR
Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov was a Russian communist revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He serverd as head of Russia from 1917 to the mid twenties. He created a one-party socialist state and political theories known as Leninism. He suppressed opponents in the Red Terror, which resulted in many deaths and many people being placed in concentration camps. -
Stalin as Leader of USSR
Joseph Stalin was the leader of the Soviet Union from 1922 till his death in 1953. He was effectively the dictator of the state. He endorsed Socialism in One Country rather than world communism. Between 1934 and 1939 he organized the Great Purge, in which many enemies of the working class were imprisioned, exiled, or kiled. -
Manhattan Project
The Manhattan Project was a research and development undertaking that produced the first nuclear weapons. It was led by the US with help from Canada and the UK. -
Yalta Conference
A meeting of the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union to discuss reorganization of Europe after World War II. -
Potsdam Conference
A meeting between the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States. They discussed the German economy, punishment for war criminals, land boundaries, and reparations. They also demanded that Japan surrender. Germany was divided. (see "Division of Germany") -
Division of Germany
The Allies divided Germany into four zones — France in the southwest, Britain in the northwest, the United States in the south, and the Soviet Union in the east. -
US successfully uses atomic bombs in warfare (first use of the atomic bomb)
On August 6, the US detonated an atomic bomb ("Little Boy") over Hiroshima killing ~70,000 people. Three days later "Fat Man" was detonated over Nagasaki killing ~35,000 people. -
US Adopts Policy of Containment
The Cold War policy of the United States and its allies to prevent the spread of communism. -
Formation of the Iron Curtain
The boundary that divided Europe from the end of World War II until the end of the cold war. The borderline ran from Estonia in the north to Yugoslavia in the south. -
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Cold War
The Cold War was a state of geopolitical tension after WWII between capitalist and communist countries. There was no large-scale fighting between the two sides. It increased development of technology due to competition, seen in the space and arms races. -
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Nuclear Arms Race
A race between the warsaw pact and NATO to build more and more effective bombs such as the H bomb. -
Truman Doctrine
An American foreign policy created to counter Soviet expansion during the Cold War. The US provided aid to countries to prevent communism from expanding. -
Marshall Plan
An American initiative to aid Western Europe, in which the United States gave over $12 billion in economic support to help rebuild Western European economies after the end of World War II. -
Berlin Airlift
After the Soviet Union blockaded their portion of Berlin, the United States, rather than allowing the Soviet Union to have the city, sent supplies to the city with airplanes. -
Creation of NATO
NATO was primarily a security pact, with Article 5 stating that a military attack against any of the signatories would be considered an attack against them all. It consisted of Belgium, Britain, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and the United States. -
USSR Successfully Tests Its Own Atomic Bombs
The project was directed by Soviet nuclear physicist Igor Kurchatov, while the military logistics and intelligence efforts were undertaken and managed by NKVD people's commissar Lavrentiy Beria. Greatly aided by its successful Soviet Alsos and the atomic spies, the Soviet Union conducted its first weapon test of an implosion-type nuclear device, RDS-1, codenamed First Lightning, on 29 August 1949, at Semipalatinsk, Kazakh SSR. -
Chinese Revolution
The Chinese Communist Revolution started in 1945, after the end of Second Sino-Japanese War, and it is the second part of the Chinese Civil War. It was the culmination of the Chinese Communist Party's drive to power since its founding in 1921. -
Korean War
Began when North Korea invaded South Korea.[39][40] The United Nations, with the United States as the principal force, came to the aid of South Korea. China came to the aid of North Korea, and the Soviet Union gave some assistance. -
Cuban Revolution
An armed revolt conducted by Fidel Castro's 26th of July Movement and its allies against the right-wing authoritarian government of Cuban President Fulgencio Batista. -
Nikita Khruschev as leader of USSR
Khrushchev was responsible for the de-Stalinization of the Soviet Union, for backing the progress of the early Soviet space program, and for several relatively liberal reforms in areas of domestic policy. -
Warsaw Pact created
The Warsaw Pact was a collective defense treaty among the Soviet Union and seven other Soviet satellite states in Central and Eastern Europe during the Cold War. It was created in reaction to the integration of West Germany into NATO. -
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Space Race
Competition between the USSR and the US for supremacy in spaceflight capability with origins in the nuclear arms race. -
Vietnam War
A war that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955[A 1] to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vietnam and the government of South Vietnam. The North Vietnamese army was supported by the Soviet Union, China and other communist allies and the South Vietnamese army was supported by the United States, South Korea, Australia, Thailand and other anti-communist allies. -
US adopts brinkmanship policy
Foreign policy practice in which one or both parties force the interaction between them to the threshold of confrontation in order to gain an advantageous negotiation position over the other. For example, the Cuban missile crisis. -
USSR invades Hungary
A revolt began as a student demonstration but spread quickly across Hungary and the government collapsed. After announcing a willingness to negotiate a withdrawal of Soviet forces, the Politburo changed its mind and moved to crush the revolution. -
Eisenhower Doctrine
The Eisenhower Doctrine was a policy enunciated by President Dwight David Eisenhower on 5 January 1957, within a "Special Message to the Congress on the Situation in the Middle East". Under the Eisenhower Doctrine, a Middle Eastern country could request American economic assistance or aid from U.S. military forces if it was being threatened by armed aggression. -
USSR launched Sputnik
The Soviet Union beat the US to the first satellite, with the October 4, 1957 orbiting of Sputnik 1. -
China's "Great Leap forward"
An economic and social campaign by the Communist Party of China (CPC) from 1958 to 1962. The campaign was led by Chairman Mao Zedong and aimed to rapidly transform the country from an agrarian economy into a socialist society through rapid industrialization and collectivization. However, it is widely considered to have caused the Great Chinese Famine. -
US Launched its own satilite
On January 31, 1958, nearly four months after the launch of Sputnik 1, von Braun and the United States successfully launched its first satellite, Explorer 1, on a four-stage Juno I rocket derived from the US Army's Redstone missile, at Cape Canaveral. -
Leonid Brezhnev as leader of USSR
Brezhnev concentrated on foreign and military affairs. During the 1970s Brezhnev attempted to normalize relations between West Germany and the Warsaw Pact and to ease tensions with the United States through the policy known as détente. At the same time, he saw to it that the Soviet Union’s military-industrial complex was greatly expanded and modernized. -
U2 Incident
A United States U-2 spy plane was shot down while in Soviet airspace. The aircraft, flown by Central Intelligence Agency pilot Francis Gary Powers, was performing photographic aerial reconnaissance when it was hit by an S-75 Dvina surface-to-air missile and crashed near Sverdlovsk. -
Bay of Pigs invasion
A failed military invasion of Cuba undertaken by the CIA-sponsored paramilitary group Brigade 2506 on 17 April 1961. -
Nicaraguan Revolution
The Revolution marked a significant period in Nicaraguan history and revealed the country as one of the major proxy war battlegrounds of the Cold War with the events in the country rising to international attention. -
Cuban Missile Crisis
A 13-day confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union concerning American ballistic missile deployment in Italy and Turkey with consequent Soviet ballistic missile deployment in Cuba. -
China’s Cultural Revolution
Set into motion by Mao Zedong, then Chairman of the Communist Party of China, its stated goal was to preserve 'true' Communist ideology in the country by purging remnants of capitalist and traditional elements from Chinese society, and to re-impose Maoist thought as the dominant ideology within the Party. -
Khmer Rouge
The Khmer Rouge organization is remembered especially for orchestrating the Cambodian genocide, which resulted from the enforcement of its social engineering policies. Its attempts at agricultural reform led to widespread famine, while its insistence on absolute self-sufficiency, even in the supply of medicine, led to the death of thousands from treatable diseases such as malaria. -
Warsaw Pact Nations Invade Czechoslovakia and Quell Prague Spring
A joint invasion of Czechoslovakia by four Warsaw Pact nations – the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, Hungary and Poland – on the night of 20–21 August 1968.[15] Approximately 250,000[4] Warsaw pact troops attacked Czechoslovakia that night, with Romania and Albania refusing to participate. -
Detente
The term is most often used in reference to a period of easing between the Soviet Union and the United States, it was the distinct lessening of the Cold War. -
Nixon Visits China and Russia
An important step in formally normalizing relations between the United States and China. It marked the first time a U.S. president had visited the PRC, which at that time considered the U.S. one of its foes, and the visit ended 25 years of separation between the two sides. Nixon's visit to Russia is considered one of the hallmarks of the détente at the time between the two Cold War antagonists. -
SALT I
SALT I limited the number of weapons a nation could possess. It was an agreement between the US and USSR. -
Helsinki Accords
The final act of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe held in Finlandia Hall of Helsinki, Finland, during July and August 1, 1975. Thirty-five states, including the USA, Canada, and all European states except Albania and Andorra, signed the declaration in an attempt to improve relations between the Communist bloc and the West. -
SALT II
SALT II was a series of talks between the United States and Soviet negotiators from 1972 to 1979 which sought to curtail the manufacture of strategic nuclear weapons. It was a continuation of the SALT I talks and was led by representatives from both countries. -
USSR invades Afghanistan
Insurgent groups known as the mujahideen fought against the Soviet Army and the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan. -
US boycotts Moscow Olympics
The 1980 Summer Olympics boycott was one part of a number of actions initiated by the United States to protest the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Soviet Union, which hosted the 1980 Summer Olympics, and other countries would later boycott the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. -
Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher adopt anti-communist stances
On March 3, 1983, Reagan predicted that Communism would collapse: "I believe that communism is another sad, bizarre chapter in human history whose — last pages even now are being written." Thatcher became closely aligned with the Cold War policies of United States President Ronald Reagan, based on their shared distrust of Communism. -
Mikhail Gorbachev as Leader of USSR
Gorbachev's policies of glasnost and perestroika and his reorientation of Soviet strategic aims contributed to the end of the Cold War. Under this program, the role of the Communist Party in governing the state was removed from the constitution, which inadvertently led to crisis-level political instability with a surge of regional nationalist and anti-communist activism culminating in the dissolution of the Soviet Union. -
Glasnost
Used as a slogan for increased government transparency by Mikhail Gorbachev. A time of decreasing pre-publication and pre-broadcast censorship and greater freedom of information, but censorship or the central control of information by the government and the Party remained a fundamental element of the Soviet system until the very end. -
Perestroika
A political movement for reformation within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union during the 1980s, widely associated with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his glasnost policy reform. -
Tiananmen Square Massacre
The Tiananmen Square protests were student-led demonstrations in Beijing in 1989. The protests were forcibly suppressed after the government declared martial law. In what became widely known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, troops with assault rifles and tanks killed at least several hundred demonstrators trying to block the military's advance towards Tiananmen Square. The number of civilian deaths has been estimated at anywhere from the hundreds to the thousands. -
Fall of The Berlin Wall
Began the evening of 9 November 1989 and continued over the following days and weeks, with people nicknamed Mauerspechte (wall woodpeckers) using various tools to chip off souvenirs, demolishing lengthy parts in the process, and creating several unofficial border crossings. -
Former Soviet Republics Become Independent Nations
On March 11, 1990, Lithuania was the first to declare its independence, with Estonia and Latvia following suit in August 1991. All three Baltic states claimed continuity from the original states that existed prior to their annexation by the Soviet Union in 1944 and were admitted to the United Nations on 17 September 1991. The remaining 12 republics all subsequently seceded. -
Germany Reunited
The process in 1990 in which the German Democratic Republic joined the Federal Republic of Germany to form the reunited nation of Germany, and when Berlin reunited into a single city, as provided by its then Grundgesetz constitution Article 23. -
End of The USSR
A result of the declaration number 142-Н of the Soviet of the Republics of the Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. The declaration acknowledged the independence of the former Soviet republics and created the Commonwealth of Independent States. -
North Korea Develops Nuclear Weapons
On October 9, 2006, North Korea announced it had successfully conducted its first nuclear test. An underground nuclear explosion was detected, its yield was estimated as less than a kiloton, and some radioactive output was detected. -
US and Cuba Renew Relations
Relations between Cuba and the United States were formally re-established on 20 July 2015, with the opening of the Cuban embassy in Washington and the U.S. embassy in Havana.
