History 5164 Final Exam

Berlin Blockade

1948; Marshall Plan heightened Soviets fear of a reunified Germany; Trizonia was created by US, France, Britain to save Germany's economy. Stalin feared it would lead to West absorbing the East. West announced the West German Republic, caused Soviets to take action & imposed blockades of all surface routes into West Berlin (rail, highway, water) in an effort to intimidate & divide Western alliances, halt the move toward West German govt, and undermine US influence in Europe. They also froze city banks & reduced the flow of electricity into West Berlin. They also issued the Warsaw Declaration that demanded the return to the 4-power division of Germany stipulated by Potsdam. Significance: US response: massive airlift. Was successful, and served as a catapult for the establishment of NATO.

Marshall Plan

1948; based on Kennan's report on the European situation, Marshall warned that economic, social, and political deterioration of Europe was conducive to political instability, totalitarian exploitation, and obstruction of peace. His plan is directed at all European countries to fight hunger, poverty, desperation, and chaos. Kennan believed the Soviets would not participate b/c they would have to open up government files to verify need. The plan caused a flurry of activity in Europe that culminated in 20 governments in Europe drafting proposals for US aid. Soviets saw as an imperialist conspiracy & intimidated their satellite countries in not participating. Soviets then negotiated defense pacts with with Finland, Bulgaria, Hungary, & Romania, and established the Cominform in Belgrade to disrupt US influence in Europe. Established the ERP (European Recovery Program) that provided over $12 billion of assistance, and also restored the selective service. Resulted from a combo of idealistic and realistic concerns, and although US did for humanitarian reasons, it also sought to stop communism from spreading, restore order to Europe, enhance US prestige, and reopen markets (promoted economic growth by expanding capitalism through Bretton Woods agreements of 1944). Resulted in Soviet clamping down on Eastern Europe & a heightened fear of a reunified Germany, and ended up being 80% military aid that hardened the division of the Cold War.

NSC-68

1950; Truman directed State & Defense Dpts to make an overall review & reassessment of American foreign & defense policy after the loss of China to communism, Soviets mastery of atomic energy, and prospect of H-bombs. This document urged the US to strike out & built a massive defense arsenal of atomic weapons & thermonuclear weapons. It defined the worlds problems as: communism v. democracy. It called for the US to contain communism then foster seeds of destruction within the Soviet system. Significance: vastly increased defense budgets, increased sensitivity to "setbacks" beyond Europe and East Asia, new worries about a Soviet military threat - that sort of thing

Open Skies proposal

1955, at a four-power summit in Geneva, President Dwight D. Eisenhower called on the United States and the Soviet Union to exchange maps showing the location of every military installation in their respective nations. The presidential initiative became known as an "Open Skies" proposal since, with such maps in hand, both superpowers would conduct aerial surveillance of each other's territory to ensure they had complied with any arms accord. While the French and British expressed interest, the Soviets rejected it. In Moscow, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev branded Eisenhower's Open Skies as an "espionage plot." Bush was able to get it signed in 1992.

Z: Why did the early 1960's prove such a dangerous & crisis-driven period in foreign policy?

1961-1968: The Presidencies of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson The Laos Crisis, 1960-1963 The Congo, Decolonization, and the Cold War, 1960-1965 USAID and PL-480, 1961-1969 The Bay of Pigs Invasion and its Aftermath, April 1961-October 1962 The Cuban Missile Crisis, October 1962 Alliance for Progress and Peace Corps, 1961-1969 The Limited Test Ban Treaty, 1963 U.S. Involvement in the Vietnam War: the Gulf of Tonkin and Escalation, 1964 The India-Pakistan War of 1965 The 1967 Arab-Israeli War U.S. Involvement in the Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive, 1968 Soviet Invasion of Czechoslovakia, 1968 The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), 1968

ABLE ARCHER

1983 NATO nuclear release simulation that used tactical nuclear weapons, followed by limited Soviet retaliation, followed by general nuclear war. Various heads of state in Western Europe participated in the exercise; closest since Cuban Missile Crisis that nuclear warfare could happen; Significance: To counter this strike (which the West never intended to launch), Soviet leader Yuri Andropov initiated Operation RYaN, the Soviet human intelligence effort to detect and preempt a Western "surprise nuclear missile attack."

Dayton Accords

4 December 1995, the Dayton Peace Accords were signed in Paris, France, ending three and half years of violent and bloody war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the most brutal conflict in Europe since the Second World War. Significance: the accords led to the deployment of NATO's first peacekeeping force to oversee implementation of the military annexe of the peace agreement. This was an important milestone, not only for security in the Western Balkans, but also for NATO's post-Cold War transformation.

"CNN effect"

A theory that seeks to explain the effect that 24-hour news networks, such as CNN, have on the general political and economic climate. Because media outlets provide ongoing coverage of a particular event or subject matter, the attention of viewers is narrowly focused for potentially prolonged periods of time. Significance: The CNN effect can therefore cause individuals and organizations to react more aggressively towards the subject matter being examined. For example, regular coverage of turmoil in the banking sector may result in the Federal Reserve taking the necessary action to minimize any potential detrimental effects.

Z: If Stalin served a roadblock to easing tensions between superpowers, why did the Cold War outlast him?

After Stalin's death in March 1953, the Cold War changed almost overnight. The Soviet Union embarked on a course of reconciliation and greater openness. However, despite an end to the Korean War and progress on many other outstanding East-West questions, the Western world remained mistrustful of Soviet motives and policies and Soviet leaders remained suspicious of Western intentions. Less than a decade after Stalin's death the Berlin Wall was erected and the Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world close to nuclear annihilation. Stalin supported and inspired copycat dictators, from Kim Il Sung in North Korea to Pol Pot in Cambodia. Just because he died didn't mean his legacy didn't continue to live on.

Z: Was there a fundamental agreement among Americans about the country's foreign policy (Cold War consensus)?

Americans had long feared radical subversion, and during the Red Scare of 1919-1920, the government had attempted to remove perceived threats to American society. Even stronger efforts were made after World War II to root out communism within the United States. Foreign events and espionage scandals contributed to the anti-communist hysteria of the period. In 1949 the Soviet Union exploded its own atomic device, which shocked Americans into believing that the United States would be the target of a Soviet attack. The main pattern in American foreign policy politics during this period was the "Cold War consensus," which was composed of three fundamental components: 1. Presidential dominance over Congress 2. A vast expansion of the executive-branch foreign and defense policy bureaucracy 3. A fervent anticommunism pervading public opinion Such consensus resulted in poor policy planning during the Bay of Pigs invasion and the persecution of American citizens. These events demonstrate how too much of a consensus can have negative consequences. PUBLIC: sacrificing personal rights and freedoms by creating an environment of mass hysteria. The media would make assumptions that would make the US go crazy. "mccarthyism" was also going on and making elected officials harder on communism

U-2 Incident

An American U-2 spy plane is shot down while conducting espionage over the Soviet Union. The incident derailed an important summit meeting between President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev that was scheduled for later that month. Significance: The U-2 incident had convinced Khrushchev that he could no longer cooperate with Eisenhower, and the Soviet leader walked out of the Paris meeting just hours after it began. Soviet negotiators also abandoned talks on nuclear disarmament the following month. These events, which unfolded during Eisenhower's final year in the White House, brought a new chill to relations between America and the USSR and set the stage for further confrontations during the administration of Eisenhower's successor, John F. Kennedy

Cambodian incursion

April 30, 1970; US bombs Cambodia to disrupt supply lines. Although Nixon officially declared the invasion in April, there had been air raids in Cambodia for the past year, without the American Citizens' knowledge. Significance: Nixon had promised "Vietnamization", and many of the citizens felt failed by the President they trusted. The relief that the soldiers may have been coming home quickly fled the minds of all of their waiting families. All the people of America became filled with anger and shock. As a result, protests both peaceful and violent erupted across the country. This reaction was significant in the Vietnam War conflict, because it marked the beginning of the large disagreement between the American Citizens and the Military arrangements that Nixon declared.

6. George Schultz

As Secretary of State for Reagan, Shultz played a crucial role in guiding U.S. diplomacy during his lengthy six and a half year tenure in office. Upon his confirmation, he inherited a number of foreign policy challenges, including war in Lebanon, delicate negotiations with the People's Republic of China and the Government on Taiwan, and a ratcheting up of Cold War tensions with the Soviet Union. Over the next several years, Shultz focused U.S. diplomatic efforts on resolving the conflict in the Middle East, defusing trade disputes with Japan, managing increasingly tense relationships with several Latin American nations, and crafting U.S. responses to the rise of Mikhail Gorbachev and the new Soviet policies of perestroika and opening to the West.Shultz helped to draft and sign landmark arms control treaties and other agreements that helped to diminish U.S.-Soviet antagonism. Significance: As a result, under Shultz's leadership, U.S. diplomacy helped to pave the way for the ending of the Cold War during 1989.

new look

As for military policy, Eisenhower instituted the "New Look," which entailed reducing the army from 1,500,000 men in 1953 to 900,000 in 1960. The navy experienced smaller reductions, while air force expenditures rose. Eisenhower was primarily interested in deterring a nuclear attack and to that end promoted expensive developments in nuclear weaponry and long-range missiles. The New Look strategy Flexible Response was an alternative to President Dwight D. Eisenhower's New Look national security policy. The New Look approach relied heavily on the capacity for a devastating assault with nuclear weapons—the strategy of massive retaliation—to fight Soviet military provocations, regardless of whether they involved nuclear weapons or not. Strategic Air Command (SAC) It was under President Dwight D. Eisenhower's administration that SAC grew most significantly in both size and importance. The "New Look" national security concept, developed in 1953, posited that U.S. forces would rely on nuclear weapons as a deterrent and on air power as a strategic advantage. It was at that point that the Air Force began developing numerous bombers to deliver...

Gaither Report

As the United States reeled from the Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik in late 1957, President Dwight D. Eisenhower received a top secret report prepared by a committee of leading scientific, business, and military experts. The panel, called the Gaither committee in recognition of its first chairman, H. Rowan Gaither, Jr., emphasized both the inadequacy of U.S. defense measures designed to protect the civil population and the vulnerability of the country's strategic nuclear forces in the event of a Soviet attack. The Gaither committee viewed these defense measures--ranging from a missile system to defend the continental United States to the construction of shelters to protect the population from radioactive fallout--and the maintenance of sufficient strategic forces to launch military strikes against Soviet targets as essential for the preservation of U.S. security. It concluded that in the case of a surprise Soviet nuclear attack the United States would be unable to defend itself with any degree of success. Significance: The committee emphasized the urgent need for the Eisenhower administration to strengthen the country's continental and civil defenses and to accelerate the development of its strategic striking power.

Z: Why did detente- Nixon/Kissinger's much ballyhooed "framework for peace" ultimately prove as fragile as it was?

Beginning in the early 1970s, President Richard Nixon and his national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, began with the Soviet Union a process of détente—a series of negotiations and cultural exchanges designed to reduce tensions and find issues on which the rival superpowers could cooperate. The real change in U.S.-Soviet relations, however, began with the selection of Mikhail Gorbachev as leader of the Soviet Union in 1985 and his policies of glasnost ("openness") and perestroika ("restructuring").

Vietnam Syndrome

By the end of 1970s, Vietnam Syndrome was no longer a medical term and it came to have a pure political meaning, coined by Henry Kissinger and popularized by Ronald Reagan to describe the U.S.'s reluctance to send troops into combat situations overseas. This happened because the U.S. was afraid that they would get bogged down in a "quagmire" again, like they did in Vietnam, and this which would lead to a loss of support for the government. A view held largely by American conservatives that the "loss" of the Vietnam War has created an American public biased against any type of American military conflicts. President George H.W. Bush declared that Vietnam Syndrome was finally "kicked". It's believed the U.S. had recovered from the disaster in Vietnam. This idea is backed up by the broad support of government in battles in Afghanistan and Iraq in first decade of 21st century.

Operation TP-AJAX

CIA's first successful overthrow of a foreign government. It was the blueprint for a succession of CIA plots to foment coups and destabilize governments during the cold war - including the agency's successful coup in Guatemala in 1954 and the disastrous Cuban intervention known as the Bay of Pigs in 1961. In more than one instance, such operations led to the same kind of long-term animosity toward the United States that occurred in Iran.

Operation RESTORE HOPE

Clan violence in Somalia interfered with international famine relief efforts, and President Bush sent American troops to protect relief workers in a new operation called Restore Hope. The US-led coalition approved by the Security Council in December 1992 had a mandate of protecting humanitarian operations and creating a secure environment for eventual political reconciliation. At the same time, it had the authority to use all necessary means, including military force.

7. Henry "Scoop" Jackson

Congressman who served under 9 presidents; Jackson was the quintessential "Cold War liberal." He was an outspoken and influential advocate of increased military spending and a hard line against the Soviet Union, while supporting social welfare programs, civil rights, and the labor movement. Significance: He guided landmark environmental legislation that greatly expanded wilderness areas and national parks in Washington and across the country, managed the bills that granted statehood to Alaska and Hawaii, and sponsored the law that turned surplus military bases into parks in Seattle and elsewhere.

Z: It is commonly said of the Cuban Missile Crisis that the US & Soviet went "eyeball to eyeball" but that by standing firm and cleverly "managing" the crisis, the Kennedy admin forced the Russian to back down. True?

Despite the enormous tension, Soviet and American leaders found a way out of the impasse. During the crisis, the Americans and Soviets had exchanged letters and other communications, and on October 26, Khrushchev sent a message to Kennedy in which he offered to remove the Cuban missiles in exchange for a promise by U.S. leaders not to invade Cuba. The following day, the Soviet leader sent a letter proposing that the USSR would dismantle its missiles in Cuba if the Americans removed their missile installations in Turkey. Officially, the Kennedy administration decided to accept the terms of the first message and ignore the second Khrushchev letter entirely. Privately, however, American officials also agreed to withdraw their nation's missiles from Turkey. U.S. Attorney General Robert Kennedy (1925-68) personally delivered the message to the Soviet ambassador in Washington, and on October 28, the crisis drew to a close. Both the Americans and Soviets were sobered by the Cuban Missile Crisis. The following year, a direct "hot line" communication link was installed between Washington and Moscow to help defuse similar situations, and the superpowers signed two treaties related to nuclear weapons. The Cold War was far from over, though. In fact, another legacy of the crisis was that it convinced the Soviets to increase their investment in an arsenal of intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the U.S. from Soviet territory.

Dien Bien Phu Crisis

Dien Bien Phu was important because it was the battle that resulted in the French giving up and leaving their colony in Indochina. They had been fighting since soon after WWII to try to regain control over their colony, which had been taken from them by Japan during the war. Their opposition was a group called the Viet Minh, which was led by communists. The US had been supporting France in this war. The US felt that it was important that Vietnam be prevented from falling into communist hands. Therefore, when France left, the US stepped in, becoming the major support for the South Vietnamese (the country was split after the French left) regime. The Vietnam War, of course, was perhaps the most important Cold War conflict and was certainly the most important Cold War-related issue of the mid-to-late 1960s. Dien Bien Phu is significant, then, because it led to the US becoming more involved in the situation that led to the Vietnam War.

Rollback

Dulles; well-publicized article he wrote in Life magazine condemned the containment policy of the Truman administration as merely a negative attempt to restrain Soviet expansionism and demanded a new policy of boldness that would restore the initiative to the United States. During the 1952 campaign he called stridently not only for the 'rollback' of Soviet gains in Eastern Europe but also for the 'unleashing' of Chiang Kai-shek.

Operation Rolling Thunder

During the Vietnam War (1954-75), as part of the strategic bombing campaign known as Operation Rolling Thunder, U.S. military aircraft attacked targets throughout North Vietnam from March 1965 to October 1968. This massive bombardment was intended to put military pressure on North Vietnam's Communist leaders and reduce their capacity to wage war against the U.S.-supported government of South Vietnam. Significance: Operation Rolling Thunder marked the first sustained American assault on North Vietnamese territory and thus represented a major expansion of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.

Peace Corps

During the course of his campaign for the presidency in 1960, Kennedy floated the idea that a new "army" should be created by the United States. This force would be made up of civilians who would volunteer their time and skills to travel to underdeveloped nations to assist them in any way they could. To fulfill this plan, Kennedy issued an executive order on March 1, 1961 establishing the Peace Corps as a trial program. Kennedy sent a message to Congress asking for its support and made clear the significance of underdeveloped nations to the United States. The people of these nations were "struggling for economic and social progress." "Our own freedom," Kennedy continued, "and the future of freedom around the world, depend, in a very real sense, on their ability to build growing and independent nations where men can live in dignity, liberated from the bonds of hunger, ignorance, and poverty." Significance: the program was judged a success in terms of helping to "win the hearts and minds" of people in the underdeveloped world. The program continues to function, and thousands of Americans each year are drawn to the humanitarian mission and sense of adventure that characterizes the Peace Corps.

"Kitchen debate"

During the grand opening ceremony of the American National Exhibition in Moscow, Vice President Richard Nixon and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev engage in a heated debate about capitalism and communism in the middle of a model kitchen set up for the fair. The so-called "kitchen debate" became one of the most famous episodes of the Cold War. As Nixon led Khrushchev through the American exhibition, the Soviet leader's famous temper began to flare. When Nixon demonstrated some new American color television sets, Khrushchev launched into an attack on the so-called "Captive Nations Resolution" passed by the U.S. Congress just days before. The resolution condemned the Soviet control of the "captive" peoples of Eastern Europe and asked all Americans to pray for their deliverance. After denouncing the resolution, Khrushchev then sneered at the U.S. technology on display, proclaiming that the Soviet Union would have the same sort of gadgets and appliances within a few years. Nixon, never one to shy away from a debate, goaded Khrushchev by stating that the Russian leader should "not be afraid of ideas. After all, you don't know everything." The Soviet leader snapped at Nixon, "You don't know anything about communism-except fear of it."

Berlin Wall

East Germany and East Berlin part of Communist Party. About 2.5 million fled to W.G. for freedom. Nikita Khrushchev demanded border to be closed. August 12-13 1961 E.G. govt. began building Berlin Wall. Kennedy unwilling to go to war with S.U. 1961 - The Soviet Union, under Nikita Khrushev, erected a wall between East and West Berlin to keep people from fleeing from the East, after Kennedy asked for an increase in defense funds to counter Soviet aggression Significance: Wall stood as a symbol of Cold War for three decades.On December, 1989 the wall was torn down & marked the symbolic end of the cold war

Z: Was the "New Look" actually new? Changes from Truman to Eisenhower Cold War strategies.

Eisenhower propaganda might seem LESS hard-nosed than the Truman variety, but that was a tactical consideration (the other stuff didn't work). Propaganda and ideological warfare become MORE important during the 1950s as the thermonuclear revolution rendered military confrontation increasingly unthinkable and Soviet "peace offensives," "peaceful coexistence," and decolonization emphasized the ideological struggle. Eisenhower was just as committed to "win" in that area as his predecessor. If the Soviets accepted them, the US would gain an advantage AND if the Soviets rejected them, the US would "win" as well because it would look like the "peace-seeking" party whereas the Soviets could be portrayed as obstructionists. These things were not "pure" propaganda, BUT they were conceived with the second purpose foremost in mind. Eisenhower, did not simply want "peace," he wanted peace on American terms, i.e. he wanted to win.

10. J. William Fulbright

Elected to the Senate in 1944, he sponsored the Fulbright Scholars Act, creating Fulbright scholarships for Americans to study abroad, and for foreign scholars to study in the United States. In 1964, as chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, Fulbright managed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave President Lyndon Johnson sweeping powers to respond to military provocation in South Vietnam. Later, troubled over the gradual escalation of the war in Vietnam, Fulbright held nationally televised "educational" hearings on Vietnam, bringing the Arkansas senator to national attention. He publicly challenged the "old myths and new realities" of American foreign policy, and warned against "the arrogance of power."

Yalta Conference

Feb 1-4, 1945. For Stalin, postwar economic assistance for Russia, and U.S. and British recognition of a Soviet sphere of influence in eastern Europe were the main objectives. Churchill had the protection of the British Empire foremost in his mind, but also wanted to clarify the postwar status of Germany. Roosevelt's goals included consensus on establishment of the United Nations and gaining Soviet agreement to enter the war against Japan once Hitler had been defeated. None of them left Yalta completely satisfied & Poland future was under Soviet regime. This foreshadowed the Cold War;

Operation JUST CAUSE

Following the shooting of a U.S. Marine, President George Bush ordered Operation Just Cause, an invasion consisting of over 25,000 soldiers. The mission was controversial due to the resulting loss of hundreds of Panamanian lives and the subsequent damage to Panama City and El Chorillo. The military was able to quickly achieve its goals as Noriega surrendered on January 3, 1990. It was the largest and most complex combat operation since the Vietnam War. The plan represented a clear understanding of immediate military and political goals of rapidly destroying the enemy

Z: LBJ bemoaned his involvement with "that bitch of a war" (Vietnam) and often claimed to be anything but enthusastic about committing US resources & troops to it. Why did he anyway?

For Johnson, the decision to continue the Vietnam commitment followed the path of his predecessors. He was committed to maintaining an independent South Vietnam and to achieving success in Southeast Asia. As a senator, he had embraced "containment theory," which predicted that if Vietnam fell to Communists, other Southeast Asian nations would do the same. Johnson was deeply sensitive about the judgment of history, and he did not want to be remembered as a President who lost Southeast Asia to Communism. When Johnson took office, he affirmed the Kennedy administration's commitments.

NATO enlargement

For all the differences between the foreign policies of the Bush administration and the Clinton administration, policy toward NATO enlargement has been one area of significant continuity. The core of the Clinton strategy was to promote peace and stability on the European continent through the integration of the new Central and Eastern European democracies into a wider Euro-Atlantic community, in which the United States would remain deeply engaged. A revitalized NATO was an important tool for the maintenance of American engagement and leadership, and its expansion to the new democracies—especially given the delays in their efforts to join the European Union (EU)—was a key part of the strategy. President Bush has largely picked up where Clinton left off. The new president not only reiterated the Clinton "in together, out together" pledge in the Balkans but forcefully made the case for NATO's continued expansion. In a major speech in Warsaw, Poland, on June 15, Bush asserted that "all of Europe's new democracies," from the Baltics to the Black Sea, should have an equal chance to join Western institutions. He suggested that the failure to allow them to do so would amount to the moral equivalent of the World War II Yalta and Munich conferences and appealed to NATO leaders to take a forward leaning approach to enlargement at their November 2002 summit in Prague.

Camp David Accords

From the beginning of his administration, President Carter looked forward to ending the Egypt-Israel dispute. This led to the establishment of the Geneva Conference, which was supposed to handle to dispute. Carter and U.S. Secretary of State Cyrus Vance met with several Arab and Israel leaders to negotiate for a return to Geneva. The historical event occurred at Camp David in Catoctin Mountain Park, Maryland, the U.S president's country retreat. Significance: The Camp David Accords was important because it established a structure for the historic peace treaty between Egypt and Israel in March of 1979.

"Great Grain Robbery"

In 1972, the Soviet Union experienced a terrible drought and the wheat crop failed, forcing the Soviets to turn to international grain markets to feed their people. Carefully concealing the magnitude of the crop failures from the West, the Soviets secretly bought 3 million tons of grain (wheat, corn, and soy) from the United States. In a brilliant operation involving KGB phone taps of US traders' phone lines to find the lowest prices and secretly buying small amounts from different dealers, the Soviets managed to spend $1.3 billion in the US grain market, purchasing nearly 25% of the total US harvest, all without driving up prices and without anyone catching on. In addition, the Soviets benefited from $300 million of US taxpayer money in the form of export subsidies, at a time when the US government was looking to alleviate chronically depressed grain prices by encouraging grain exports. When everyone finally realized what had happened, which took several months, all hell broke loose. Exacerbated by a drought in Australia and a big move by India to expand purchases on international grain markets, worldwide grain prices skyrocketed to 125-year highs. The price of soy, for example, zoomed from $3.31 a bushel to $12.90 in just 10 months, an increase of 390%. Traders who had placed bets on a rise in prices booked spectacular gains, leading to accusations of insider trading, but investigations later ruled this out. The Soviets had simply been too sneaky. Significance: led to stringent new reporting rules for US commodity dealers that are still in place to this day and was also a significant part of a massive surge in overall commodity prices that helped drive the US economy into recession and stagflation, ultimately resulting in Ronald Reagan.

Z: What were the origins of containment policy & extent implemented by Truman admin?

In its most general form, containment denotes the American effort, by military, political, and economic means, to resist communist expansion throughout the world. But precisely because of the looseness of the doctrine and the differing interpretations, including questions about the selective application of efforts to stop communism, the doctrine's author, George F. Kennan, an influential foreign service officer in 1947 and later a respected private scholar, often opposed important tactics that many American policymakers defined as the implementation of containment: the global rhetoric of the Truman Doctrine in 1947, establishment of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949-1950, the heavy military emphasis of U.S. policy in the 1950s, the extension of alliances to Asia and the Middle East, and the prolonged military involvement in Vietnam in the 1960s and 1970s. Truman argued that the United States could no longer stand by and allow the forcible expansion of Soviet totalitarianism into free, independent nations, because American national security now depended upon more than just the physical security of American territory. Rather, in a sharp break with its traditional avoidance of extensive foreign commitments beyond the Western Hemisphere during peacetime, the Truman Doctrine committed the United States to actively offering assistance to preserve the political integrity of democratic nations when such an offer was deemed to be in the best interest of the United States.

Tet Offensive

January 31 as the occasion for a coordinated offensive of surprise attacks aimed at breaking the stalemate in Vietnam. Giap believed that the attacks would cause Army of the Republic of Vietnam (ARVN) forces to collapse and foment discontent and rebellion among the South Vietnamese population, leading them to rise up against the regime in Saigon. Significance: requested more than 200,000 new troops in order to mount an effective counteroffensive, an escalation that many Americans saw as an act of desperation. As antiwar sentiment mounted on the home front, some of Johnson's advisers that had supported past military buildup in Vietnam

8. John Foster Dulles

John Foster Dulles was appointed Secretary of State by President Dwight Eisenhower on January 21, 1953. Dulles served for much of the decade, leaving an indelible mark upon U.S. foreign policy that included close cooperation between the Department of State and the Central Intelligence Agency as well as a focus upon international mutual security agreements designed to contain communism. Significance: One of his last directives was the formulation of the Eisenhower Doctrine in response to the Suez Crisis. (The Eisenhower Doctrine was an expression of the key tenets of Dulles's foreign policy views: containment and international mutual security agreements reinforced by economic aid.)

Case-Church amendment

June 19, 1973 - The U.S. Congress passes the Case-Church Amendment which forbids any further U.S. military involvement in Southeast Asia, effective August 15, 1973. The veto-proof vote is 278-124 in the House and 64-26 in the Senate. Significance: The Amendment paves the way for North Vietnam to wage yet another invasion of the South, this time without fear of U.S. bombing.

"Peaceful coexistence"

Khrushchev's foreign policy of pursuing peaceful coexistence with the United States and its allies was a dramatic change from previous leaders' attitudes. In 1956, after Khrushchev had succeeded Joseph Stalin and was beginning to consolidate power, Khrushchev began a process of "de-Stalinization" to weaken his enemies in the Communist Party and strengthen his position as leader. Shortly after this, Khrushchev continued to alter Party policy with his change in approach to foreign policy. This policy of a peaceful coexistence was meant to improve relations between the Soviet Union and the United State and had major implications for the preceding events of the Cold War. Khrushchev's policy marks a drastic change in Soviet policy and it is, therefore, necessary to understand the effects felt domestically and abroad. Overall, Khrushchev's policy of trying to maintain a peaceful coexistence between capitalism and communism failed miserably. Both the United States and the U.S.S.R. never tried hard enough or trusted each other enough to make it work. The one thing that Khrushchev was able to accomplish with his foreign policy was to create a slight thaw in the Cold War, this just before a Siberian freeze ended up taking place.

Lucky Dragon

March 1, 1954; US tested a bomb on the island of Bikini. A Japanese tuna fishing boat, the Lucky Dragon, was caught in the path of Bravo's fallout. It was 100 miles east of Bikini when the bomb was detonated. The crew members suffered from radiation sickness, and one of the them died of liver and blood damage on 23 September. The Lucky Dragon Incident touched several sensitive issues in Japan: the atomic legacy of World War II; disruption in the supply of fish; a principal food item; curtailment of fishing rights on the high sea; and a deep-rooted concern that the United States was insensitive to the feelings and sufferings of the Japanese people and unduly preoccupied with the development of weapons for mass destruction. Japanese outcry to stop US testing of bombs in their area.

"Christmas bombing"

Nixon needed a military solution, he called "Linebacker II" to the diplomatic roadblock for three reasons: 1. To force North Vietnam back to the bargaining table. 2. To let the world know that the U.S. still dealt from a position of power. 3. To prove to Thieu that the U.S. had not abandoned him. Began on December 18. Because of the holiday season, news outlets were quickly calling the campaign the Christmas Bombing. For the next 11 days, minus the Christmas Day break, B-52s and tactical fighter-bombers flew 729 sorties over North Vietnam, dropping 15,000 tons of bombs, and hitting some 1,600 military targets. They destroyed rail tracks and cars, some three million gallons of fuel, and airfields, and they knocked out an estimated 80% of the country's electric supply capacity. Significance: The Christmas Bombing had the result Nixon wanted. By December 26, North Vietnam was indicating its willingness to return to negotiations. On December 29, Nixon halted the bombing. In January 1973, Nixon and Kissinger announced that the U.S. and North Vietnam had signed a peace treaty -- which was basically unchanged from the October 1972 version. By the end of January, American prisoners of war were returning home, and by March the American combat experience in Vietnam was over. North Vietnam did not consider the Christmas Bombing a defeat. With the U.S. out of the way, communists were able to take the south in 1975.

Moscow Summit

Nixon's second visit to Moscow in May 1972, this time as president, was for a more conciliatory purpose. During a week of summit meetings with Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and other Soviet officials, the United States and the USSR reached a number of agreements, including one that laid the groundwork for a joint space flight in 1975. On May 26, Nixon and Brezhnev signed the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT), the most significant of the agreements reached during the summit. The treaty limited the United States and the USSR to 200 antiballistic missiles each, which were to be divided between two defensive systems.

NATO

North Atlantic Treating Organization was a military alliance founded in 1949 between US, Canada, and "North Atlantic" countries of Western Europe & Scandinavia. The first peace-time US military alliance since 1780s, NATO provided European signatories with a guarantee of American involvement in case of future Soviet aggression & is an example of the Truman's admin attempts to implement the containment policy.

Cuban Missile Crisis

October 1962; Khrushchev puts missiles in Cuba pointed at the US to balance nuclear capabilities as US missiles were in Turkey pointed at the Soviets. Significance: it forced to great nations and super powers to reconsider a nuclear war and also determine that they have to coexist peacefully even though they were enemies. The Cuban missile crisis brought the world very close to a possible third world war and a nuclear war at the same time. By then the entire world had seen what a nuclear weapon can do and how much damage can be caused due to a single weapon.

Limited Test Ban Treaty

On August 5, 1963, the Limited Test Ban Treaty was signed by the United States, Great Britain, and the Soviet Union. After Senate approval, the treaty that went into effect on October 10, 1963, banned nuclear weapons testing in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water.

East African embassy bombings

On August 7, 1998, at approximately 10:30 a.m. local time, two Embassies of the United States of America, located in the East African cities of Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, were attacked in coordinated truck bombings, later determined to have occurred approximately four minutes apart. In Nairobi, 213 people were killed in the blast, while 11 individuals died in the bombing at Dar es Salaam. The bombings were carried out by members and associates of Usama Bin Ladin's organization, known by the Arabic word "al-Qaeda" Significance: The US Government will also vigorously investigate members of the al-Qaeda organization in the United States and around the world.

Iranian Hostage Crisis

On November 4, 1979, a group of Iranian students stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran, taking more than 60 American hostages. The immediate cause of this action was President Jimmy Carter's decision to allow Iran's deposed Shah, a pro-Western autocrat who had been expelled from his country some months before, to come to the United States for cancer treatment. However, the hostage-taking was about more than the Shah's medical care: it was a dramatic way for the student revolutionaries to declare a break with Iran's past and an end to American interference in its affairs. Significance: The Iranian hostage crisis was a pivotal moment in Iran-United States relations that signified the end of America's influence in the country and the consolidation of an Islamist anti-American movement. It established the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini as a powerful leader and significantly weakened the foreign policy of President Jimmy Carter. The incident also served as a flash point for hostility between the two countries that lasted for decades.

Reykjavik Summit

On October 11, 1986, halfway between Moscow and Washington, D.C., the leaders of the world's two superpowers met at the stark and picturesque Hofdi House in Reykjavik, Iceland. Secretary General Mikhail Gorbachev had proposed the meeting to President Ronald Reagan less than thirty days before. The expectations for the summit at Reykjavik were low. Reagan and Gorbachev had established a personal relationship just one year before at their Geneva Summit. In Geneva they attempted to reach agreement on bilateral nuclear arms reductions. Since then, their negotiators had reached an impasse. Both leaders hoped a face to face meeting at Reykjavik might revive the negotiations. Despite failing to achieve either man's ultimate goal, Reykjavik will be recorded as one of the most important summits in history. A year after Reykjavik the U.S. and Soviet Union signed the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), for the first time eliminating an entire class of nuclear weapons. The Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) was signed a few years later during President H.W Bush's term.

Sputnik

On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched the earth's first artificial satellite, Sputnik-1. The successful launch came as a shock to experts and citizens in the United States, who had hoped that the United States would accomplish this scientific advancement first. Significance: The success of Sputnik had a major impact on the Cold War and the United States. Fear that they had fallen behind led U.S. policymakers to accelerate space and weapons programs. In the late 1950s, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev boasted about Soviet technological superiority and growing stockpiles of ICBMs, so the United States worked simultaneously to develop its own ICBMs to counter what it assumed was a growing stockpile of Soviet missiles directed against the United States.

Yom Kippur War

On October 6, 1973, hoping to win back territory lost to Israel during the third Arab-Israeli war, in 1967, Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a coordinated attack against Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar. Significance: In 1974, the first of two Egyptian-Israeli disengagement agreements providing for the return of portions of the Sinai to Egypt were signed. The unexpected Egyptian-Israeli cease-fire exposed Syria to military defeat, and Israel seized even more territory

13. Salvador Allende

On September 4, 1973, as the Chilean military prepared to overthrow Salvador Allende in a US-backed coup d'état Salvador Allende, the first democratically chosen Marxist leader in Latin America, remains a hero of the left, of the poor and of the underprivileged. A tenacious leader, he secured Chile's top political post on his fourth attempt following his election in September 1970. Despite his Marxist credentials, Allende was quintessentially a Chilean nationalist who committed his life's work to the betterment of his fellow countrymen and countrywomen, and to freedom from economic dependence or servitude to any outside power.

2. Colin Powell

One of the Vulcans; served two tours in Vietnam, he ascended the military ranks while earning positions at the Pentagon and the Department of Defense. Powell was named national security adviser to President Ronald Reagan in 1987, and in 1991 he took over as joint chief of staff. He became a national figure during the Persian Gulf War, developing the "Powell Doctrine," as chief military strategist. Powell became President George W. Bush's secretary of state in 2000, but resigned in 2004 after acknowledging his defense of an Iraq invasion was based on faulty information.

Operations Coordinating Board (OCB)

President Dwight D. Eisenhower created the Operations Coordinating Board (OCB) to follow up on all NSC decisions. The OCB met regularly on Wednesday afternoons at the Department of State, and was composed of the Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Deputy Secretary of Defense, the Directors of CIA, USIA, and ICA, and the Special Assistants to the President for National Security Affairs and Security Operations Coordination. The OCB was the coordinating and implementing arm of the NSC for all aspects of the implementation of national security policy. NSC action papers were assigned to a team from the OCB for follow-up. More than 40 interagency working groups were established with experts for various countries and subjects.

"Wise Men"

President Johnson holds a secret meeting with some of the nation's most prestigious leaders, who were collectively called "the Wise Men." This group included former Secretary of State Dean Acheson, General of the Army Omar Bradley, Ambassador-at-Large Averell Harriman, and former Ambassador to South Vietnam Henry Cabot Lodge. Johnson asked them for advice on how to unite the U.S. in the Vietnam War effort. They reached the conclusion that the administration needed to offer "ways of guiding the press to show the light at the end of the tunnel." In effect, they decided that the American people should be given more optimistic reports. Significance: backfired. administration had painted such an upbeat picture of Allied progress in the war, many Americans began to question the credibility of the president and antiwar sentiment increased significantly after the Tet Offensive.

Madman Theory

President Richard Nixon and his national security adviser Henry Kissinger believed they could compel "the other side" to back down during crises in the Middle East and Vietnam by pushing so many chips into the pot" that Nixon would seem 'crazy' enough to "go much further. Nixon's and Kissinger's Madman strategy during the Vietnam War included veiled nuclear threats intended to intimidate Hanoi and its patrons in Moscow.

Operation PB Success

Prohibited by Eisenhower from using American troops to accomplish their goals in Guatemala, the CIA established training camps for the opposition army in the bordering nations of Nicaragua and Honduras. To compensate for both the small number of men choosing to involve themselves in the operation and the widespread support for the Arbenz government, the CIA devised a massive propaganda campaign in Guatemala to convince the populace of the invincibility of the forces seeking to take control of the country. Furthermore, CIA agents also conducted an intense psychological battle against the supporters of Arbenz, ranging from phone warnings in the middle of the night to death threats. On June 18, 1954, after approximately one year of preparation, U.S.- backed troops invaded Guatemala with the intention of overthrowing Arbenz. Realizing his army had forsaken him and fearing for his life, Arbenz resigned as president on June 27th and fled to Mexico. The U.S.-chosen leader of the military coup, Carlos Castillo Armas, assumed control of the government, thus ensuring the promotion of American interests in Guatemala. Significance: future presidents used covert operations when faced with the threat of communism in Latin America

Geneva Summit

Reagan & Gorbachev, along w/ Britain & France, met in Geneva to discuss ending the Cold War, disarmament, unifying Germany, and increasing economic ties. In reality, in addition to agreeing in principle to the idea of a 50 percent reduction in strategic arms and an "interim" agreement on INF, the main significance of the Geneva Summit was that it served as a fundamental learning experience for both sides. Gorbachev realized that strategic defense was a matter of Reagan's personal conviction and that most likely it was rooted not in the needs of the military-industrial complex but in the President's deepest abhorrence of nuclear war. Reagan, on the other hand, had a chance to appreciate the genuine, repeatedly expressed concern of the Soviet leader about the possibility of putting nuclear weapons in space, which was the essence of Gorbachev's fears over SDI. Reagan also could sense Gorbachev's sincere eagerness to proceed with very deep arms reductions on the basis of equal security, not superiority. Reagan also sensed in Gorbachev a willingness to make concessions in order to move forward on arms control. Significance; Both leaders came out of the summit with a new appreciation of each other as a partner. They succeeded in building trust and opening a dialog, which in very short order made possible such breakthroughs as Gorbachev's Program on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons by the Year 2000 (January 15, 1986) and the INF and the START Treaties.

Iran-Contra Scandal

Reagan Administration was trading weapons for hostages. Trying to get hostages free by supporting contra's. Supporting Iran Contra's in order to get them to free the hostages that were being held in Lebanon. Some of the Money from weapons sales would be given to Nicaragua which aid for had been outlawed by Us Bowland amendments. They were not only illegal because they violated international law (Iran had a weapons importation embargo in effect at the time) but just like Watergate officials went to great lengths to cover up their actions.

Z: Reagan supposedly once told William Clark, one of his national security advisors that his Soviet policy was simple: "we win, they lose". Was it that simple? What was Reagan's policy towards the Soviet Union?

Reagan particularly wanted to redefine national policy toward the Soviet Union. Along with most other national leaders, he had supported the fundamental policy of containing the Soviet Union that President Harry Truman adopted in 1947 and was subsequently followed by all Presidents of both parties. But Reagan believed that the Soviets had taken advantage of détente, as practiced by Presidents Nixon, Ford, and Carter. As an example, Reagan contended that the SALT II nuclear treaty, negotiated by Carter but never ratified by the Senate, imposed greater limits on the United States than on the Soviet Union. At the same time, Reagan was convinced that the Soviets were weaker economically than the intelligence community believed. As early as June 18, 1980, Reagan told reporters and editors at The Washington Post, that "it would be of great benefit to the United States if we started a buildup" because the Soviets would be unable to compete and would come to the bargaining table. Reagan's vision, not well understood when he took office and sometimes misrepresented even today, was of a world free of nuclear weapons and the terror they posed to all mankind.

1. Caspar Weinberger

Reagan's secretary of defense. He opposed sending weapons to Iran but was involved in the affair, along with building up the SDI program. Significance: Readiness, sustainability, and modernization became the watchwords of the defense program.

9. Joseph McCarthy

Senator who in Feb 1950, looking for a bid for reelection, waved a so-called list of Communists in the State Department. This led to a witchhunt that spread throughout the country, lasting for 5 years. Fear of subversion at home, the US began a stronger policy abroad, leading Americans to think problems in all other countries were caused by the Soviets.

Taiwan Straits Crisis

Tensions between the People's Republic of China (PRC) and the Republic of China (ROC) in the 1950s resulted in armed conflict over strategic islands in the Taiwan Strait. On two separate occasions during the 1950s, the PRC bombed islands controlled by the ROC. The United States responded by actively intervening on behalf of the ROC. The importance of the islands in the Taiwan Strait was rooted in their geographic proximity to China and Taiwan Over the next few years, the U.S. Government took steps that allied it more firmly to the ROC Government on Taiwan. In 1954, the United States led the creation of the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization, which was designed to unify the region against the perceived Communist threat. President Eisenhower was concerned that the loss of the islands would hurt Nationalist morale and might be a precursor to the Communist conquest of Taiwan. Continued for 20 years.

INF Treaty

The 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty required the United States and the Soviet Union to eliminate and permanently forswear all of their nuclear and conventional ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges of 500 to 5,500 kilometers. Significance: The treaty marked the first time the superpowers had agreed to reduce their nuclear arsenals, eliminate an entire category of nuclear weapons, and utilize extensive on-site inspections for verification. As a result of the INF Treaty, the United States and the Soviet Union destroyed a total of 2,692 short-, medium-, and intermediate-range missiles by the treaty's implementation deadline of June 1, 1991. Neither Washington nor Moscow now deploys such systems.

Carter Doctrine

The Carter Doctrine was a policy proclaimed by President of the United States Jimmy Carter in his State of the Union Address on January 23, 1980, which stated that the United States would use military force if necessary to defend its national interests in the Persian Gulf. Significance: ended detente; secured few if any tangible gains it would continue to shape U.S. policy during the Cold War, largely because subsequent administrations bought into its premises. President Ronald Reagan and his advisers regarded the Soviet Union as an aggressive, expansionist power; if anything, they, and the Bush administration that was to follow, were even more willing to protect U.S. interests in the Persian Gulf from Soviet predations and political instability. The Carter Doctrine also hastened the buildup of American arms, a process that was already under way by January 1980, and for which some historians give him high marks. It would be the Reagan administration, however, that would capitalize on the perceived need for military expenditures, expanding the size and cost, and revamping the shape, of America's military forces.

Eisenhower Doctrine

The Doctrine was created in an attempt to stop the spread of Communism throughout the Middle-East and Western Europe. It stated that America would give economic support to all countries that were feeling the pressure and the strain of Soviet Union. The United States of America also said that military force would be used if the country in distress needed it. This clearly stated the fact that America would not back down to the Soviet Union or any other communistic countries. The aim of the doctrine was to keep as many countries economically independent and free from communism. Significance: The Eisenhower Doctrine was one of many crucial events that took place during the Cold War. It was still in the first decade of the Cold War, but until this time not much was really happening in the world besides the Korean Conflict. The slow induction of countries into the USSR had been slowing gathering more and more countries of the East. The economically free countries of the world were doing very little to stop this spread, except the U.S.. We needed to be the leaders of the Cold War to show the rest of the world that Communism would not be tolerated anywhere.

Gulf of Tonkin Incident

The Gulf of Tonkin Incident occurred in August 1964. North Vietnamese warships purportedly attacked United States warships, the U.S.S. Maddox and the U.S.S. C. Turner Joy, on two separate occasions in the Gulf of Tonkin, a body of water neighboring modern-day Vietnam. President Lyndon Baines Johnson claimed that the United States did nothing to provoke these two attacks and that North Vietnam was the aggressor. Subsequent reports show that the United States actually provoked these attacks by supporting South Vietnamese commandos operating in North Vietnam and by using U.S. warships to identify North Vietnamese radar stations along the coastline of North Vietnam. There remains no doubt that the North Vietnamese attacked the U.S.S. Maddox in the first incident, which occurred on August 2, 1964, although it does appear that the United States provoked this attack. Significance: the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution gave unlimited power to the president to deal with the problem in Vietnam. It led to one of the most hated conflicts in all of American history

Helsinki Accords

The Helsinki Declaration of August 1, 1975 was a turning point in Cold War relations inside European borders. The Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact countries celebrated the acknowledgment of their national boundaries; a desired goal since the end of World War II. West European democracies celebrated the Warsaw Pact countries' willingness to adopt ten major points of international diplomacy. One of the most pivotal of these points was the seventh clause of the treaty, an agreement to uphold human rights. Each East European country promised to protect minority rights, allow religious worship, and grant political and economic freedom for all of their citizens. Each country published the Helsinki Declaration at home, which created a promise of wide reforms if the countries honored this agreement. As citizens throughout Eastern Europe petitioned for their new human rights, a widespread dissident movement against the Communist Parties of Eastern Europe emerged, including the arrival of the Charter 77 in Czechoslovakia.

Grenada Invasion

The Invasion of Grenada took place on October 25th, 1983. The U.S. military was trying to stop a military coup that had overthrown the democratic government. This was the first time since the conflict in Vietnam, that American soldiers went into combat. It was also another conflict that occurred during the Cold War, the main countries involved were America and Cuba. Significance: Operation Urgent Fury had been a great success. The communists were dealt a severe blow and at a very low cost of American lives.

"Missile Gap"

The Missile Gap was in essence a growing perception in the West, especially in the USA, that the Soviet Union was quickly developing an intercontinental range ballistic missile (ICBM) capability earlier, in greater numbers, and with far more capability than that of the United States. Significance: Both the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations struggled to formulate policy in response to what was then believed to be an ever-growing advantage in Soviet strategic missiles. Breakthroughs in technology and innovative use of aerial and satellite photography eventually provided the CIA with a more accurate assessment of Soviet missile capacity, allowing policy makers to shift gears.

Sandinista 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.

"Mike" test

The United States tested its first thermonuclear device, known as Ivy Mike, two years earlier in 1952, also in the Marshall Islands. In the wake of the Ivy Mike test, U.S. scientists rushed to create a set of deliverable thermonuclear designs. Whereas Ivy Mike was a "wet" thermonuclear device (meaning that the hydrogen isotope used in the device was liquid), Castle Bravo was a "dry" device, which greatly reduced its weight and size. Castle Bravo was the first deliverable thermonuclear device, and the test aimed to pave the way for the creation of more effective weapons, including weapons that could be deliverable by aircraft.

Domino Theory

The falling domino principle is when a country makes a decision neighboring countries will make the same decision. If you knock down the first domino the last will surely fall. This was used in the Cold War as a way to use force and other resources in an effort to prevent countries from accepting the communist doctrine. Idea was if one country accepted communism another would follow. Significance: This is how US justified Vietnam, couldn't let Vietnam fall to communism because then other nations in that region would follow.

Operation DESERT STORM

The first major foreign crisis for the United States after the end of the Cold War presented itself in August 1990. Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq, ordered his army across the border into tiny Kuwait. This was no ordinary act of aggression. Iraq's army was well equipped. The United States had provided massive military aid to Iraq during their eight-year war with Iran, giving them the fourth largest army in the world. The Iraqi takeover posed an immediate threat to neighboring Saudi Arabia, another major exporter of oil. If Saudi Arabia fell to Saddam, Iraq would control one-fifth of the world's oil supply. American ground troops declared Kuwait liberated just 100 hours after the ground attack was initiated. American foot soldiers moved through Kuwait and entered southern Iraq. Significance: Skillful diplomacy proved that the United Nations could be used as an instrument of force when necessary.

"Team B"

The most notorious attempt by militarists and right-wing ideologues to challenge the CIA was the Team B affair in the mid-1970s. The 1975-76 "Team B" operation was a classic case of threat escalation by hawks determined to increase military budgets and step up the U.S. offensive in the cold war. Concocted by right-wing ideologues and militarists, Team B aimed to bury the politics of détente and the SALT arms negotiations, which were supported by the leadership of both political parties Significance: as a successful model for challenging moderate threat assessments by the foreign policy establishment, particularly the CIA and the State Department. In prevailing over the CIA, Team B demonstrated that "strategic intelligence" based on a policy-driven analysis of an adversary's perceived intentions could triumph over fact-based intelligence.

Panama Canal Treaties

The treaty, signed by President Jimmy Carter and Panamanian leader Omar Torrijos, contained two parts; one promised an end to U.S. control of the canal beginning in 2000; Panama was to take over operation and defense of the canal. The neutrality component of the treaty gave the U.S. permanent authority to defend the canal if it were placed under threat as a neutral water passage.

War Powers Act

Today, when we refer to the War Powers Act, most people actually mean the War Powers Resolution, which Congress passed in 1973. It is designed to limit the executive power to wage war without Congressional approval. was passed by Congress over President Nixon's veto to increase congressional control over the executive branch in foreign policy matters. The Act states that the president could send U.S armed forces into action abroad only by the authorization of Congress or if the United States is already under attack. The act also requires the president to notify Congress within 48 hours of committing armed forces to military action and forbids armed forces from remaining for more than 60 days, with a further 30 day withdrawal period, without an authorization of the use of military force or a deceleration of war. Significance: Ever since the United States was formed, there has been a tension over who controls the use of armed forces.

Z: Did the Korean War in 1953 have momentous consequences in regards to foreign relations?

Truman reassured America's European allies that the U.S. commitment to Asia would not come at Europe's expense—a commitment made more tangible in 1951 by increased American troop deployments to Europe and not Korea. The President thus guaranteed the United States to the defense of both Asia and Europe from the Soviet Union and its allies. Likewise, the Korean War locked in the high levels of defense spending and rearmament called for by NSC-68. Finally, the American effort in Korea was accompanied by a serious financial commitment to the French defense of a non-communist Indochina. In a very real sense, Korea militarized the Cold War and expanded its geographic reach.

Truman Doctrine

Turkish control of the straits constitutes the stopper through with Soviet political & military influence could most effectively flow into eastern Mediterranean & Middle East. $400 million for massive military & economic aid to Turkey & Greece and would consider aid to other countries on "individual merits". Did without the UN, calling it an "emergency". US moved toward the foreign policy of containment.

Shanghai Communique

US President Richard Nixon broke the ice between China and the US with his historic visit in February 1972. The trip turned hostility into reconciliation and began a process of normalization of bilateral ties. The first motive behind Nixon's visit, was to contain the expansion of the Soviet Union in developing countries which had threatened the hegemony of US. Secondly, setbacks in the warming of US-Soviet relations made Nixon look to China. He thought that US relations with Soviet Union would be closer after the ice between the US and China thawed. Three months after his visit to China, Nixon visited the Soviet Union in May 1972 and signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty with President Leonid Brezhnev. This treaty may be the best signed between the two powers during the Cold War. Thirdly, the US wanted to withdraw from the Vietnam War and hoped China could put pressure on North Vietnam to end the war.

Pearl Harbor Lessons

after the fall of France & attack on Pearl Harbor this provided an education for American foreign policy in the inadequacies of continentalism and isolationism. Arose a "globalist" consensus that primary American postwar interest should lay not in just securing the Western hemisphere but in keeping its Eastern counterpart as well free from control by a single potentially hostile power.

Paris Peace Accords

as an agreement between the government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam (North Vietnam), the Provisional Revolutionary Government of the Republic of South Vietnam (PRG), the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam), and the United States to bring an end to the Vietnam War. Significance: Both Kissinger and Le Duc Tho were hailed for their leading roles in securing the peace accord. In fact, they were both awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, although the later refused to accept it. Despite all the negotiation efforts and agreements, the PPA did not take effect thoroughly. As a matter of fact, it was violated blatantly by both South and especially North Vietnam as North Vietnamese troops and the Viet Cong gradually attacked southern provinces again. Two years later, after "Ho Chi Minh Campaign" in the spring of 1975, North Vietnamese forces captured Saigon and ended the long 30-year war.

Czech Coup

communists overthrew the Czech republic in Feb 1948 & installed a regime tied to the Kremlin. This help to promote Marshall Plans passage.

3. Cyrus Vance

emphasized negotiations over military confrontation during his tenure as Secretary of State and shared with President Carter a belief that human rights should be a central tenet of U.S. diplomacy. Within his first months of entering office, Vance worked diligently on arms control issues with the Soviet Union and sought a comprehensive peace agreement between Israel and its Arab neighbors. Vance helped negotiate the Panama Canal Treaty, which would relinquish U.S. control of the canal zone; the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty, the first peace treaty between Israel and an Arab neighbor; the restoration of full diplomatic relations with China; and a settlement among political factions in Zimbabwe that allowed for majority rule.

Reagan Doctrine

he Reagan Doctrine advocated the need to provide both, overt and covert support to anti-communist movements, in an effort to roll back Soviet-backed communist regimes in parts of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Those in favor of this policy argued that it was the need of the hour to counter increasing Soviet influence in the world. For this, the Heritage Foundation identified nine countries, namely Afghanistan, Iran, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam in Asia, Angola, Ethiopia, and Libya in Africa, and Nicaragua in Latin America. The Reagan Doctrine brought an end to Soviet expansion under the garb of the Brezhnev Doctrine, which stated that the Soviet Union had the right to intervene in the affairs of Communist countries when hostile forces tried to turn the development of some socialist country towards capitalism. In essence, the Reagan Doctrine was America's fitting reply to the Soviet Union's Brezhnev Doctrine.

Radio Free Europe

is a US-state funded broadcasting organization that provides news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia and the Middle East "where the free flow of information is either banned by government authorities or not fully developed"; began in 1950 by Kennan & Wisner after WWII. provided news, features and music aimed at communist and non-communist elites as well as the general population. RFE and RL also gave a voice to dissidents and opposition movements that, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, would emerge as leaders of the new post-communist democracies.

4. Douglas MacArthur

led the US occupation of Japan & dominated their policies; he rigidly opposed any restrictions on his military actions & wanted to widen the conflict; implanted democratic reforms that provided a model of Western ideals in East Asia thereby threatened Soviet interests in that part of the world. Significance: Japan became a model of democratic reform in E. Asia, a growing industrial ally to US, and a source of embarrassment to the Soviet Union. He was eventually fired that set a storm of protest & calls for Truman's resignation; When MacArthur violated the principle of civilian control of the military by attempting to orchestrate public support for bombing China and permitting an invasion of the mainland by Chiang Kai-Shek's Nationalist Chinese forces, Truman charged him with insubordination and relieved him of his duties, replacing him with General Matthew Ridgeway

SALT I/ABM Treaty

limit deployment of missile systems that could theoretically be used to destroy incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) launched by the other superpower. Negotiations to prohibit ballistic missile defenses were first proposed by the United States in 1966 but did not begin until late 1969, as part of the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT). The ABM Treaty was signed by U.S. Pres. Richard Nixon and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev at a summit in Moscow in May 1972, and it was ratified by both the U.S. Senate and the Supreme Soviet later that year.

12. Robert Taft

opposed the Truman Doctrine saying that the US was taking on Britain's responsibilities.

Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD)

the idea that even if the Soviet Union unleashed an all-out nuclear assault on U.S. forces, enough American weapons would remain intact to deliver a similarly devastating counterattack.

North American Free Trade Agreement

version of the Good Neighbor Policy, the world`s largest free trade area was created when the United States, Canada and Mexico launched the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). That agreement has brought economic growth and higher standards of living for all three countries, and is committed to helping the partners to realize a more integrated and efficient North American economy. NAFTA Initialing Ceremony NAFTA took effect on January 1, 1994. The agreement immediately lifted tariffs on the majority of goods produced by the signatory nations. It also called for the gradual elimination, over a period of 15 years, of most remaining barriers to cross-border investment and to the movement of goods and services among the three countries. Major industries affected include agriculture, automobile and textile manufacture, telecommunications, financial services, energy, and trucking. NAFTA was followed by the signing of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT/World Trade Organization (WTO), also in 1994.

Bay of Pigs

was a CIA plan to overthrow the Cuban communist government led by Fidel Castro; began in 1960 led by the Kennedy Administration the CIA began training exiles that had fled from Cuba. The idea was to train these exiles and then have them inspire a revolution through the Cuban people. The US thought the Cuban people wanted to overthrow Castro and communism, but this was not the case. The operation was very unsuccessful; Significance: Great example of failed American foreign policy. Led people to question the Kennedy administration as to why the invasion occurred.Outcome of Bay of Pigs left Castro very uncertain of the US and so he sought help from the Soviet Union. Led Khrushchev to expect Kennedy will back down in times of crisis escalation and ultimately led to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Massive retaliation

was a doctrine passed by the Eisenhower administration in accordance with the nuclear deterrence doctrine. It said that the US would resort to nuclear weapons to stop and Soviet challenge anywhere of any kind. This was flawed because if a threat were made and delivered on there would be a nuclear war, but if a threat were made and not delivered then credibility would be undermined.

Z: Nixon promised that he would procure "peace with honor" in Vietnam. To what extent did he do that?

was a phrase U.S. President Richard M. Nixon used in a speech on January 23, 1973 to describe the Paris Peace Accord to end the Vietnam War; In addition to U.S. troop withdrawals and efforts to prepare and modernize the South Vietnamese army, Nixon's Vietnamization strategy also featured programs designed to strengthen the South Vietnamese government and expand its political base in rural areas. He offered U.S. assistance to help South Vietnamese officials organize local elections and implement social reforms and economic development initiatives.

Vietnamization

was a policy of the Richard Nixon administration to end U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War through a program to "expand, equip, and train South Vietnam's forces and assign to them an ever-increasing combat role, at the same time steadily reducing the number of U.S. combat troops Significance: The significance of Vietnamization was that it allowed U.S. troops to withdraw without actually losing the Vietnam War by training the Southern Vietnamese to fight the Vietminh and Vietcong instead of the US troops. However, the Southern Vietnamese eventually fell to North Vietnam.

Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars)

was a program first initiated on March 23, 1983 under President Ronald Reagan. The intent of this program was to develop a sophisticated anti-ballistic missile system in order to prevent missile attacks from other countries, specifically the Soviet Union. Significance: Yet with political pressure, both domestic and international, combined with budgetary conflicts, the Strategic Defense Initiative was slated for failure from the start. Fear of Soviet retaliation due to violations in the ABM treaty from the first S.A.L.T. talks was a primary factor in these international pressures, but United States legislators and congressmen also argued that a creation of a large anti-ballistic missile system would raise tensions between the two nations and potentially spark a conflict.

11. Robert McNamara

was an American business executive and the eighth Secretary of Defense, serving from 1961 to 1968 under Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, during which time he played a major role in escalating the United States involvement in the Vietnam War.

14. Zbigniew Brzezinksi

was assistant to the president of the United States for national security affairs during the Carter administration (1977-1980). accomplishments of the Carter administration, Brzezinski was proudest of its success in the Middle East (the Camp David accords), the normalization of relations with the People's Republic of China, the Panama Canal treaties, SALT II, the commitment to majority rule in Africa, the identification of American policy with the human rights issue, and the plan to strengthen the military and strategic position of the United States by building the MX missile.

Munich Lessons

was to encourage firmness at all costs, even the risk of war. "Containing" Joseph Stalin was at the heart of America's Cold War. Came from: 1) not sharing about the nuclear bomb w/ the Soviets b/c there no returns on appeasement; emphasized the futility of treating reasonably an immoral and irrational adversary, 2) debate over Turkish Straits: The Soviet Union proposed a joint system of control and defense by a body composed of Turkey and the other Black Sea powers, instead of Turkey retaining complete control. This proposal was met with alarm by the U.S. State Department, which saw this as an example of what was to become known as the "domino theory."

5. George F. Kennan

wrote "long telegram". He resided in the Soviet as a member of US assembly and detested the principles of the Bolshevik Revolution. He felt the Soviets had a "neurotic" view of the world & were fearful of capitalist encirclement. He felt that the US should work toward securing industrial & economic centers in Western Europe & Japan and prepare countermeasures short of war to discourage Soviet expansion. But his writing were vague & led policymakers to assume that the Soviets intended to take over the world with communist ideology & the US had to be militarily ready to stop this.