Download Document

Peace with Problems:
1945-1960
Chapter 15
Section 2
A Global Cold War

The Cold War rivalry
between the United States
and the Soviet Union
expanded to all parts of the
world including Asia,
Africa, and Latin America.
China

U.S. policymakers hoped
that China would
eventually become a strong
and prosperous democracy
after Japan was defeated
in World War II.


China was in danger of becoming
a Communist nation.
Mao Zedong led the communist
revolution in China. (1945-1949)
Mao Zedong’s Rise To Power


China, the most populous nation in the
world, had a huge population of
peasants who toiled in poverty.
A discontented young peasant named
Mao Zedong decided in the 1920s that
the time had come for the Chinese
working class (industrial workers and
peasants) to take control of their
government and adopt a Communist
system.
Mao Zedong


General Jiang Jieshi (old spelling
Chiang Kai-shek) battled for
control of China against Mao
Zedong’s Communist forces.
General Jiang Jieshi with his
Nationalist supporters fled to the
island of Taiwan in 1949 after
suffering defeats on the
battlefield.
General Jiang Jieshi
Above: General Jiang Jieshi with
Roosevelt and Churchill
The A-Bomb

The Soviet Union tested the ABomb in 1949.

Now that Russia announcing it
had nuclear weapons was an
important event for not only
the United States but for the
world because now the world
now had to live in fear that
someday such weapons might
be used in a war capable of
destroying all life on the planet.
The Manhattan Project cost
the United States
government 2 trillion
dollars.
 It was the most expensive
building project in the
history of mankind.


Do you know what the
atomic bombs names were
that were dropped on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
Little Boy (Nuclear fission of
uranium 235).
Fat Man (Filled with Plutonium)
Enola Gay


In 1952 the United States
announced that it had
developed a weapon thousands
of times more destructive than
the atomic bomb, or A-bomb.
Its new weapon was the
Hydrogen bomb or H-bomb.
Russian Hydrogen bomb
Crater blast left by a hydrogen
bomb
Atom Bomb Description
What are Americans going to
do out of fear of nuclear attack
back home?
 Show students websites
depicting atomic and hydrogen
bomb detonations.

Korean War

The United States became
involved with the Korean
War five years after World
War II.

The main event that caused
the United States to become
involved in the Korean War
was U.S. opposition to
communism which resulted
from the sudden attack by a
North Korean army
(Communist) against the
territory of South Korea.
Truman used his power as
commander in chief to conduct
an undeclared war in Korea,
which he called a police action.
 Truman managed to declare
war on North Korea without
Congress’s approval.


China got involved in the
Korean War by siding with the
Communist North Korea.
Chinese
troops
taken as
prisoners
during the
Korean
War.



MacArthur urged President Truman
to permit him to drop atomic bombs
on Chinese bases in Manchuria, a
part of China, in order to stop the
Chinese attack.
Truman refused to give his
permission, wishing to pursue a
“limited war” in Korea.
He feared that bombing China would
probably result in a far larger and
more dangerous war.
MacArthur campaigned anyways
to bomb China and at this point in
1951, President Truman removed
MacArthur as the commander of
UN forces in Korea.
 Truman concluded that he could
not allow MacArthur to challenge
the president’s authority as
commander in chief.


The decision to remove
MacArthur was not an easy
one because it took courage
to remove a general that was
popular with the American
people and a World War II
war hero.
General MacArthur

“Old soldiers never die, they just
fade away.”
Harry Truman

Harry Truman was also the
first president to use economic
aid to fight the cold war.
Truman’s Point Four Program

Foreign aid sent to
developing countries in Asia,
Africa, and Latin America
for helping to combat
hunger and starvation.
Cold War at home
In this time of Communist expansion,
many Americans wondered whether
their own country might be a target of
Communist plots.
 They feared that Communists spies
and Communist sympathizers might
be anywhere, working as secret agents
of the Soviet government.

Loyalty Checks

To determine whether an federal
employee was likely to be loyal or
disloyal, Truman ordered the
Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI) and the Civil Service
Commission to find out about the
employee’s past associations.

Some 3 million government
workers were investigated
because of the loyalty tests.
Smith Act

The law prohibited any group
from advocating or teaching
the violent overthrow of the
U.S. government and also
prohibited any person from
belonging to such a group.

In effect, since U.S.
Communists advocated the
overthrow of capitalist
governments (although not
necessarily by violence), the
Smith Act made it illegal for
U.S. citizens to join the
Communist Party.

Do you think that the Smith
Act violates the first
amendment under the
Constitution?

According to the Supreme Court
Case of Dennis et al. vs. United
States (1951) the first
amendment rights had not been
violated because it presented a
clear and present danger of the
public when the speech is about
overthrowing the government by
force and violence.
Yates vs. United States (1971)
For the law to be violated, said the
Court, a speaker must encourage
people to do something, not merely
believe in something.
 Any idea could be advocated so
long as the speaker did not urge
people to commit dangerous acts.

McCarran Act


An anti-communist law aimed at
“Communist-front” organizations.
Such groups did not identify
themselves as Communists but were
accused of either receiving support
from the Communists or including
Communist members.
The law required all Communist and
Communist-front organizations to file
membership lists and financial
statements with the U.S. attorney
general.
 It also prohibited the employment in
national defense plants of Communists
or members of Communist-front
organizations and the entry into the
United States of Communists or former
Communists.

House Un-American Activities
Committee


Called before the House committee, a
labor organizer named John Watkins
answered questions about his own
dealings with Communist groups.
But he refused to answer questions
about the activities of other persons he
knew. He believed that such questions
were not relevant to the committee’s



Watkins was convicted of violating a
federal law that made it a crime to
refuse to answer a congressional
committee’s questions.
The Supreme Court decided that
Watkins’s conviction was not valid.
The Court ruled that a witness at a
congressional hearing may properly
refuse to answer any committee
question that does not relate to the
committee’s lawmaking task.
Alger Hiss

Hiss, a former State
Department official accused
of spying for the Soviet
Union, was convicted of
perjury and sentenced to
five years in prison.
Alger Hiss
The Rosenberg Trial
It was a much publicized case of
Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, who
were convicted of spying and
passing nuclear secrets to the Soviet
Union.
 They were executed in 1953, at the
height of anti-Communist hysteria
that gripped the nation.

J. Robert Oppenheimer
Oppenheimer, who had
successfully directed U.S. efforts to
build the first atomic bomb, took a
stand against the development of
the more powerful hydrogen bomb.
 Accused of being a Communist, he
was forced to leave his post and
endured public humiliation.

McCarthyism

Term used to describe the
activities of Wisconsin Senator
Joseph McCarthy, who gained
national prominence by making
unsubstantiated accusations of
disloyalty and espionage against
numerous government officials.



Eisenhower
The next president following
Truman would be Eisenhower.
Eisenhower promised that if he
was elected he would end the
Korean War.
The Korean War ended the peace
treaty split Korea up along the
38th parallel in 1953.