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Chapters 27 and 28 Quizlet

Terms in this set (147)

1. Summarize "Connecting Concepts"
Chapter 27 focuses on the development and consequences of the Cold War. It also discusses the tensions between the United States and Russia. The chapter talks about an attempt to prevent a post-war recession and it also examines the reasons for the movement of American public to a more conservative posture.
2. Describe the legacy of mistrust between the Soviet Union and the United States up to World War II. How did the view of the world articulated by the United States contrast with the vision held by the Soviets and, to a great extent, the British
At the heart of the tension was the difference in the ways the nations envisioned the world. One vision was of a world in which nations abandoned their traditional beliefs in military alliances and spheres of influence and governed their relations with one another through democratic process, with an international organization. That was the American vision. The other vision was the Soviet Union and to some it extent, Great Britain. Both Churchill and Stalin tended to envision a postwar structure in which the great powers would control areas of strategic interest to them.
3. What were the accomplishments of the Casablanca and Teheran Conferences
Casablanca, Roosevelt and Churchill could not accept Stalin's most important demand? the immediate opening of a second front in western Europe. But they tried to reassure Stalin by announcing that they would accept nothing less than the unconditional surrender of the Axis powers, thus indicating that they would not negotiate a separate peace with Hitler and leave the Soviets to fight on alone. At Teheran, Roosevelt and Stalin established a cordial personal relationship. Stalin agreed to an American request that the Soviet Union enter the war in the Pacific soon after the end of hostilities in Europe. Roosevelt, in turn, promised that an Anglo-American second front would be established within 6 months.
4. How did the Yalta Conference deal with the Polish and German questions?What differing views of the conference did the Soviets and Americans hold
Roosevelt and Churchill insisted that the pro-Western "London" Poles must be allowed a place in the Warsaw regime. Stalin agreed only to a vague compromise by which an unspecified number of pro-Western Poles would be granted a place in the government. Roosevelt wanted a reconstructed and reunited Germany. Stalin wanted to impose heavy reparations on Germany and to ensure a permanent dismemberment of the nation. The final agreement was vague and unstable. The United States, Britain, France and the Soviet Union would each control its own zone of occupation in Germany. Berlin was divided into 4 sectors. At an unspecified date, Germany would be reunited.
5. What was the basic United Nations plan that was agreed to by Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin at Yalta
The New United Nations would contain a General Assembly, in which every member would be represented, and a Security Council, with permanent representatives of 5 major powers, each of which would have veto power. The Security Council would also have temporary delegates from several other nations.
6. When and where did President Roosevelt die
He died in Warm Springs, Georgia on April 12, 1945.
7. National Self-Determination
Britain was always uneasy about the implications of Wilson's self-determination ideal for its own enormous empire. Because of this, Churchill and Stalin tended to both vision a power structure where the strong nations control areas of the world that they want.
8. Yalta Conference
Roosevelt and Churchill insisted that the pro-Western "London" Poles must be allowed a place in the Warsaw regime. Stalin agreed only to a vague compromise by which an unspecified number of pro-Western Poles would be granted a place in the government. Roosevelt wanted a reconstructed and reunited Germany. Stalin wanted to impose heavy reparations on Germany and to ensure a permanent dismemberment of the nation. The final agreement was vague and unstable. The United States, Britain, France and the Soviet Union would each control its own zone of occupation in Germany. Berlin was divided into 4 sectors. At an unspecified date, Germany would be reunited.
9. Teheran Conference
Roosevelt and Stalin established a cordial personal relationship. Stalin agreed to an American request that the Soviet Union enter the war in the Pacific soon after the end of hostilities in Europe. Roosevelt, in turn, promised that an Anglo-American second front would be established within 6 months.
1. Compare and contrast Roosevelt's and Truman's attitudes toward Stalin and the Soviet Union. To what extent was Truman's potential influence over the Soviet's economy constrained by wartime realities
Roosevelt had hoped that Stalin was a reasonable man with whom an ultimate accord might be reached. Truman sided with those in the government who considered he Soviet Union fundamentally untrustworthy. Truman met with the Soviet foreign minister and chastised him for violations of the Yalta accords, but Truman had only limited leverage by which to compel the Soviet Union to carry out its agreements. Truman met in July at Potsdam and he reluctantly accepted he adjustments of the Polish—German border that Stalin had long demanded; he refused to permit the Russians to claim any reparations from the American, French and British zones of Germany which meant that Germany would remain divided.
2. How did the U.S. deal with China and Chiang Kai-shek in the postwar period?How did the situation in China shape U.S. policy toward Japan
Truman had the choice of supporting Mao Zedong, Chiang Kai-shek or a third person and he went with Chiang. For the next several years the long struggle between the nationalists and the communists erupted into a civil war, the U. S. continued to send money and weapons to Chiang. The United States had the choice to go to war in China, but instead they abandoned the strict occupation policies of the 1st years after the war The U.S. encouraged rapid economic growth in Japan.
3. What led to the Truman doctrine and containment?What pattern of foreign policy did the doctrine establish
Containment was slowly emerging; rather than attempting to create unified "open" world, the United States and its allies would work to "contain" the threat of further Soviet expansion. The new doctrine emerged in part as a response to events in Europe in 1946. Russia was expanding their communism influence and George F. Kennan warned that they must be stopped. The policy then put in place lasted for more than 40 years.
4. What motives led to the Marshall Plan?How successful was it
There were many motives: humanitarian concern for the European people; a fear that Europe would remain an economic drain on the United States if it could not quickly rebuild and begin to feed itself; a desire for a strong European market for American goods. Above all, the Western European governments had to be strengthened else they might fall under the control of communists. Although Russia and its allies rejected the plan, 16 Western European nations eagerly participated. Over the next 3 years, the Marshall Plan channeled over $12 billion of American aid into Europe, helping to spark a substantial economic revival.
5. How did the National Security Act of 1941 reorganize the administration of national security?What agencies were created
It created a new Department of Defense to oversee all branches of the armed services, combining the functions previously performed separately by the War and Navy departments. A National Security Council, operating out of the White House, would oversee foreign and military policy. A Central Intelligence Agency would place the wartime Office of Strategic Services and would be responsible for collecting information through both open and covert methods.
6. Why did Stalin blockade Berlin?How did the United States respond, and what resulted
The United States, France and Britain agreed to merge their quadrants of Germany which scared the Soviets. If Germany was to be officially divided, Stalin was implying, then the country's western government would have to abandon its outpost in the heart of the Soviet-controlled eastern zone. Truman refused. Truman then ordered a massive airlift to supply the city with food, fuel, and other needed goods. The airlift continued for more than 10 months. In the spring of 1949, Stalin lifted the blockade.
7. What was the fundamental agreement central to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)?How did the Soviet Union respond
It declared that an armed attack against one member (of 12) would be considered an attack against all. The formation of NATO eventually spurred the Soviet Union to create an alliance of its own with the communist governments in Eastern Europe with the Warsaw Pact.
8. What events of 1949 thrust the Cold War into a new and seemingly more dangerous stage
An announcement in September that the Soviet Union had successfully exploded tis first atomic weapon shocked and frightened many Americans. So did the collapse of Chiang Kai-shek's nationalist government in China.
9. What modification in containment policy was outlined in the NSC-68 report
The new document argued that he United States could no longer rely on other nations to take the initiative in resisting communism it must itself establish firm and active leadership of the noncommunist world. And it must move to stop communist expansion virtually anywhere it occurred. The report called for a major expansion of American military power, with a defense budget almost 4 times the previously project figures.
10. Potsdam Conference
Truman met in July at Potsdam and he reluctantly accepted he adjustments of the Polish—German border that Stalin had long demanded; he refused to permit the Russians to claim any reparations from the American, French and British zones of Germany which meant that Germany would remain divided.
11. United Nations
The New United Nations would contain a General Assembly, in which every member would be represented, and a Security Council, with permanent representatives of 5 major powers, each of which would have veto power. The Security Council would also have temporary delegates from several other nations.
12. Containment
Rather than attempting to create unified "open" world, the United States and its allies would work to "contain" the threat of further Soviet expansion.
13. Mao Zedong
He and his communist armies were in a bitter rivalry with Chiang. He was so successful that Mao was in control of ¼ of the population by 1945.
14. Chiang Kai-shek
He was the leader of China. He was friendly to the U. S., but his government was corrupt and incompetent with feeble popular support. His nationalist government was in a rivalry with Mao's communist armies.
15. National Security Act
It created a new Department of Defense to oversee all branches of the armed services, combining the functions previously performed separately by the War and Navy departments. A National Security Council, operating out of the White House, would oversee foreign and military policy. A Central Intelligence Agency would place the wartime Office of Strategic Services and would be responsible for collecting information through both open and covert methods.
16. Marshall Plan
The United States feared that they would go down if the European governments didn't start to fix their economies and governments. Although Russia and its allies rejected the plan, 16 Western European nations eagerly participated. Over the next 3 years after it was passed, the Marshall Plan channeled over $12 billion of American aid into Europe, helping to spark a substantial economic revival.
17. Berlin Airlift
Stalin put a blockade around Berlin after America, France and England agreed to merge their shares of Germany. Truman then responded by ordering a massive airlift to supply the city with food, fuel and other needed goods. The airlift continued for more than 10 months, transporting nearly 2.5 million tons of material, keeping a city of 2 million people alive, and transforming Wet Berlin into a symbol of the West's resolve to resist communist expansion.
18. Warsaw Pact
After the NATO was formed, Stalin created an alliance of his own with the communist governments in Eastern Europe. This alliance was created in the 1955 Warsaw Pact.
19. NATO
On April 4, 1949, 12 nations signed the agreement and declared that an armed attack against one member would be considered an attack against all. The NATO countries would maintain a standing military force in Europe to defend against what many policymakers believed was the threat of a Soviet invasion.
20. NSC-68
The American foreign policy was changed because of the escalating crisis with Russia. The new document argued that he United States could no longer rely on other nations to take the initiative in resisting communism it must itself establish firm and active leadership of the noncommunist world. And it must move to stop communist expansion virtually anywhere it occurred. The report called for a major expansion of American military power, with a defense budget almost 4 times the previously project figures.
1. What factors combined to keep the United States from experiencing another depression after the war?What economic problems did the nation face?How did Truman respond
Government spending dropped sharply and abruptly; $35 billion of war contracts were canceled within weeks of the Japanese surrender. But increased consumer demand soon compensated. A $6 billion tax cut pumped additional money into general circulation. The flood of consumer demand ensured that there would be no depression, but it contributed to more than two years of serious inflation. In 1946, Truman vetoed an extension of the authority of the wartime Office of Price Administration, thus eliminating price controls. Inflation soared to 25% before he relented a month later and signed another bill doing something similar to what he vetoed earlier.
2. How did reconversion affect the many women and minorities who had taken war-related jobs
Employers tended to push women, blacks, Hispanics, Chinese, and others out of the plants to make room for white males. Some workers, particularly women, left the workforce voluntarily, out of desire to return to their former domestic lives. But as many as 80% of women workers, and virtually all of the other ethnicities wanted to work. Women started to move to the service sector after being kicked out of factories.
3. What was the Fair Deal?Why was it initially unsuccessful
It called for the expansion of Social Security benefits, the raising of the legal minimum wage from 40 to 65 cents an hour, a program to ensure full employment through aggressive use of federal spending and investment, a permanent FEPC, public housing and slum clearance, long-range environmental and public works planning, and government promotion of scientific research. He also added national health insurance. The Republicans gained control of Congress and quickly show down the Fair Deal with their conservative stand point.
4. Describe the provisions of the Taft-Hartley Act. What was its impact on the labor movement
It made illegal the so-called closed shop. And although it continued to permit the creation of so-called union shops, it permitted states to pass "right-to-work" laws prohibiting even that. Repealing this provision, Section 14(b), would remain a goal of the labor movement for decades. Outraged workers and union leaders denounced the measure as a "slave labor bill." Truman vetoed it, but Congress overruled him. It damaged weaker unions and it made more difficult the organizing of worker who had never been union members.
5. What strategy did Truman use to win the 1948 presidential election despite problems within the party
As the campaign gathered momentum, Truman became more and more aggressive, turning the fire away from himself and toward Dewey and the "do-nothing, good-for-nothing" Republican Congress, which was, he told the voters, responsible for fueling inflation and abandoning workers and the middle class. The president traveled nearly 32,000 miles and made 356 speeches, delivering blunt, extemporaneous attacks. He called for the repeal of the Taft-Hartley Act, increased price supports for farmers, and strong civil rights protection for blacks. He sought to recreate the New Deal.
6. What were the successes and failures of Truman's reform agenda after 1948
Congress raised the legal minimum wage to 75 cents per hour. It approved an important expansion of the Social Security system, increasing benefits by 75% and extending them to 10 million additional people. And it passed the National Housing Act of 1949, which provided for the construction of 810,000 units of low-income housing, accompanied by long-term rent subsidies. He was too able to make progress with national health insurance and aid to education. Nor was he able to persuade Congress to accept the civil rights legislation he proposed in 1949.Truman did battle racism on his own. He ordered an end to discrimination in the hiring of government employees. He began to dismantle segregation within the armed forces. And he allowed the Justice Department to become actively involved in court battles against discriminatory statutes.
7. How did the fear of potential nuclear war affect the attitudes and daily lives of Americans in the 1950s and early 1960s?What were the positive expectations for atomic technology
There were American film noir movies. These movies portrayed the loneliness of individuals in an impersonal world but also suggested the menacing character of the age, the looming possibility of vast destructions. Sometimes films and television programs addressed nuclear fear explicitly. Schools and office buildings had regular air raid drills, to prepare people for the possibility of nuclear attack. Radio stations regularly tested the emergency broadcast systems. Fallout shelters sprang up in public buildings and private home. Nuclear power also began to spring up over the country, welcomed as the source of cheap and unlimited electricity, their potential dangers scarcely even discussed by those who celebrated the creation of atomic power.
8. GI Bill of Rights
Also known as the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, it provided economic and educational assistance to veterans, increasing spending of money even further.
9. The Fair Deal
It called for the expansion of Social Security benefits, the raising of the legal minimum wage from 40 to 65 cents an hour, a program to ensure full employment through aggressive use of federal spending and investment, a permanent FEPC, public housing and slum clearance, long-range environmental and public works planning, and government promotion of scientific research. He also added national health insurance.
10. Election of 1948
Although it looked like Dewey would win by a long shot, Truman pulled ahead and won 49.5% of the popular vote to Dewey's 45.1% and he won 303 electoral votes to 189. Democrats regained both houses of Congress by substantial margins.
11. Thomas Dewey
He was the Republican candidate in 1948. He reelection victory in 1946 (for Governor of New York) made him one of the nation's leading political figures. Polls showed Dewey with an apparently insurmountable lead in September, so much so that some opinion analysts stopped taking surveys.
12. United Mine Workers
In April 1946, John L. Lewis led his organization on strike, shutting down the coal fields for 40 days. Fears grew rapidly that without vital coal supplies, he entire economy might grind to a halt. Truman finally forced the miners to return to work by ordering government seizure of the mines. But in the process, he pressured mine owners to grant the union most of its demands.
13. Taft-Hartley Act
It made illegal the so-called closed shop. And although it continued to permit the creation of so-called union shops, it permitted states to pass "right-to-work" laws prohibiting even that. Repealing this provision, Section 14(b), would remain a goal of the labor movement for decades.
14. Dixicrats
The southern conservatives formed the States' Rights Party, with Governor Strom Thurmond of South Carolina as its presidential nominee.
15. National Housing Act
It which provided for the construction of 810,000 units of low-income housing, accompanied by long-term rent subsidies.
1. What caused the Korean War?What was the role of the U.N. in authorizing and fighting the war
When WWII was over the Soviets supported a communist regime in the North and the United States supported a pro-Western government in the South. They ended up dividing the nation. The Russians left a strong communist government in the north with a strong, Soviet-equipped army. The Americans left a small military and a pro-Western government in Syngamn Rhee. The North wanted to use their military to reunite the country. American delegates were able to win UN agreement to a resolution calling for international assistance to the Rhee government.
2. Why did the war turn into a stalemate
Victory seemed near, until the new communist government of China intervened. By November 4, 8 divisions of the Chinese army and entered the war. The UN offensive stalled and then collapsed.
3. Why did Truman dismiss Douglas MacArthur?Why was the decision so controversial
MacArthur resisted any limits on his military discretion. The United States was fighting the Chinese, he argued. It should therefore attack China itself. He said that "there is no substitute for victory" which gained wide popular support. This statement made Truman release MacArthur. 69% of all Americans supported MacArthur so there was large public outrage.
4. What social and economic effects did the Korean War have in America
Truman created the Office of Defense Mobilization to fight inflation by holding down prices and discouraging high union wage demands. Truman ordered the government to seize control of the railroads when workers stopped working. Workers ultimately got most of what they had demanded. Truman later seized the steel mills, but the Court said he exceeded his power. The Korean War let the government pump new funds into the economy.
5. Who was the leader of North Korea?(You may need to look this up on your own!)
Kim Il-sung was the leader.
6. The 38th Parallel
The Soviets created a communist government in Korea and America had created a pro-Western democratic one. They had divided the nation, supposedly temporarily, along the 38th parallel.
7. Syngman Rhee
A few months after the Soviets left Korea, the Americans handed control to the pro-Western government of Syngman Rhee, who was anticommunist but only nominally democratic. He had a relatively small military, which he used primarily to suppress internal opposition.
8. General Douglas MacArthur
MacArthur resisted any limits on Truman's military discretion. The United States was fighting the Chinese, he argued. It should therefore attack China itself. He said that "there is no substitute for victory" which gained wide popular support. This statement made Truman release MacArthur. 69% of all Americans supported MacArthur so there was large public outrage.
9. Liberation
The administration went beyond NSC-68 and decided that the war would be an effort not simply at containment but also at "liberation." After a surprise American invasion at Inchon in September had routed the North Korean forces from the south and sent them fleeing back across the 38th parallel, Truman gave MacArthur permission to pursue the communists into their own territory. His aim was to create "a unified, independent and democratic Korea."
1. Describe the factors and cases that combined to create the anticommunist paranoia of the late 1940s and early 1950s
One factor was that communism was not an imagined enemy in the 1950s. It had tangible shape. In addition, America had encountered setbacks in its battle against communism: The Korean stalemate, the "loss" of China, the soviet development of an atomic bomb. Much of the anticommunist furor emerged out of the Republican Party's search for an issue with which to attack the Democrats. The HUAC did a grand job attacking movies and officials trying to "weed out" communism. There was the Hiss trial and the Julius and Ethel Rosenberg trial.
2. How did Joseph McCarthy exploit the existing mood of hysteria?What sort of tactics did he use in his attacks on alleged subversion
In the midst of a speech in Wheeling, Wes Virginia, he raised a sheet of paper and claimed to hold a list of 205 known communist currently working in the US. State Department. In the weeks to come, as he repeated and expanded his accusations, he emerged as the nation's most prominent leader of the crusade against domestic subversion. After 1952, with the Republicans in control of the Senate and McCarthy the chairman of a special subcommittee, he conducted highly publicized investigations of subversion in many areas of the government. McCarthy never produced solid evidence of actual communist subversion, but the fear of communism made him able to gain growing popular support and ruin many careers. The Republicans used him to gain support.
3. What personalities and policies led to the Republican victory in the presidential election of 1952
Public frustration over the stalemate in Korea and popular fears of internal subversion combined to make 1952 a bad year for the Democratic Party Truman decided not to run again and instead Stevenson was the candidate. Eisenhower was the presidential candidate for the Republicans. Eisenhower attracted support through his geniality and his statesmanlike pledges to settle the Korean conflict. Nixon effectively exploited the issue of communist subversion. Nixon went to launch harsh attacks on Democratic "cowardice," "appeasement," and "treason." Eisenhower won the election.
4. House Un-American Activities Committee
The HUAC held widely publicized investigations to prove that, under Democratic rule, the government and tolerated communist subversion. The committee turned first to the move industry. More alarming to much of the public was HUAC's investigation into charges of disloyalty leveled against a former high-ranking member of the State Department: Alger Hiss.
5. McCarran Internal Security Act
It was passed in 1950 and it required all communist organizations to register with the government. Truman vetoed the bill. Congress easily overrode his veto.
6. Election of 1952
It was Adlai Stevenson for the Democratic Party against Eisenhower and Nixon for the Republican Party. Because of the Democrats bad reputation and because of how liked Eisenhower was, he won the election. He was 55% of the popular vote to Stevenson's 44% and 442 electoral votes to Stevenson's 89. Republicans gained control of both houses of Congress.
7. Dwight D. Eisenhower
He was: a military hour, commander of NATO, president of Columbia University in New York. He was the presidential candidate for the Republicans in 1952 and his running mate was Nixon. Eisenhower attracted support through his geniality and his statesmanlike pledges to settle the Korean conflict.
8. Alger Hiss trial
Whittaker Chambers told the committee that Hiss had passed classified State Department documents through him to the Soviet Union. When Hiss sued him for slander, Chambers produced microfilms of the documents. Hiss could not be tried for espionage because of the statue of limitations. But largely because of Nixon, Hiss was convicted of perjury and served several years in prison.
9. Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
They were members of the Communist Party, whom the federal government claimed had been the masterminds of the conspiracy to give the Soviets information on atomic bombs. The case against them rested in large part on testimony by Ethel's brother, David Greenglass, a machinist who had worked on the Manhattan Project. He admitted to channeling secret information to the Soviet Union through other agents. His sister and brother-in-law had, he claimed, planned and orchestrated the espionage. The Rosenbergs were then sentenced to death on April 5. Two years later, they died in the electric chair.
10. McCarthyism
In the midst of a speech in Wheeling, Wes Virginia, he raised a sheet of paper and claimed to hold a list of 205 known communist currently working in the US. State Department. In the weeks to come, as he repeated and expanded his accusations, he emerged as the nation's most prominent leader of the crusade against domestic subversion. After 1952, with the Republicans in control of the Senate and McCarthy the chairman of a special subcommittee, he conducted highly publicized investigations of subversion in many areas of the government. McCarthy never produced solid evidence of actual communist subversion, but the fear of communism made him able to gain growing popular support and ruin many careers.
11. Adlai Stevenson
He was the Democratic presidential candidate for 1952. He was the Governor of Illinois, whose dignity, wit, and eloquence made him a beloved figure to many liberals and intellectuals.
12. Richard M. Nixon
He pressed the attack against Alger Hiss, got him thrown in jail and later become Eisenhower's vice president. During the campaign, Nixon effectively exploited the issue of communist subversion. Nixon went to launch harsh attacks on Democratic "cowardice," "appeasement," and "treason."
1. What factors caused the low unemployment rate and the great growth in GNP from 1945 to 1960?How widespread was the prosperity
Government spending continued to stimulate growth through public funding's of schools, housing, veterans' benefits, welfare, the $100 billion interstate highway project and above all, military spending. The rapid expansions of suburbs helped stimulate growth in several important sectors of the economy. More people had cars, which spiked the automobile industry. The growth was far from equally distributed, but it affected most of society.
2. What unique factors combined to stimulate the rapid population expansion and economic growth that characterized the American West, and especially the Los Angeles area, in the post-World War II era
Some parts of the West had become among the most important industrial and cultural centers of the nation in their own right. Most of the growth of the West came from WWII spending. But there was also the enormous increase in automobile use after WWII. State governments in te West invested heavily in their universities. Climate also contributed: California, Nevada and Arizona attracted many migrants because of their warm, dry climates. Los Angeles was particularly remarkable More than 10% of all new businesses I the United States between 1945 and 1950 began in Los Angeles. Its population rose by over 50% in 20 years.
3. How did the labor union movement change in the 1950s?What problems surfaced
Corporations enjoying booming growth were reluctant to allow strikes to interfere with their operations. As a result, business leaders made important concessions to unions. Unions started to develop "postwar contracts." Workers in steel, automobiles, and other large unionized industry were receiving generous increases in wages and benefits; in return, the unions tacitly agreed to refrain from raising other issues. Strikes became far less frequent. In 1955, the AFL and CIO merged into one organization. Success with unions bred some corruption. In 1957, the powerful Teamsters Union became the subject of a congressional investigation, and is president, David Beck, was charged with misappropriation of union funds. Beck ultimately stepped down to be replaced by Jimmy Hoffa, whom government investigators pursued for nearly a decade before finally winning a conviction against him in 1967. The United Mine Workers also became tainted. John L. Lewis's last years as head of the union were plagued with scandals and dissent within the organization. His successor, Tony Boyle, was ultimately convicted of complicity in the 1969 murder of the leader of a dissident faction within the union.
4. Baby Boom
The national birth rate reversed a long pattern of decline with the so-called baby boom, which had begun during the war and peaked in 1957. The nation's population rose almost 20% in the decade. The baby boom contributed to increased consumer demand and expanding economic growth.
5. Keynesian economics
The British economist John Maynard Keynes had argued that by varying the glow of government spending and taxation and managing the supply of currency, the government could stimulate the economy to cure recession and dampen growth to prevent inflation. By the mid-1950s, Keynesian theory was rapidly becoming a fundamental article of faith.
6. Labor's "postwar contract"
Workers in steel, automobiles, and other large unionized industry were receiving generous increases in wages and benefits; in return, the unions tacitly agreed to refrain from raising other issues. Strikes became far less frequent.
7. Suburbanization
The rapid expansion of suburbs helped stimulate growth in several important sectors of the economy. The number of privately owned cards more than doubled in a decade, sparking a great boom in the automobile industry. Demand for new homes helped sustain a vigorous housing industry. The construction of roads and highways stimulated the economy as well. The economy grew nearly 10 times as fast as the population in 30 years after the war.
8. Corporate consolidation
Over 4,000 corporate mergers took place in the 1950s; and more than ever before, a relatively small number of large-scale organizations controlled an enormous proportion of the nation's economic activity. This was particularly true in industries benefitting from government defense spending. In 1959, half of all defense contracts went to only 25 firms.
9. AFL-CIO
In 1955, the AFL and CIO merged into one organization. Relations weren't always the best. The CIO leaders believed that he AFL hierarchy was dominating the relationship. AFL leaders were suspicious of what they considered the radical past of the CIO leadership. Eventually, tensions subsided.
10. Teamsters Union
In 1957, the powerful Teamsters Union became the subject of a congressional investigation, and is president, David Beck, was charged with misappropriation of union funds. Beck ultimately stepped down to be replaced by Jimmy Hoffa, whom government investigators pursued for nearly a decade before finally winning a conviction against him in 1967.
11. United Mine Workers
The United Mine Workers also became tainted. John L. Lewis's last years as head of the union were plagued with scandals and dissent within the organization. His successor, Tony Boyle, was ultimately convicted of complicity in the 1969 murder of the leader of a dissident faction within the union.
1. Describe how the prewar groundwork in antibiotics and immunization flowered after 1945. What major diseases were virtually eliminated in the U.S.
The development of antibiotics had its origins in the discoveries of Louis Pasteur and Jules-Francois Joubert. In the 1870s, they produced the first conclusive evidence that virulent bacterial infections could be defeated by other, more ordinary bacteria. In the 1930s, scientists in Germany, France, and England demonstrated the power of so-called sulfa drugs which could be used effectively to treated streptococcal blood infections. New sulfa drugs were soon being developed at an astonishing rate, and were steadily improved. In 1928, Alexander Fleming, an English medical researcher, accidentally discovered the antibacterial properties of an organism that he named penicillin. A group of researchers at Oxford University learned how to produce stable, potent penicillin in sizable enough quantities to make it a practical weapon against bacterial disease. Penicillin became popular around the world in 1948 because the war stalled the effort to share the new drugs. The first great triumph with immunization was the development of the smallpox vaccine by the English researcher Edward Jenner in the late 18th century. A vaccine against typhoid was developed in 1897. Vaccination against tetanus became widespread in many countries just before and during WWII. Medical scientists also developed a vaccine, BCG, against tuberculosis in the 190s. An effective vaccine against yellow fever was developed in the later 1930s, and one against some forms of influenza in 1945. There was also a vaccine against polio. It was free in 1955 and it became an oral vaccine in 1960.
2. How had the use of computers expanded by the mid-1950s?What company dominated the computer market in these years
The first significant computer of the 1950s was the UNIVAC, which was developed initially for the U.S. Bureau of the Census by the Remington Rand Company. The was the first computer able to handle both alphabetical and numerical information easily. The computer became popular when it predicted that Eisenhower would have a landslide victory over Stevenson. Remington Rand had limited success in marketing the computer, but in the mid-190s, the International Business Machines Company introduced its first major data-processing computers and began to find a wide market for them among businesses in the United States and abroad.
3. Describe the process by which the U.S. developed reliable ICBMs. Why was this military effort so critical to the space program
American scientists experimented in the 1950s with the first Atlas and then the Titan ICBM. There were some early successes, but there were also many setbacks, particularly because of the difficulty of massing sufficient, stable fuel to provide the tremendous power needed to launch missiles beyond the atmosphere. By 1958, scientists had created a solid fuel to replace the volatile liquid fuels of the early missiles. Within a few years, a new generation of missile, known as the Minuteman, with a range of several thousand miles, became the basis of the American atomic weapons arsenal.
4. What impact did the Soviet launching of Sputnik have on U.S. education and the space effort
The United States had yet to perform any similar feats, and the American government reacted to the announcement with alarm, as if the Soviet achievement was also a massive American failure. Federal policy began encouraging and funding strenuous efforts to improve scientific education in the schools, to create more research laboratories, and above all, to speed the development of America's own exploration of outer space.
5. After the U.S. won the race to the moon, what direction did the American space program take
Six more lunar missions followed, the last in 1972. Not long after that, the government began to cut the funding for missions, and popular enthusiasm for the program began to wane.
6. Antibacterial drugs
The development of antibiotics had its origins in the discoveries of Louis Pasteur and Jules-Francois Joubert. In the 1870s, they produced the first conclusive evidence that virulent bacterial infections could be defeated by other, more ordinary bacteria. In the 1930s, scientists in Germany, France, and England demonstrated the power of so-called sulfa drugs which could be used effectively to treated streptococcal blood infections. New sulfa drugs were soon being developed at an astonishing rate, and were steadily improved.
7. Penicillin
In 1928, Alexander Fleming, an English medical researcher, accidentally discovered the antibacterial properties of penicillin. There was little progress with penicillin until a group of researchers at Oxford University, directed by Howard Florey and Ernest Chain, learned how to produce stable, potent penicillin in sizable enough quantities to make it a practical weapon against bacterial disease. It became widely available to doctors and hospitals around the world by 1948.
8. Immunization
The first great triumph with immunization was the development of the smallpox vaccine by the English researcher Edward Jenner in the late 18th century. A vaccine against typhoid was developed in 1897. Vaccination against tetanus became widespread in many countries just before and during WWII. Medical scientists also developed a vaccine, BCG, against tuberculosis in the 1920s. An effective vaccine against yellow fever was developed in the later 1930s, and one against some forms of influenza in 1945.
9. Salk vaccine
In 1953, American scientist Jonas Salk introduced an effective vaccine against polio. It was provided free to the public by the federal government in 1955. After 1960, an oral vaccine developed by Albert Sabin made widespread vaccination even easier. By the early 1960s, these vaccines had virtually eliminated polio in the United States.
10. Chemical pesticides
The most famous of the pesticides was DDT, a compound discovered in 1939 by a Swiss chemist named Paul Muller. He had found that although DDT seemed harmless to human beings and other mammals, it was extremely toxic to insects. American scientists learned of Muller's discovery when malaria and typhus threatened American soldiers. It was first used on a large scale in Italy in 1943-1944 during a typhus outbreak.
11. Television
Researchers in the 1940s produced the first commercially viable televisions and created a technology that made it possible to broadcast programming over large areas. Later, in the late 1950s, scientists at RCA's David Sarnoff Laboratories in New Jersey developed the technology for color television.
12. UNIVAC
It was the first significant computer of the 1950s. It was developed initially for the United States Bureau of the Census by the Remington Rand Company. It was the first computer able to handle both alphabetical and numerical information easily. It used tape storage and could perform calculations and other functions much faster than its predecessor, the ENIAC. UNIVAC was used to predict the results of the 1952 election on television which brought wide attention to the computer.
13. Hydrogen bomb
In 1952, the United States successfully detonated the first hydrogen bomb. Unlike the plutonium and uranium bombs, the hydrogen bomb derives from fusion. It is capable of producing explosions of vastly greater power than the earlier, fission bombs. The development of the bomb gave incentive for the United States and Russia to work harder on space.
14. Space Program
The United States launched its first satellite, Explorer I, in January 1958. NASA was established and the first astronauts were selected. NASA's initial effort, the Mercury Project, was designed to launch manned vehicles into space to orbit the earth. But the Americans accomplished this months after the Soviets did. NASA later introduced the Gemini program, whose spacecraft cold carry two astronauts at once. Mercury and Gemini were followed by the Apollo program; whose purpose was to land men on the moon.
15. Sputnik
The Soviet Union announced that it had launched an earth-orbiting satellite into outer space. This announcement caused the United States to react with alarm and started to work hard towards space exploration.
1. Explain the expanded role of advertising and consumer credit. Why can it be said that the prosperity of the 1950s and 1960s was substantially consumer-driven
There was a growing absorption with consumer goods. That was a result of increased, prosperity, of the increasing variety and availability of products, and of advertisers' adeptness in creating a demand for those products. It was also a result of the growth of consumer credit, which increased by 800% between 1945 and 1957 through the development of credit cards, revolving charge accounts, and easy-payment plans. The prosperity was consumer driven because people had money and wanted to spend it on a lot of new "high-tech" machines and gadgets.
2. What was the appeal of Levittown and similar suburban developments?How did typical suburbs transform family life and shape women's attitudes?What role did race play in suburbanization
Young couples-often newly married and the husband a war veteran, eager to start a family, assisted by low-cost, government-subsidize mortgages provided by the GI Bill-rushed to purchase the inexpensive homes. One reason why people wanted to move to the suburbs was the enormous importance postwar Americans placed on family life after 5 years of disruptive war. Suburbs provided families with larger homes than they could find in the cities. Many people were attracted by the idea of living in a community populated largely by people of similar age and background and found it easier to form friendships and social circles there than in the city. Women in particular often valued the presence of other nonworking mothers living nearby to share the tasks of child raising. There were some African American suburbs, but most suburbs were restricted to whites. In an era when the black population of most cities was rapidly growing, many white families moved to the suburbs to escape the integration of urban neighborhoods and schools. For professional men, suburban life generally meant a rigid division between their working and personal worlds. For many middle-class, married women, it meant increased isolation form the workplace. The emphasis on family life strengthened popular prejudices against women entering the professions.
3. Describe how commercial television drew on the concepts and corporate structure of the radio era. How did the medium simultaneously unify and alienate Americans
Like radio, the television business was driven by advertising. The need to attract advertisers determined most programming decisions; and in the early days of television, sponsors often played a direct powerful and continuing role in determining the content of the programs they chose to sponsor. Many early television shows bore the names of the corporations that were paying for them. By the late 1950s, television news had replaced newspapers, magazines, and radios as the nation's most important vehicle of information. Television advertising helped create a vast market for new fashion's and products. Televised athletic events gradually made professional and college sports one of the most important sources of entertainment in America. Through television news and other venues, less affluent people could acquire a vivid picture of how the rest of their society lived. And at the same tie that television was reinforcing the homogeneity of the white middle class, it was also contributing to the sense of alienation and powerlessness among groups excluded from the world it portrayed.
4. Why did vacation travel, especially to national parks, expand in the 1950s
The construction of the interstate highway system contributed dramatically to the growth of travel. So did the increasing affluence of workers, which made it possible for them to buy cars. People who traveled to national parks did so for many reasons? some to hike and camp; some to fish and hunt; some simply to look in awe at the landscape.
5. Describe the ideas of the several writers of the 1950s who explored the growing tensions between organized, bureaucratic society and the tradition of individualism. What was The Organization Man
William H. Whyte Jr. produced one of the most widely discussed books of the decade: The Organization Man, which attempted to describe the special mentality of the worker in a large, bureaucratic setting. Self-reliance, Whyte claimed, was losing place to the ability to "get along" and "work as a team" as the most valued trait in the modern character. David Riesman made similar observations in The Lonely Crowd, in which he argued that the traditional "inner-directed" man, who judged himself on the basis of his own values and the esteem of his family, was giving way to a new "other-directed" man, more concerned with winning the approval of the larger organization or community. Saul Bellow produced a series of novels that chronicled the difficulties of American Jewish men had in finding fulfillment in modern urban America. J. D. Saligner wrote of a prep-school student who was unable to find any area of society in which he could feel secure of committed.
6. Why did rock 'n' roll, and especially Elvis Presley, become so popular in the 1950s?What was the role of radio and, later, TV
Presley became a symbol of a youthful determination to push at the borders of the conventional and acceptable. His good looks; his self-conscious effort to dress in vaguely rebellious style of urban gangs; and most of all, the open sexuality of his music and his public performance made him wildly popular. By the 1950s, radio stations no longer felt obliged to present mostly live programming. Instead, many radio stations devoted themselves to playing recorded music. Early in the 1950s, disk jockeys appeared. They began to create programming aimed specifically at young fans of rock music. American Bandstand, a televised showcase for rock 'n' roll hits that began in 1957, featured a live audience dancing to mostly recorded music. The show helped spread the popularity of rock-and made its host, Dick Clark, one of the best-known figures in America among young Americans. The radio and television encourage the sale of records.
7. How did black music influence the development of rock music?To what extent was the audience multiracial
Black rhythm and blues traditions were drawn heavily on by white rock and roll. This type of music appealed to some white youths in the early 1950s because of their pulsing, sensual rhythms and their hard-edged lyrics. Black music itself also became more popular for both whites and blacks.
8. Consumer culture
The middle-class culture was a growing absorption with consumer goods. This was because of prosperity, new products, advertisers, more credit. Prosperity fueled the automobile industry. Many people bought dishwashers, garbage disposals, televisions, hi-fis and stereos. There were also new consumer crazes like the hula hoop and Mickey Mouse.
9. Consumer credit
Consumer credit was growing. It increased by 800% between 1945 and 1957 through the development of credit cards, revolving charge accounts, and easy payment plans.
10. Disneyland
The popularity of the Walt Disney-produced children's television show The Mickey Mouse Club created a national demand for related products. It also helped produce the stunning success of Disneyland, an amusement park near Los Angeles that re-created many of the characters and events of Disney entertainment programs. The success of Disneyland depended largely on the ease of highway access from the dense urban areas around it, as well as the vast parking lots that surrounded it.
11. Federal Highway Act
It appropriated $25 billion for highway construction. It was one of the most important alterations of the national landscape in modern history. These highways dramatically reduced the time necessary to travel form one place to another. They also made trucking a more economical way than railroads to transport goods to markets.
12. Fast-food restaurants
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13. Levittown's
The most famous of the postwar suburban developers, William Levitt, used new mass-production techniques to construct a large housing development on Long Island. This first "Levittown" consisted of several thousand 2-bedroom Cape Cod-style houses, with identical interiors and only slightly varied facades each perched on its own concrete slab, facing curving, treeless streets. Levittown houses sold for under $10,000 and they helped meet an enormous and growing demand for housing. Young couples rushed to purchase the inexpensive homes.
14. Feminism
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15. Situational comedies
Much of the programming of the 1950s and early 1960s created a common image of American life? an image that was predominantly white, middle-class, and suburban and that was epitomized by such popular situation comedies as Ozzie and Harriet and Leave It to Beaver.
16. Environmentalism
The Sierra Club was reborn when Bernard DeVoto published "Shall We Let Them Ruin Our National Parks?" in an attempt to preserve Echo Park. It became the nation's leading environmental organization. By the mid-1950s, a large coalition of environmentalists, naturalists, and wilderness vacationers had been mobilized in opposition to the dam, and in 1956 Congress blocked the project and preserved Echo Park in its natural state.
17. Multiversity
A phrase first coined by the chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley to describe his institution's diversity. It represented a commitment ot making higher education a training ground for specialists in a wide variety of fields.
18. The Beat Generation
The most caustic critics of bureaucracy, and of middle-class society in general, were a group of young poets, writers, and artists generally known as the "beats." They wrote harsh critiques of what they considered the sterility and conformity of American life, the meaninglessness of American politics and the banality of popular culture.
19. James Dean
His popularity in such movies as Rebel Without a Cause, East of Eden and Giant, conveyed a powerful image of youth culture in the 1950s. Both the roles he played and in the way he lived his own life, Dean became an icon of the unfocused rebelliousness of American youth in his time. He died in a car accident at age 24 in 1955.
20. Rock 'n' Roll
One of the most powerful cultural forces for American youth was rock 'n' roll and Elvis Presley. Presley became a symbol of a youthful determination to push at the borders of the conventional and acceptable. His good looks; his self-conscious effort to dress in vaguely rebellious style of urban gangs; and most of all, the open sexuality of his music and his public performance made him wildly popular. Rock 'n' roll drew heavily form black rhythm and blues traditions, which appealed to some white youths in the early 1950s.
1. What was the extent of hard core poverty in the otherwise prosperous nation?What groups predominated in this "hard core"
Approximately 20% of the poor were people for whom poverty was a continuous, debilitating reality, form which here was no easy escape. That included approximately half the nation's elderly and a large proportion of African Americans and Hispanics. Native Americans constituted the single poorest group in the country, a result of government policies that undermined the economies of the reservations and drove many Indians into cities, where some lived in worse poverty.
2. Why was so much of rural America still mired in poverty as late as 1960
Because of enormous surpluses in basic staples, prices fell 33% in those years, even though national income as a whole rose 50% at the same time. Even most farmers who managed to survive experienced substantial losses of income at the same time that he prices of many consumer goods rose. Black sharecroppers and tenant farmers continued to live at or below the subsistence level throughout the rural South.
3. Describe the process that led to large pockets of poverty-stricken minorities in cities, especially in the North and Southwest. Why did so many of these people remain poor at a time of growing national affluence
As white families moved from cities to suburbs in vast numbers, many inner-city neighborhoods became vast repositories for the poor, "ghettos" from which here was no easy escape The growth of these neighborhoods owed much to a vast migration of African Americans out of the countryside and into industrial cities. Similar migrations from Mexico and Puerto Rico expanded poor Hispanic neighborhoods at the same time. Some critics have argued that the new migrants were victims, in part, of their own pasts, that the work habits, values and family structures they brought with them from their rural homes were poorly adapted to the needs of the modern industrial city. Other have argued that he inner city itself created a "culture of poverty" that made it difficult for individuals to advance. Many others argue that a combination of declining blue-collar jobs, inadequate support for minority-dominated public schools, and barriers to advancement rooted in racism was the source of inner-city poverty.
4. The Other America
It was a book written by Michael Harrington, in which he chronicled the continuing existence of poverty in America. The conditions he described were not new. Only the attention he was bringing to them was.
5. Ghettoes
As white families moved from cities to suburbs in vast numbers, many inner-city neighborhoods became vast repositories for the poor, "ghettos" from which here was no easy escape The growth of these neighborhoods owed much to a vast migration of African Americans out of the countryside and into industrial cities.
6. Urban renewal
For many years, the principal policy response to the poverty of inner cities was "urban renewal": the effort to tear down buildings in the poorest and most degraded areas. The projects destroyed over 400,000 buildings, among them the homes of nearly 1.5 million people. In some cases, urban renewal provided new public housing for poor city residents. Some of it was considerably better than the housing they left; some of it was poorly designed and constructed.
1. Describe the response of the political power structure of the Deep South to the Brown v. Board of Education and Brown II rulings. How did the Little Rock episode illustrate the conflict
Strong local opposition produced long delays and bitter conflicts. Some school districts ignored the ruling altogether. Other attempted to circumvent it with purely token efforts to integrate. More than 100 southern members of Congress signed a "manifesto" in 1956 denouncing the Brown decision and urging their constituents to defy it. Southern governors, mayors, local school boards, and nongovernmental pressure groups all worked to obstruct desegregation. Many school districts enacted "pupil placement laws" allowing school officials to place students in schools according to their scholastic abilities and social behavior, but they really just maintained segregation. Many white parents simply withdrew their children form the public schools and enrolled them in all-white schools. At Little Rock, an angry white mob tried to prevent implementation of desegregation by blockading the entrances to the school and the Governor refused to do anything.
2. What was the importance of the Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott
The boycott was very successful and buses were no longer segregated at the end of it. Also, an important result was the rise to prominence of Martin Luther King Jr.
3. What philosophy shaped Martin Luther King, Jr.'s approach to civil rights protest?How did he become the principal leader and symbol of the movement
King's approach to black protest was based on the doctrine of nonviolence. He drew from Mahatma Gandhi, Henry David Thoreau and from Christian doctrine. He urged African Americans to engage in peaceful demonstrations; to allow themselves to be arrested, even beaten, if necessary; and to respond to hate with love. For the next 13 years? as a leader of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an interracial group he founded shortly after the bus boycott- he was the most influential and most widely admired black leader in the country.
4. What were the key factors that converged in the postwar period to ignite the civil rights movement
The legacy of WWII was one of the most important. Millions of black men and women and served in the military or worked in war plants and had derived from the experience a broader view of the world, and of their place in it. Another factor was the growth of an urban black middle class, which had been developing for decades but which began to flourish after the war. Much of the impetus for the civil rights movement came from the leaders of urban black communities. Television and other forms of popular culture were another factor. More than any previous generation, postwar African Americans had constant, vivid reminders of how the white majority lived. Television also conveyed the activities of demonstrators to a national audience. The Cold War made racial injustice an embarrassment to Americans trying to present their nation as a model to the world. Labor unions with substantial black memberships also played an important part in supporting the civil rights movement.
5. Brown vs. the Board of Education
In considering the legal segregation of a Kansas public school system, the Court rejected its own 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision, which had ruled that communities could provide blacks with separate facilities as long as the facilities were equal to those of whites. The Topeka suit involved the case of an African American girl who had to travel several miles to a segregated public school every day even though she lived virtually next door to a white elementary school. The following year, the Court issued another decision known as "Brown II" to provide rules for implementing the 1954 order.
6. Little Rock Nine
They were a group of Nine African Americans that were some of the first to enroll into Little Rock High School in 1957.
7. Montgomery Bus Boycott
After Rosa Parks was arrested, civil rights leaders leaped on the opportunity to start a bus boycott. The boycott was planned for some time, but Parks' arrest was the sparkplug for it. Once launched, the boycott was almost completely effective. The boycott put economic pressure not only on the bus company but on many Montgomery merchants as well, since they couldn't ride the bus to get to the father merchants. Late in 1956, the Supreme Court ruled that buses could not be segregated.
8. Martin Luther King, Jr.
He was chosen to head the boycott movement. He was a local Baptist pastor and the son of a prominent Atlanta minister, a powerful orator, and a gifted leader. At first King was reluctant to lead the movement. But once he accepted the role, he became consumed by it. His strategy for civil rights was to meet hate with love and act without violence.
9. Civil Disobedience
One of the people King got his ideas from was Henry David Thoreau. He specifically pulled ideas from his doctrine of civil disobedience.
10. Civil Rights Act of 1957
It provided federal protection for African Americans who wished to register to vote. It was a weak bill, with few mechanisms for enforcement, bit it was the first civil rights bill of any kind ot win passage since the end of Reconstruction, and it served as a signal that the executive and legislative branches were beginning to join the judiciary in the federal commitment to the "Second Reconstruction."
1. How had the economic attitudes of many corporate leaders changed by the time of the Eisenhower administration
Above all, many business leaders had reconciled themselves to at least the broad outlines of the Keynesian welfare state the New Deal had launched. Indeed, some corporate leaders had come to see it as something that actually benefited them? by helping maintain social order, by increasing mass purchasing power, and by stabilizing labor relations.
2. What sort of individuals dominated Eisenhower's cabinet
He appointed wealthy corporate lawyers and business executives who were not apologetic about their backgrounds. Charles Wilson, president of General Motors, assured senators considering his nomination for secretary of defense that he foresaw no conflict of interest because he was certain that "what was good for our country was good for General Motors, and vice versa."
3. Contrast Eisenhower's attitude toward new social legislation with his approach to existing programs. What act of his presidency led to the largest public works project in American history
He supported the private rather than public development of natural resources. To the farmers, he lowered federal support for farm prices. He also removed the last limited wage and price controls maintained by the Truman administration. He opposed the creation of new social service programs. He tried to reduce federal expenditures and balance the budget. He agreed to extend the Social Security system as well as unemployment compensation. He also rose the minimum wage. He created the Federal Highway Act of 1956 which was the largest public works project in American history.
4. What led to the demise of Senator Joseph McCarthy and the end of the Red Scare
In January 1954, McCarthy overreached when he attacked Secretary of the Army Robert Stevens and the armed services in general. At that point, the administration and influential members of Congress organized a special investigation of the charges, which became known as the Army-McCarthy hearings. The result was devastating to McCarthy. Watching McCarthy in action, much of the public began to see him as a villain, and even a buffoon. In December 1954, the Senate voted 67 to 22 to condemn him. 3 years later, he died.
5. Election of 1956
In 1956, Eisenhower ran for a second term, even though he had suffered a serious heart attack the previous year. With Adlai Stevenson opposing him again, he won by another, even greater landslide, receiving nearly 54% of the popular vote and 457 electoral votes. Democrats retained control of both houses of Congress.
6. Army-McCarthy Hearings
In January 1954, McCarthy overreached when he attacked Secretary of the Army Robert Stevens and the armed services in general. At that point, the administration and influential members of Congress organized a special investigation of the charges, which became known as the Army-McCarthy hearings. They were the first congressional hearings to be nationally televised. Watching McCarthy in action, much of the public began to see him as a villain, and even a buffoon.
1. Why did John Foster Dulles move the United States toward the policy of massive retaliation
Dulles announced "massive retaliation" in early 1954. The United States would, he explained, respond to communist threats to its allies not by using convention forces in local conflicts but by relying on "the deterrent of massive retaliatory power" (nuclear weapons). The real force behind the massive-retaliation policy was economics. With pressure growing both in and out of government for a reduction of American military expenditures, an increasing reliance on atomic weapons seemed to promise, "more bang for the buck."
2. How did the Korean War end
On July 27, 1953, negotiators at Panmunjom finally signed an agreement ending the hostilities. Each antagonist was to withdraw its troops a mile and a half from the existing battle line, which ran roughly along the 38th parallel.
3. How did the U.S. react to the establishment of Israel?How did Israel's neighbors react
President Truman recognized the new Jewish homeland the day after it declared its independence. Palestinian Arabs, unwilling to accept being displaced form that they considered their own country, joined with Israel's Arab neighbors and fought determinedly against the new state in 1948.
4. Why was the United States so committed to stability in the Middle East?How was this approach implemented in Iran
It was concerned with the Middle East because the area was oil-rich and American petroleum companies had major investments there. Thus the United States reacted with alarm as it watched Mohammad Mossadegh, the nationalist prime minister of Iran, begin to resist the presence of Western corporations in his nation in the early 1950s. The American CIA joined with conservative Iranian military leaders to overthrow Mossadegh. They then created monarchy that supported the United States.
5. What led to the Suez crisis of 1956?What position did the United States take
General Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt began to develop a trade relationship with the Soviet Union in the early 1950s. In 1956, to punish Nasser for his friendliness toward the communists, Dulles withdrew American offers to assist in building the great Aswan dam across the Nile. A week later, Nasser retaliated by seizing control of the Suez Canal from the British. On October 29, 1956, Israeli forces attacked Egypt. The next day the British and French landed troops in the Suez to drive the Egyptians out. By refusing to support the invasion, and by joining in a United Nations denunciation of it, the United States helped pressure the French and British to withdraw and helped persuade Israel to agree to a truce with Egypt.
6. What led to increasing animosity toward the United States on the part of many Latin Americans?What did the Guatemalan incident reveal about American intentions
In 1954, Eisenhower ordered the CIA to help topple the new, leftist government of Jacobo Arbenz Guzman in Guatemala. It was a regime that Dulles (responding to the entreaties of the United Fruit Company, a major investor in Guatemala fearful of Arbenz) argued was potentially communist.
7. What led to Fidel Castro's rise in Cuba?How did the United States deal with his new regime
In 1956, a popular movement of resistance to the Batista regime began to gather strength under Fidel Castro. On January 1, 1959, with Batista having fled to exile in Spain, Castro marched into Havana and established a new government. When Castro began accepting assistance from the Soviet Union in 1960, the United States cut back the "quota" by which Cuba could export sugar to America at a favored price. Early in 1961, as one of its last acts, the Eisenhower administration severed diplomatic relations with Castro.
8. What did the Hungarian Revolution and the U-2 incident illustrate about the nature of the United States-Soviet relationship in the late 1950s and into 1960
In Hungary, there was an uprising for democratic ideals, but the Soviet Union entered Budapest to crush the uprising and restore an orthodox, pro-Soviet regime. The U-2 Crisis was when Nikita Khrushchev suggested that he and Eisenhower discuss Berlin personally, in each other's countries. Khrushchev's visit to America had mostly a polite public response. Eisenhower went to Moscow shortly after. Just before the final Paris meeting, The Soviet Union shot down an American U-2, a high-altitude spy plane, over Russian territory. Khrushchev lashed out angrily at the American incursion and broke up the Paris summit almost before it could begin. These incidents showed that there were still high tensions between the two nations, but they wanted to avoid a full-scale war. It also showed that they were trying, even a bit, to be "civil" but quickly let anger and accusations reach them.
9. Massive Retaliation
Dulles announced "massive retaliation" in early 1954. The United States would, he explained, respond to communist threats to its allies not by using convention forces in local conflicts but by relying on "the deterrent of massive retaliatory power" (nuclear weapons). The real force behind the massive-retaliation policy was economics.
10. Dien Bien Phu
When French troops became surrounded in a disastrous siege of North Vietnam, only American intervention could prevent the total collapse of the French military effort. Yet Eisenhower refused to permit direct American military intervention in Vietnam.
11. Israeli independence
In May 14, 1948, Israel proclaimed its independence and President Truman recognized the new Jewish homeland the next day. The creation of Israel caused conflicts with their neighbors.
12. Suez Crisis
General Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt began to develop a trade relationship with the Soviet Union in the early 1950s. In 1956, to punish Nasser for his friendliness toward the communists, Dulles withdrew American offers to assist in building the great Aswan dam across the Nile. A week later, Nasser retaliated by seizing control of the Suez Canal from the British.
13. Fidel Castro
In 1956, a popular movement of resistance to the Batista regime began to gather strength under Fidel Castro. On January 1, 1959, with Batista having fled to exile in Spain, Castro marched into Havana and established a new government. When Castro began accepting assistance from the Soviet Union in 1960. This hurt the relations with the United States, which were eventually ended when Castro joined an alliance with the Soviet Union.
14. U-2 Crisis
It was when Nikita Khrushchev suggested that he and Eisenhower discuss Berlin personally, in each other's countries. Khrushchev's visit to America had mostly a polite public response. Eisenhower went to Moscow shortly after. Just before the final Paris meeting, The Soviet Union shot down an American U-2, a high-altitude spy plane, over Russian territory. Khrushchev lashed out angrily at the American incursion and broke up the Paris summit almost before it could begin.
Sets with similar terms