Download UNIT 11 Study Guide

AP U.S. HISTORY
Unit 11: The Cold War Era
Unit Study Guide
Required Reading: Divine Chapters 28-31; American Pageant: 36-40
Your timeline should focus on the time period covered in the unit and include separate lines for economic, political, social/cultural,
and international (meaning U.S. interactions with other nations) events. For each event, you should include a brief description and
explanations of its significance.
1945
1995
Economic
Political
Social/Cultural
International
Discussion Questions/Statements: You do not have to answer and submit these. These questions align with AP themes and are
provided to encourage you to reflect and make connections. They can be an excellent review tool, as working with these bigger ideas
will assist in your learning the details.
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American Identity:
a. Discuss the new importance of the “Third World” in American foreign policy of the 1980s and 1990s.
b. Which development caused the greatest change in American society in the immediate postwar years: increased
affluence, the migration to the suburbs, the entry of women into the work force, or the “baby boom”?
Politics and Citizenship:
a. What was legitimate concern and what was hysterical “witch-hunting” in the postwar wave of domestic
anticommunism?
b. Did Reagan’s and Bush’s hard-line policies contribute to the collapse of Communism, or did Communism
fundamentally fall because of its own internal weaknesses?
c. What role did each of the following play with regard to the Cold War; Berlin Airlift, containment, Marshall Plan,
Truman Doctrine, NATO, Korean War?
d. To what extent was the election of Reagan an endorsement of his conservative ideology, and to what extent was it a
repudiation of the perceived failures of federal government policies in the stalemated 1970s?
War and Diplomacy:
a. What were the causes of the Vietnam War? What were the consequences? Why did it divide American society so
severely? How did it impact America’s role in the world?
b. Was the primary threat from the Soviet Union military or ideological – that is, was the danger that the Soviet army
would invade Western Europe or that more and more people in Europe and elsewhere would be attracted to
communist ideas?
c. How did Nixon’s foreign policy of Détente differ from previous administrations? How did détente help or hurt
relations with China and the Soviet Union?
Reform: Was the nonviolent civil rights movement of the 1960s a success? Why or why not?
Culture: Were the cultural upheavals of the 1960s a result of the political crisis, or were developments like the sexual
revolution and the student revolts inevitable results of affluence and the “baby boom”?
American Diversity: How did Kennedy and Johnson deal with the civil rights issue? What were their goals and were their
goals actualized by the end of the decade?
Focus Questions: Answer these questions and keep answers in UNIT STUDY GUIDE TAB in your UNIT BINDER
Chapter 28
1. Identify the Potsdam Conference and describe the conflicting political and economic goals of the United States and the USSR
for the postwar world, and how these clashing aims launched the Cold War.
2. Discuss the significance of the Korean War in terms of American military effectiveness, its prediction of future United States
involvement in Asia, and its impact on American commitment to fighting the Cold War.
3. Outline the provisions of NSC-68 and explain its impact on the development of American foreign policy during the 1950s.
4. Show the relationship between the Cold War and the emergence of internal loyalty programs and the second Red Scare in the
United States.
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Identify the House Committee on Un-American Activities and discuss its role in the Red Scare.
Discuss Eisenhower’s “New Look” and explain Eisenhower’s “doctrine of massive retaliation” in terms of its impact on
American foreign relations during the 1950s and on increasing American fear of nuclear war.
Assess the U.S. role in the Middle East.
Identify the significance of the Soviet launch of the Sputnik and indicate the American response to that event.
Discuss the misunderstandings typical of Soviet-American relations during the 1950s, focusing on the U-2 affair of 1960.
Chapter 29
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Comment on the increase in marriage and birth rates in postwar America and how the increases impacted national
consumerism.
Give some examples of challenges to that culture of conformity.
Outline the provisions of the Federal Highway Act of 1956 and explain the impact of massive road construction on American
society and culture.
Discuss the role of Martin Luther King, Jr. and the organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.
Discuss the creation of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Sit-In movement.
Chapter 30
1. Define the meaning of John Kennedy’s New Frontier and describe the tone, achievements, and failures of his administration.
2. Analyze the Kennedy administration’s role in Berlin and containing Communism in southeast Asia.
3. Define the Bay of Pigs affair and describe the events that led to a crisis over missiles in Cuba and how it was settled. Explain
why Khrushchev was willing to take a risk in Cuba.
4. Explain the historical significance of the 1963 March on Washington.
5. Outline the major components of Lyndon Johnson’s “war on poverty.”
6. Identify Barry Goldwater and describe his political philosophy during the 1960s.
7. Explain the reasons for the escalation of U.S. involvement in Vietnam and the growing protest against the war.
8. Understand the origins, ideas, personalities and effects of the Black Power Movement, and the effects of inner city riots in the
late 1960s.
9. Identify and explain the historical significance of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) and explain the political
philosophy and approach presented by the SDS in the Port Huron Statement.
10. Explain the events that gave Nixon a victory in 1968.
Chapter 31
1. Define the term neoconservatism and identify the major authors and publications that articulated the philosophy.
2. List the major accomplishments of the Nixon administration in foreign affairs outside the realm of the Vietnam War.
3. Discuss the role of Henry Kissinger in the foreign affairs of the Nixon administration. How did his European background
define his approach to diplomacy? How did he respond to the American tradition of moral diplomacy? How significant was
Kissinger’s role in defining American foreign policy during the 1970s?
4. List the factors that contributed to the economic inflation and “stagflation” of the 1970s.
5. Discuss the ways in which Carter attempted to handle the nation’s economic crisis and energy shortage.
6. State the major goals of feminist leaders and show the similarities between the women’s and civil rights movements.
7. Define the Moral Majority and discuss the fundamental changes that altered the economy.
8. Identify and explain the historical significance of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI).
9. The changing relations between the United States and the Soviet Union under Reagan and Gorbachev. Identify Mikhail
Gorbachev and explain the meanings of the terms glasnost and perestroika.
Key Terms: These must be in your UNIT BINDER which is checked the day before the unit exam. Who, what, when and why each was significant.
Remember to use website I provided or you may use another source you find more helpful.
Federal Highway Act
Montgomery bus boycott
McCarthyism
U-2 incident
Marshall Plan
Truman Doctrine
containment
Casablanca Conference Teheran Conference
Dumbarton Oaks Conference
Alger Hiss
NSC 68
"long hot summers:
Youngstown Sheet and Tube v Sawyer
Henry Wallace
Douglas MacArthur
baby boomers
Sputnik
Jack Kerouac
beat generation
Little Rock school crisis Eisenhower Doctrine
GI Bill of Rights
Servicemen's Readjustment Act
Jackie Robinson
New Frontier
Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
Employment Act of 1946
Brown v Board of Education
Fair Deal
United Nations
Yalta Conference
San Francisco Conference
Berlin Airlift
George Kennan
Korean War
NATO
Taft-Hartley Act
National Defense Education Act
Ralph Bunche
dynamic conservatism
David Riesman
Dixiecrats
Civil Rights Commission
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
Miranda v Arizona
Cuban Missile Crisis
Huey Newton
Stokely Carmichael (Black Power)
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
Jimmy Carter
Vietnamization (Guam/Nixon Doctrine)
Washington outsiders
George Wallace
Martin Luther King
Bay of Pigs
Roe v Wade
Gideon v Wainwright
Economic Opportunity Act
War on Poverty
Great Society
Malcolm X
Warren Commission
Lee Harvey Oswald
SALT I Treaty
hippies
Camp David Accords
Mayaguez incident
Bakke v Board of Regents
affirmative action
Gerald Ford
Michael Harrington (The Other America) supply-side economics
Reaganomics
stagflation
Civil rights Act 1964
Voting rights Act 1965
Barry Goldwater
Lyndon Johnson
Rachel Carson (Silent Spring) Ralph Nader (Unsafe at any Speed)
Kent State
War Powers Act
Equal Rights Amendment
Betty Friedan (The Feminine Mystique)
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
OPEC
Helsinki Accords
Peace Corps
SNCC
Tet Offensive