YouTube Transcript:
American YAWP - Chapter 25 - The Cold War

all right this is the American yach
chapter 25 the Cold War so the cold war
is the global event that follows World
War II so recall last chapter World War
II uh that started conventionally in
1939 when Hitler invaded Poland and
ended in
1945 immediately as World War II ends
the world is sent into this other
conflict we refer to it as the C war and
in terms of the dates although you could
make an argument that a lot of the
features of the Cold War existed prior
to World War II we typically say that it
started in 1945 so that as soon as World
War II ended the Cold War began and this
lasted until
1989 so one important thing to keep in
mind as we make our way through future
chapters is that the cold war is going
to be going on in the background for
almost the rest this textbook so um you
know do keep that in mind and
understanding some of the key components
in this chapter will help us understand
future chapters we're introducing this
chapter with an image here of a testing
of a nuclear weapon in Nevada in 1962
and this points to uh an important
feature of the Cold War and that
something that we call the arms race and
the arms race was a competition by the
United States and the Soviet Union to
develop the latest and greatest in terms
of weapon technology and we can connect
that back to the ending of World War II
uh the atomic weapons that were used on
Japan to force their surrender the idea
is that um you know nations want to
continue building bigger batter more
destructive Weaponry so why don't we go
ahead and just Define the Cold War here
in terms of uh a definition and then we
can uh we can progress from there so as
far as the cold war is concerned we're
going to Define this as the
global uh
political and
ideological
struggle between
capitalists
and
communist
countries so an important feature of the
Cold War is this term ideological so
when you see the term ideological think
idea and that is to say the cold war is
much more a battle over ideas than it is
about let's say territory or resource
ources although those things definitely
do have a role here and the two ideas
that are represented here are the ideas
of capitalism on the one hand and
communism on the uh on the other now
these are mostly in terms of like uh you
know economic
modalities um but they end up being
proxies for a lot of other things during
this conflict now even though this is an
ideological struggle and and and
actually there's a a phrase here that
will help us better understand
what exactly the cold war is about and
they said this in fact at the time and
that was to quote
unquote win the hearts and
Minds so the idea is that for each side
the capitalist and communist Nations is
to convince the world that their
economic system that their political
system is superior now in terms of the
major drivers or motivators of the Cold
War it's going to be the the superpower
Nations and this term superpower is
something that we use in the post World
War II period to describe two Nations
specifically the superpowers we'll say
these are the
two
Nations which
emerged
from World War
II a
leading the
world in
wealth
power and
influence you know the case in terms of
you know geopolitics prior to World War
I and during World War II itself is that
you had world powers you know you had
countries like Japan and Germany and
Britain and France and the United States
and Soviet Union and you know it wasn't
really clear which nation was superior
to the others and this had been the case
for quite some time but after World War
II because of the way that J Japan Was
Defeated because of the way that Germany
was defeated uh France was occupied
Nations like uh Britain you even though
they did emerge on the Victorious side
the British had fought in World War II
longer than any of the other Victorious
powers and so they were forced to give
up their empire so after the war was
over there's really only two Nations
that stand above everyone else in terms
of wealth power and influence and we
don't just call them world powers we
call them superpowers because there's
really nobody else close and it's the
superpowers that lead uh this cold war
um one is the United
States and the United States represents
and will fight and influence for the
ideas of
capitalism and
democracy the other one is the Soviet
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Union which is for
communism and if you're a little bit
confused about okay what's capitalism
and what's communism they're different
economic models you know capitalism uh
Champions individual ownership um
communism is State ownership uh you
might think about this in terms of a
very simple uh example of something like
private property right in the United
States individuals own their own land uh
in a communist system the resources are
not or you know property is not owned by
individuals but it's owned by the state
right communally that's the idea um and
in terms of the Soviet political system
it's mostly one party rule you know the
Communist Party
uh you know they have elections within
their own party but uh they're
interested in advancing the ideology of
uh of Communism so when we think about
the Cold War conventionally you know in
a broader sense yes it is a struggle
between the capitalists and communist
countries but a lot of times we say look
the cold war is really the United States
versus the Soviet Union capitalism
versus communism you know that's a
little bit more simplified of a uh of an
explanation now an important thing to
understand about the development of the
Cold War is that these two Nations the
United States and the Soviet unions had
actually been allies during World War II
you know you had the US and the Soviets
but we saw that during World War II even
though the Americans and the Soviets got
along because they had a common enemy in
Germany right you know that old adage
the enemy of my enemy is my friend
having a a mutual enemy in Germany made
this Alliance possible but as Germany
was being defeated you know even before
their official surrender as the German
threat was being put away this
cooperation between the Americans and
the Soviets began to disintegrate and
you saw this happening a little bit
during some of those post-war
conferences where the Americans and the
Soviets were trying to decide what are
we going to do after the war and
eventually they couldn't figure anything
out the best example was the case of
Japan
remember that um during World War II an
agreement that was made between the
Soviets and the Americans was that the
Americans had agreed to attack Germany
if the Soviets agreed to attack Japan
well by the time the war unfolded the
Americans went at Japan alone without
Soviet uh assistance they didn't want it
and uh and they didn't need it so the
Cold War and this animosity that
develops between the Soviets and the
Americans it's it's it's sort of uh you
know step by by stamp and event by event
the relationship deteriorates by the
ending of World War II the American
ambassador to the Soviet Union George
Kennan sends a Long Telegram back to the
United States outlining the current
diplomatic situation between the Soviets
and the Americans so The Long Telegram
will say this is a
communication uh
from the uh we'll say
the
Soviet
Ambassador I guess technically the
proper I mean he technically wasn't the
Ambassador I guess but still um from the
US
[Music]
ambassador to the Soviet Union that
proper way to put
it oops
and what he said in that Long Telegram
George Canon was that
cooperation is not
possible and this outlined the approach
that the United States would take
diplomatically with the Soviet Union
seeking other ways to deal with
Communism and to deal with the Soviets
Dena cooperation we have a quote here
from Kennan in The Long Telegram he says
quote World communism is like a
malignant parasite which feeds only on
disease tissue Russian nationalism in
the new guise of international Marxism
is more dangerous and Insidious than
ever before George Kenan The Long
Telegram
1946 this uh divide between the Soviets
and American worlds was further
solidified when Winston Churchill uh
former prime minister in Great Britain
and who was uh Britain's leader during
World War II came to the United States
and more or less airm this division
between uh capitalism and communist uh
capitalism and communism gave a speech
called the Iron Curtain and in this
speech Churchill said that the
Eastern European
block or we'll just say Eastern European
nations they
under Soviet
influence had
been cut
off from the
rest of the
world right an iron curtain has
descended over Eastern Europe and that
was characteristic of the fact that as
World War II ended when Soviet and
American armies marched towards Germany
the countries of Eastern Europe were
liberated by the Soviet Union so after
the war was over because the Soviets had
liberated those Nations they had the
boots on the ground so they were able to
reconstruct those governments in a way
that they saw fit and similarly for the
Nations that the United States and Great
Britain and other allies had liberated
they got to control or influence what
type of governments they constructed and
so the dividing lines between where
Soviet and American troops had met
during World War II that became this
great division um not just in Europe but
around the world and you know going uh
you know forward in the Cold War you
know typically when the term West is
used we mean the capitalist Nations and
when the terms East are used we mean
communist Nations right so east west
um Soviet Union United States communism
capitalism all of these things become
you know synonyms right you can fill in
one uh one for the other um as far as
this conflict goes again an important
thing to keep in mind I would say is
that you know looking at it at a macro
level um this quote here does come in
very handy the idea is to win the hearts
and minds of people around the world and
one of the reasons why we call it a
quote unquote Cold War it's because the
idea is that
cold means that no
direct
fighting occurred
[Music]
between the US and Soviet
Union were a quote unquote Hot War now
they don't have anything called the you
know the the hot War but you know if a
war were quote unquote hot that would be
things like you know
bombs guns you know etc etc so a a
unique feature again it's called a war
which might be a little bit
misleading um but this war is much more
a war of ideas now there will be
conflicts and we will cover them in uh
in this chapter and in future chapters
but those conflicts are called proxy
wars and a proxy wars a war that is not
directly between the United States and
the Soviet Union but the United States
and the Soviet Union will be able to
fight each other indirectly so again
it's cold because there's no direct
fighting between the United States and
the Soviet Union as opposed to a you
know Hot War um now as far as the Cold
War goes there's pretty much three
phases of it or we can track you know
sort of three phases uh the first Cold
War this is from you know the 1940s as
World War II is coming to a conclusion
up until the 19
1960s then we enter into the period
known as Deton Deton is a period
say of
relaxed
tension and this is mostly the 1970s so
in the 1970s the competition between the
Americans and the Soviets tends to die
down a little bit um there's a little
bit more cooperation going on in this
period um than in earlier periods um but
the cold war picks back up again in the
quote unquote second Cold War and this
is from 1979 to
1989 so once again you know as we make
our way through the next couple of
chapters um this conflict will be going
on in the background from the 1940s all
the way until
1980 section two political economic and
Military
Dimension so like we mentioned earlier
at some of the post-war conferences
specifically Yalta and potam uh these
were conferences of the Allied powers
during World War II so
conferences uh with United States
Britain and Soviet
Union and early on in the war most of
these conferences were dedicated to
coordinating the war effort you know how
are we us three nations how are we going
to defeat the Germans how are we going
to defeat uh the Japanese well these
later conferences Yalta and potam they
were much more about what was going to
happen uh after the war was over you
know how are we going to rebuild once we
win because by that time victory was a
little bit more clear for the Allied
side how can we reconstruct the post-war
world and uh they were really mired by
non-cooperation
between the US and Soviet Union you know
Britain's going to have to take a back
seat uh a little bit here in the cold
war and some examples that we find of
non-cooperation is one well we'll just
list these things here a
divided
Germany so there was no consensus in
terms of what to do with Germany after
the war was over so instead what the
Allied Powers agreed upon was to divide
Germany in four different parts now at
this time they had hoped that this was
only going to be
temporary that perhaps you know they
might not be able to find a solution
right here right now but maybe in the
future they can figure something out
this agreement to divide Germany into
four parts this ends up being a
permanent condition right for Germany
and part of it was because they couldn't
find anything uh cooperating with
uh another reason is that Roosevelt
died in 1945 just right before Germany
surrendered and his successor Harry
Truman was more well say har Truman was
uh Truman
was we'll say anti-communist might be a
good way of uh putting it no he was not
as interested in cooperating with the
Soviet Union as Roosevelt was and you
know there was a certain degree of
familiarity between Roosevelt and Stalin
for example the two had been meeting
they had an opportunity to build a
relationship with each other and you
know when Truman came in you know he
wasn't as familiar with the process of
diplomacy and and uh wasn't really
looking to cooperate maybe as much and
the third thing is that the United
States by this point had an atomic bomb
and so from the perspective of the
United states with the atomic weapon
there was certainly a sentiment or a
feeling that we don't need any help or
cooperation in fact you saw that in how
the war unfolded in Japan um you know
the United States defeated Japan without
Soviet assistance with the use of this
Atomic weapon so those are just three
examples of the type of non-cooperation
that started to emerge in some of these
post-war uh meetings um this
non-cooperation only continues right as
as the Cold War progresses on another
great example of this is the Breton
Woods conference the Breton Woods
conference this was a conference say
conference to
establish the
[Music]
postwar
onomy right what would the economy look
like after the war was over because
foras deadly and destructive that the
war was uh there was an entire side of
uh you know the economy that needed also
to be uh considered and what this
essentially did was to
create say an
international primarily
capitalists
system and a lot of nations were
represented at the bretonwood conference
United States would take uh somewhat of
a leading role there in reestablishing
or rebuilding the post-war Global
Financial system and the Soviet Union
who attended it uh they rejected
it rejected it know they did not want to
be part of this new international order
uh you know on the side of the the
economic so we can see the political
disagreements and the economic
disagreements um you know happening
immediately after the war was was over
now as far as the relationship between
the United States and the Soviet Union
goes there was essentially three choices
that the United States could take or not
three choices but there was a range of
actions the United States could have
taken in response to Communism on the
one hand the most aggressive action
would have been something like World War
III you know was the tension and
non-cooperation between the Soviets and
the Americans so intense that perhaps
World War I was required or desired well
considering that World War II was so
deadly and so destructive neither side
really had an appetite for another War
so as much as the Soviets and the
Americans dislike each other neither
side was really wanting another conflict
there was also the ability to Simply do
nothing and that is to allow communism
to influence and spread around the world
while the United States returns back to
a period of isolationism
and if we recall from World War I that's
exactly the uh uh position that the
United States had taken that taken an
isolationist uh position well after
World War II uh many Americans you know
those especially in in leadership
positions don't think it's the wisest
idea to just Retreat from the world uh
especially considering some of the
lessons that were learned from World War
II uh you know some would point out that
it was because of American isolationism
that you know Fascism and other radical
uh regime spread so doing nothing is
rejected and what the Americans
eventually settle on is a strategy that
is somewhere in the middle and that is
containment and uh here in this uh you
know section here these two policies of
containment and the Truman Doctrine
these end up being very important
guiding principles as far as the cold
war is concerned both of these will more
or less be followed by the United States
from 1945 to 1989 so um you know get
these policies down now and it helps
explain American action in the world
again for the next 40 years or so so
containment this is the
policy say the US
policy of
preventing
the spread of
[Music]
Communism and this was inspired by The
Long Telegram and George
Kennan inspired by
Kennan again it's not World War III it's
not doing nothing essentially what the
United States is saying is that
currently where communism exists that's
okay that's acceptable but if communism
is to spread to another area that's
going to call for United States action
and that's pretty much the the position
that the US will uh will approach
according to George Kennan in 19 uh 1947
the Soviet Union quote should be sorry
the United States quote should regard
the Soviet Union as a rival and not a
partner and that is very much the
relationship now another guiding
principle besides containment is the
Truman Doctrine which is named for the
uh the president Harry Truman who came
in into office after Roosevelt passed
away in 1945 in fact it was Truman who
was president during the ending of World
War II and it was Truman who decided to
use the atomic weapons Truman is also
someone that believes in containment and
wants the United States to take a much
more proactive approach but he is
concerned about some of the isolationist
sentiment that is happening now the
Truman Doctrine there's two ways of
looking at it one is a literal way and
in terms terms of what the Truman
Doctrine was literally was that this was
a
speech
given by
[Music]
Truman to
Congress to get
Aid get pretty much mean money right get
money to
prevent communism
specifically in the countries of
Greece and
Turkey so uh you know with um the defeat
of
Nazism the question of well what
government is going to succeed in places
like Greece and Turkey these were
Nations that the British had
historically had a lot of influence over
but the British after World War II are
are forced to give up their empire so
the British are retreating from the
world and the question is well what is
going to fill that vacuum and the
Americans and Truman specifically fear
that in Greece and Turkey that communism
might take hold so he's trying to get
Congress to say look we need to reject
isolationism we need to put money
towards uh Greece and Turkey and prevent
communism there now in the short term
Truman is successful he gets money from
Congress uh communism is defeated in
Greece and Turkey and Greece and Turkey
become two uh important
uh allies in the broader Cold War but in
Truman's speech he he outlines a vision
for American action in the world and it
really becomes a guiding principle for
American foreign policy um going forward
um in this speech and we have a little
bit of a quote here from Truman in his
uh
Doctrine he says qu or first of all it
says it falls on the United States to
quote support free people's resisting
attempt tempted sub subjugation by
outside pressures so this dichotomy
between free and
subjugated uh the Truman Doctrine in
some sense Paints the
world in quote unquote black and
white and what black and white mean are
you know free which means
capitalists
and
subjugated which means
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communist and what that means for the
United States is that um as far as the
uh the world goes there's really just
two sides you know you're either uh
either free or either
subjugated uh it's either free or
subjugated and that's very much the
Outlook that the United States has you
know it's you know free and subjugated
are you know kind of coded terms for
capitalist and Communists but as far as
the American perspective goes towards
the rest of the world there's just two
sides right you're either with us or
against us and the Truman Doctrine
doesn't leave a lot of room for
countries to for example be neutral or
stay out of it um not according to the
United States and it also
commits the US
us to Global I mean maybe not so much
Global at this time I mean that's yeah
we we'll keep Global in here it's it's
somewhat
inferred uh
intervention in other words the Truman
Doctrine
rejects
isolationism so this idea that there's
only two sides right capitalist and
communist no room in between the idea
that the United States is committing
itself to other countries around the
world that it's rejecting isolationism
all these things are again these are the
guiding principles that motivate US
foreign policy for the next 40 years so
containment Truman Doctrine and their uh
and their significance now one of the
first areas that we find these policies
in action is in Europe and in Europe
following World War II Not only was
world to the deadliest conflict killing
80 million people but it was severely
disrupting in terms of like damaging
infrastructure you know roads Bridges uh
you know telephone wires you know
everything has been destroyed there's
homelessness and so one of the great
fears for the United States was that
communism would spread in Europe and the
reason why communism would spread in
Europe was because the economic
situation was so poor that people would
elect communist repres representatives
and this was somewhat the case during uh
the Great Depression you know when
they're bad Economic Times people are
willing to embrace more radical ideas
and so for fear we'll say the martiall
plan for
fear that
communism say may
be they
voted voted in so this is not a fear of
communist takeover from the outside this
is a fear that the ideas of Communism
will appeal to war torn
countries the
US provided and this is what the
Marshall Plan
is uh what is it $13
billion for
European
the
reconstruction after World War
II so essentially the best way to
prevent communism is to just dump a
bunch of money on war torn Europe and
the Marshall Plan ends up being a very
successful plan you know those Nations
that get um United States Aid uh they
end up rebuilding their economies rather
quickly I think you know some textbook
call it the economic Miracle the
rebuilding from 1945 to 1950 and strong
stable capitalist economies end up being
a pretty good deterrent against the
ideas of Communism so not only does
Europe properly rebuild after the war is
over but for the countries that received
martial Aid dollars um you know they
became allies for the United States for
a very long time and were not enticed by
the ideas of of Communism here we have a
quot qu from General George Marshall for
who the Marshall Plan is named after
says quote United States should do
whatever it is able to do to assist in
the return of normal economic health to
the world without which there can be no
peace so major economic plan economic
aid rebuild Europe Stave off communism
uh that was the idea now the Marshall
Plan interestingly enough was designed
to go to All European countries however
the Nations that were under Soviet
control that had installed Communist
governments the quote unquote satellite
States these are the we're going to call
them the quote unquote independent
because
technically these are nations that are
independent nations of Eastern
Europe these were the ones that were
liberated by the Soviet Union so now
that the war is over their policies and
governments are going to be dictated by
the Soviet Union this is the independent
nations of Eastern Europe
under
Soviet
control with
Communist
governments right this is what uh we
might also describe if we use the uh
previous term the Iron Curtain Nations
right when Winston Churchill said that
an iron curtain had descended over
Europe he was talking about these
satellite states which again technically
they're independent but in reality um
the Soviet Union really dicks gets to
dictate what goes on uh as this foreign
minister from uh I guess at the time
would have been Czechoslovakia the Czech
foreign minister said quote we went to
Moscow Moscow is the capital of the
Soviet Union we went to Moscow as the
foreign minister of an independent and
sovereign state but returned as a Lackey
of the Soviet government as like a stoe
or a fool of the Soviet government so
this foreign minister is very much
reflecting the idea that um you know
these nations truly are independent now
Stalin who was the uh leader of the
Soviet Union
again Stalin is the Soviet
leader Stalin saw the Marshall Plan Aid
as somewhat of a a trojan horse right he
didn't trust that the aid was going uh
to Europe just out of the you know
Goodwill of the Americans which it
wasn't it had political motives so what
he did for the satellite States He
forced them to reject
it rejected the Marshall
Plan and um you know this will create
and ends up creating a a pretty
significant divide between the Western
and Eastern uh European nations as far
as their economies are concerned not
just the fact that the West accepted
Marshall Plan Aid in the East didn't
that contributes to it but it's the way
in which the two economies are oriented
under uh the respective U you know
superpowers right superpowers now up
until this point the tension between the
United States and the Soviet Union has
has grown more non-cooperative you know
diplomacy Has Broken down but it hasn't
turned outright violent and certainly
considering that World War II just ended
neither side really wanted conflict
again but pretty soon uh this uh tension
that was building up between the Soviets
and the United States would have the
potential for violence not that it would
break out in violence but both sides
would realize that a war might be
possible and all of this occurred over
the city of Berlin now weall that
Berlin is the German
capital and the German Capital as a
result of you know not being able to
really figure out an agreement was
divided into four
zones along with Germany which was
divided into four zones so it's a little
bit weird in terms of uh you know how it
looks but let's uh do our best to uh
draw Germany here I have no you know no
idea how Germany is shaped it's shaped
something like this um but uh the way
that Germany had been divided after the
war was that Soviets got a big chunk in
the East that's where the Red Army had
invaded and the Americans and the
British and the French they would divide
up the rest of Germany so you had you
know American Zone French Zone and a
British Zone and then you had a Soviet
zone the city of Berlin which was the
capital
was located in the Soviet zone right but
this city was also divided into four
different pieces so uh you had in Berlin
what we might describe right if this is
you know all the Soviet zone and we'll
you put it red for the Soviet Union you
had this little tiny
island of Berlin that served somewhat
like uh you know quote unquote an
island of
capitalism in a
sea of
Communism all right so is the second I
mean it looks really small but we're
talking about like three million people
of a capital city but this this section
of American occupied and American
controlled territory surrounded by uh
Eastern Germany which eventually became
uh called and it was this little speck
uh of Berlin that uh you had a again a
pretty significant situation unfold
which almost led the Americans and the
Soviets into war and we call this the
Berlin blockade or the Berlin airlift so
essentially what happened was that the
Americans the British and the French
because they all you know represented
the capitalist Democratic side of the
Cold War they decided essentially to use
a uniform currency uh in the western
part of Germany in some sense combining
their sections together
so we might say in
response do the
US
British and
French we'll call it quote unquote a
combined
currency
Stalin
blockaded
I'll say blockaded we'll just say
American
Berlin so you can imagine right from
this again very poorly drawn map here
that in this you know quote unquote
island of capitalism there would have
been roads and trains and all sorts of
other things leading into the city well
Stalin effectively blockaded that entire
section and what Stalin was counting on
was that the Americans and the British
would just give up right this this
section here that it wasn't essentially
worth fighting over and in some sense he
was right because the Americans were not
interested in fighting over it right
this wasn't reason enough to call uh you
know to to declare World War II but the
Americans were also not willing just to
stand by and do nothing and that was
rather than let the people in Western
Berlin be starved out of you know food
and resources and other things the
Americans the British and the French and
other allies would airlift supplies to
the people of Western Berlin effectively
making the blockade uh um uh obsolete
right effectively making it so that it
had no effect so the Berlin blockade
Stalin's blockading of Western Berlin
was responded with the Berlin airlift
this is the US
response to the blockade
it
lasted and and and to you know clear it
up it's uh blockade we'll just say uh
airlifted
supplies to West
Berlin for 11 months this went on and
again you can imagine you know things
had gotten pretty tense because yes uh
you know the Soviets were counting on
the fact that the United States was not
willing to wage war over a blockade but
you know when Nations start blockading
each other there you know there have
been lesser offenses that have led to
war between two Nations and when the
Americans started airlifting supplies
into Berlin you know it might have just
taken one Rogue Soviet officer to start
shooting at American airplanes that
could have caused World War too so a
very tense situation It ultimately did
not lead to a direct War but it led to a
sense that a war could be possible right
maybe in the future um eventually though
as Americans continued to airlift in
supplies and showed no uh willing this
to uh to back down or to stop the
Soviets or
Stalin removed the
blockade and this was considered a
tremendous American you know Victory I
mean at least in terms of just the
Optics of it that the th was forced to
relent and the United States would
retain control of Western Berlin for the
duration of uh of the Cold War
eventually they would
build a wall oops eventually they would
build a wall around this island here and
that wall that they built around that
that was that would be known as the
Berlin
wall and uh what result Ed from this and
you know if this wasn't already clear
from before was that this temporary
division in Berlin and this temporary
division of Germany became permanent so
uh Germany became divided the western
part of
Germany so essentially the British the
Americans and
um uh the French all
combined their uh section into West
Germany the Soviets
Eastern
Germany and uh that pretty much remained
the case all the way until 1989 right
Germany would provided here so uh let's
just your textbook mentions the actual
names of these nations so
let's go ahead and outline them
so West this was called the
federal repu of Germany
the
East it's called the
German
Democratic
Republic and
Germany
was
permanently be
divided until 1989 right so this
temporary division turned permanent and
uh Germany became uh kind of a Berlin
especially right Berlin became a a
microcosm of the Cold War East West
divide literally a wall eventually being
built between the two sides and um when
we say that the Cold War ended in 1989
it's actually because the Berlin Wall is
destroyed and and you know because the
Wall came to symbolize the Cold War its
destruction symbolized the uh but you
can see the American British and
Canadian effort to airlift all the
supplies um you know I believe that like
uh an airplane landed every 90 seconds
or something like that so um it was um
you know a very big um project that was
undertaken by the United States to
preserve Western Berlin on the side of
um capitalism and democracy now in
response to the Berlin blockade and the
Berlin airlift this increased tension
this sort of ramping up of potential
outbreak for War uh left both sides
seeking military alliances and that's
exactly what they did in 1949 the United
States and Allied Nations created the
military Alliance known as NATO the
North Atlantic Treaty Organization this
was a military
Alliance uh milit
Alliance of the
Us and
other capitalist democracies
and in response the Soviet Union formed
the Warsaw pack was the same thing the
military
Alliance of the Soviets anything but the
opposite
side and
other
communists and uh NATO North Atlantic
Treaty Organization this was you know
primarily a defensive um agreement and
the idea was and this was the
slogan an
attack on
one an
attack on
all and so the United States was
committing itself to the defense of
other nations which traditionally and
historically the United States really
hadn't done that you know the US had
been part of wars and conflicts but they
had always joined those conflicts more
or less on their own terms but now the
United States is committing itself to
the defense of other capitalist
democracies and kind of in the same way
that World War I um you know the one of
the contributing factors to that war was
the alliance Network we have a little
bit of a recreation of an alliance
Network and so it means that potentially
right potentially a smaller conflict
might boil over into much bigger bigger
conflict right and so U you know in some
sense we might assess that the world is
maybe uh maybe more dangerous now for
the most part the United States was
primarily concerned about communism in
Europe right you know the episode over
Berlin the example when it came to the
Marshall Plan um you know the Soviet
Union in a sense was in Europe or at
least Soviet soldiers were in Europe but
in 1949 the United States would
realize uh that the cold war is actually
much more Global than what they
anticipated and their attention is going
to be ripped away from Europe to the
rest of the world specifically in Asia
because in 1949 a very important
development takes place and that is the
founding of the People's Republic of
China this is uh we'll say the
communist regime
in
China and it came to
Power by
defeating uh Chen Kai
Shack you remember from last
section
and and and
the
Chinese
nationalists in the Chinese Civil
War and this was a big blow to the
United States you know if the United
States policy is to contain Communism
then allowing communism to take over the
biggest country in the world world has
got to be you know about as as big of a
failure as one could uh as one could
imagine and you know the United States
really felt like it's uh you know it
failed in this it wasn't paying enough
attention to Asia it was too focused on
Europe too focused on Berlin and while
the Americans were too focused there Mao
zong who is the
leader the leader of the Chinese
communists
uh managed to take control of the
country uh Chen Kai and the nationalists
who were you know they were seen as uh
you know the side that the United States
had supported they were forced to
evacuate to the island of Taiwan and
when the peoples of Republic of China
when you know when they came to power
the US
refused to recognize
China as the uh as the legitimate
government but it became clear now that
with Chinese success or with MAO success
and the Communist Party taking over in
China that Joseph Stalin you know the
major adversary of the Cold War now had
a very important Ally in Mao Zong and um
you know and communist China so what was
the United States response to this well
the response was that you know we here
in the United States we dropped the ball
we should have been more Vigilant in
preventing communism around the world
and we need to escalate our involvement
and expand our involvement around the
world now this was already you know we
might say that this idea was already
implicit in the Truman Doctrine when
Truman said that there are free and
subjugated people and wherever there are
free people fighting subjugation we're
going to help you but this was made even
more clear with a uh a National Defense
memo known as NSC 68 this is a
national National Defense
memo uh in
response to communist
China and essentially it said that the
United States was going to be more
aggressive in pursu
um you know anti-communist efforts uh
around the world we just say uh
increased uh we'll say us say
[Music]
militarism and
commitment uh increase us militarism and
commitment to fighting
[Music]
communism
globally so after um you know after that
you find that the United States is much
more involved in places like Asia and
it's fact partially because of the
success of Communists in China that we
have essentially the first quote unquote
Hot War of uh of the Cold War and that
is the Korean War which started in 1950
ended in 1953 and is sometimes referred
to as the forgotten War so you might say
about the Korean War this is the
first quote unquote Hot
War meaning that um this is a war that
would have actual fighting and bombing
and killing and all the other things
that we associate with war but it's a
war that is like pretty much all other
wars during the Cold War and it's not
direct so it's not directly between the
United States and the and the Soviets
but we'll see that the Soviets and the
Americans they're able to fight each
other indirectly right this is a proxy
war so there's a couple of things that
are going on in uh in Korea So
Korea as a country had been a Japanese
colony and had been a colony in fact
even prior to World War II but when the
Japanese were defeated the question was
well what's going to happen with Korea
because Japan can't hold on to it
anymore right they lost the war and so
what ends up happening is that it ends
up being divided by by the powers right
the superpowers the Americans and uh and
the Soviets the northern part of
Korea is controlled by the Soviets and
the southern part of Korea ends up being
controlled by the Americans so somewhat
of a similar circumstance that happened
in Germany but now here happening on the
other side of the world now in some
sense both North and South sought a
United Country
and so there is uh you know when we look
at these various proxy wars there's
layers to it right there's there's a lot
of different layers when it comes to
motivations and reasons and the case of
Korea is uh is the same so there were
Korean nationalists that wanted um you
know to unify the Korean Peninsula but
then you had this you know Cold War
layer on top of it between communism and
uh and capitalism so calls for unified
Korea calls for unified you know
communist or capitalist Korea eventually
resulted in North
Korea
invasion of South
Korea in 1950 right and this started the
crean
war so initially this is a war that
involves North Korea versus South Korea
I mean in some sense it's just Korea um
you know this division between North and
South didn't exist uh when it was a a
Japanese Colony or not in the same way
that it did after World War II now the
United States is worried that by the
north invading the South which they are
having military success they are
emboldened by the communist in China the
the Communist in China were successful
in their War so they think they can be
successful in their War however the
United States uses a new international
tool to um further their own goals and
that is the United Nations and this is
maybe a you might say a clever use of
the UN by the United States because
recall that the United Nations as an
organization this is a you know a a
we'll say a
international
government
to maintain peace you know this was
created following World War II as the
successor to the League of Nations
because the League of Nations failed to
prevent World War II the United Nations
was created so that another War wouldn't
break out well the United States goes to
the United Nations and says look North
Korea's
invasion of South Korea uh how is this
any different different than Hitler's
invasion of Poland how is this different
than Japan's invasion of China and so
the United Nations successfully gets the
United Nations to intervene again their
goal is to maintain peace but they see
um North Korea's Invasion as a threat to
World Peace the United States sees this
as a way to further their policy of
containment right to prevent communism
from spreading to uh you know to South
uh South Korea so we might say that the
UN
forces
led by US
general Douglas
MacArthur about Arthur down
here
oops uh Douglas MTH arur
intervene on the
[Music]
side of South
Korea so technically right technically
the Korean war is not an American war
right it's a un intervention the reality
is is that again this un intervention
was very much to the great benefit of
the United States and um most of those
who were fighting including the person
in charge of it all were either American
or Korean right to to put it frankly um
Douglas MacArthur has a lot of success
with the UN intervention and soon South
Korea is now pushing back North Korea in
fact so much so that not only do they
contain the Communist threat right they
reestablished the border between North
and South but MacArthur and and uh UN
forces end up pushing so far north that
they begin encroaching on the Chinese
border which provokes China to enter
into the conflict so we might say uh
MacArthur's
advancement
provokes
Chinese
entry into the
war right into the war so uh you know
once again we have North
Korea and South
Korea and that's how initially the war
started but you know the
US joins in on one
side
China join in on the another and you
know by the time the war is unfolding
it's much much bigger and of course in
the background you know the Soviets are
sending their port uh support to the
other side so us and Chinese troops do
fight directly in this conflict but
again there's no direct conflict between
the United States and the and the Soviet
so again this is what we mean by proxy
war fighting indirectly now during the
course of the war there's a big
disagreement on the American side
exactly how to conduct this and this is
between the sitting US president Harry
Truman and the war hero uh Douglas
MacArthur uh MacArthur
was you know he was probably one of the
most popular figures in the United
States at the time uh war hero say
because his
um
leadership in defeating Japan you know I
don't think
I don't know I don't know if the last
chapter actually mentioned MacArthur by
name but you know he was the General
that led American forces over Japan the
island hopping strategy and you know
Americans you know seeing Japan as you
know the the bigger threat or or you
know the because of Pearl Harbor the
main adversary in World War II uh there
was probably nobody more popular than
MacArthur in uh in the United States
Truman was not a very popular president
at this time in fact and so
this um you know this rivalry between
Truman and MacArthur ended up boiling
over into the American public and turned
out to be a pretty a pretty big
controversy so what was the disagreement
all about between Macarthur this you
know beloved effective famous General
and Truman who was you know former vice
president not um you know not very
popular at the time well
MacArthur
wanted
essentially to expand the
war and use nuclear
weapons Truman
refused Truman wanted a much uh limited
War so for example MacArthur wanted to
invade China uh Truman said no MacArthur
wanted nuclear weapons Truman said no
MacArthur then went public and
criticized Truman and um you know that
was you know one step too far so what
eventually resulted from this conflict
was that
Truman
fired MacArthur from his
position
and um you know by that point most of
the fighting uh in the Korean War had uh
had subsided you know the early years
1950 were was some of the
um most intense fighting and the two
sides eventually agreed to an Armistice
this was in
1953 and the Armistice more or less uh
left we'll just say an ENT
fighting
left
Korea
permanently
provided uh to
um what it remains today uh the north
remains a communist state the South
remains a capitalist State one of the
reasons why the Armistice was signed or
you know just a kind of important note
here that Joseph Stalin died in
1953 and uh you know when Stalin died in
53 there was some sort of ambiguity or
question about what the you know future
of the Soviet Union would be at the time
and his death allowed for an Armistice
to um you know to be signed and so when
we think about the long-term
consequences of the Cold War Korea is
probably the best example because that's
a divide that was created from the cold
war and continues to uh to exist today
um but that conflict the Korean war that
is again what we call the uh the
Forgotten War uh we tend to overlook
that but in the early 1950s 195 1953 um
you know there was a war that waged on
in Korea the conflict of The Cold War
that is probably much more familiar or
we might say the conflict that defines
the Cold War in the United States is the
conflict in Vietnam
and in the
1950s we start to see the beginnings of
the Vietnam War it's not underway yet
but we see the origins of it now Vietnam
has somewhat of a similar story to Korea
and the way in which um you know the the
ending of World War II and the cold war
ends up shaping the future of the
country so initially Vietnam it's a a
country in Asia if you're not familiar
kind of by China um it had started off
as a French colony so all the way back
when we talked about
imperialism um you know we said that the
United States had created a colony in in
places like the Philippines well uh the
French had created a French colony in uh
in Vietnam during World War II though in
1940 France was defeated by Germany and
their defeat meant that they would lose
their colonies and so Germany Ally
Japan they took over the colony from 194
to 1945 so Vietnam went from a French
Colony then to a Japanese Colony well
Japan they lost the war and so the
question was from 1945 onwards what was
the future of uh of Vietnam going to be
right and and again Japan has to to give
it up well one of the leading
nationalist figures hoi Min hoochi Min
will call him a
leading
nationalists but also as we'll find
communist
leader and you know there is some
question or debate about this you know
was hoim Min a nationalist was he a
communist was he both was he one at one
time one at the other um because uh they
they could be antithetical in uh in some
situation but hoim mini is the leading
nationalist uh leader in
Vietnam he
issued the
Vietnamese
Declaration of
Independence uh
wanting
a
free and
independent
Vietnam and what's interesting about his
declaration right the one that he gave
for Vietnam wishing to be free it was
similar to the US
declaration and in fact
both us and
hoien
B
Japan in World War II so this is one of
the more interesting aspects or
interesting features about the Vietnam
war is that there was a time between
1940 and
1945 that the United States and hoi Min
had a common enemy right hoi Min wanting
Vietnam to be free from outside rule
this time it's the the Japanese the
United States also fighting against the
Japanese so he had modeled a declaration
of independence that was somewhat
similar to um the American Declaration
of Independence and I think hoochi Min
really hoped that America would support
the idea of an independent Vietnam well
hoien and others in the Vietnam the
Vietnam this is just the we'll call this
the uh
Vietnamese
nationalist
organization the hoi men is the
Nationalist leader the Viet men are the
Nationalist organization unfortunately
for hoien and the Vietnamese this uh
appeal for Independence and this idea of
trying to maybe persuade the Americans
to support Independence um this did not
come to fruition because in fact the
French who had controlled the colony
prior to Japanese Occupation they wanted
to reconquer Vietnam the
France
tempted to
reconquer Vietnam and you know they had
their
regions um why after World War
II so even though hoim Min might have
been appealing to the United States
France was a much much more important
Ally in this conflict and so essentially
a conflict emerged where on one side
there was the
vietman right again people like hoochi
Min who wanted Vietnam to be
independent and there was the French who
were trying to reconquer well because
France was such a good Ally and such a
strong and important Ally in uh Europe
the United States decided to give their
support to France well knowing what we
know about proxy wars in the Cold War if
one side is getting support from France
the other side's going to get support
from the Soviet Union and that's exactly
what happened and so this little
component of this conflict the American
assistance to French uh French
reconquest of Vietnam this is the
origins or the roots of the Vietnam War
right so we might just say
the
origins of the Vietnam
War not yet right Americans aren't
directly involved yet but um in some
sense we're you know dipping our toes in
the water of what will be a a future
conflict um now unfortunately for France
so this lasts from 1946 to
1954 their reconquest is thwarted by the
Vietnamese at dbn Fu this is a
battle French
lose
forcing
their
withdrawal so effectively France is no
longer in the conflict and so on the
side supporting capitalism and democracy
you know the United States uh kind of
gets stuck with the bill in uh in some
sense and so what this means is that you
know
once the French
withdraw well what's going to be the
future of uh of Vietnam section three
the arms buildup Space Race and
technological advancement as far as the
cold war is concerned technology
actually played quite a big role um most
clearly uh on the military front know
weapons technology would turn out to be
very important but as we'll see there
are other ways in which technology could
be used to further the interests of both
the Americans and the Soviets that
weren't maybe necessarily related to
like weapons or or military
um because technology was important and
because you know information was
important both the Soviets and the
Americans engaged in Espionage that is
to say that
US and Soviet
Union use
spies to
obtain
information
and
technology and very early on during the
Cold War there was no technology perhaps
more important than the atomic bomb that
was held by the United States now
unfortunately for the US and fortunately
for the Soviet Union in
1949 the
Soviets
successfully tested
and atomic
bomb and you know this was something
that the Americans had enjoyed ever
since the ending of World War II you
know the United States could rely that
we had the atomic bomb nobody else did
so in that sense we didn't have to rely
on anyone else or we didn't really need
cooperation when the Soviets tested
their own weapon that was uh a serious
wakeup call as far as the United States
is concerned and if you combine this
with what happened in China in 1949 when
Ma Zong and the Communist successfully
took over 1949 ends up not being a Very
Good Year in fact uh you know up until
1949 the United States had a lot of
success a lot of success with the
Marshall Plan a lot of success with the
uh Berlin blockade and Berlin airlift
but um 1949 is when the Soviets in a lot
of ways uh you know strike back and so
as soon as the Soviets um you know
successfully tested their own weapon
then was really on the United States to
develop an even bigger weapon and this
is where weapon technology and you know
the types of bombs created by both the
Soviets and the Americans just become
bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger
um we refer to this as the arms race or
the nuclear arms race and you know this
is we might say the
competition
between US and Soviet
Union to
develop more
weapons and bigger
weapons and those
technological advancements came um
scientists figured out how to make a
bigger bomb uh called a hyd ydrogen
weapon or hydrogen bomb a
hydrogen and the United States developed
one in
1952 and the Soviet Union developed one
in 1953 so as far as Weapons technology
was concerned seemed as if the Soviet
Union was uh catching up very quickly
and this arms race was not just in terms
of the size of the weapon or how big the
bomb was it was also in terms of which
side had more weapons so you know for
example uh you know it was the case that
if the United States possessed 10 Atomic
weapons then the goal for the Soviet
Union would be to build 20 and then
because the Soviets had 20 well now the
United States needed more so they needed
40 well you end up having this arms race
where each side continues to build up
more and more and more weapons and you
essentially get to a point where both
SIDS have the capacity to do incredible
damage uh you know if a war were to uh
were to break out now the arms race or
you know the the buildup of the military
that really characterizes the Cold War a
lot of it happened under the presidency
of Dwight D Eisenhower he serves from
1952 to
1960 and we'll say
president uh
during the arms
race um Dwight D Eisenhower had been uh
you know commander of Allied Forces
during D-Day he was a war hero he was
responsible for for Allied victory over
the the Nazis in in Europe so uh
Eisenhower ends up being a pretty
well-liked uh president overall U one
thing about Eisenhower was that he is
committed to much of the same policies
that preceded him with with Truman so we
might just say
committed to earlier policies like
containment and the Truman
Doctrine um he does put his own uh
signature we might say on Cold War
policy it's typically Eisenhower that we
associate the most with massive
retaliation this is we'll call it
Eisenhower's
policy and it certainly reflects uh the
you know the buildup going on between
the US in terms of their weapons and
this policy more or less dided that a
Soviet
attack on the
US would be
met
with quote unquote massive
retal this was a a
warning to the Soviets um that the
United States was prepared to unleash in
its its entire Arsenal if it came to uh
you know if it came to a conflict um
this pattern of continuously building up
more and more and more and more weapons
between you know both sides um we
eventually reached the point between the
Americans and the Soviets where mutually
assured destruction or mad was reached
we might say about mutually assured
destruction that the arms
race
created there so
[Music]
many
weapons that any War
between US and Soviet
Union would
result in mutual
destruction and uh that became became a
very scary reality for a lot of the Cold
War that both the Americans and the
Soviets had built up such an Arsenal in
terms of weapons that if a war were to
break out neither side would be able to
uh to survive interestingly enough
mutually assured destruction did in some
way serve somewhat as a
deterrent right you could probably make
an argument about whether mutually
assured destruction made the world a
safer or more dangerous place because uh
now when when both sides had the
capacity to to um you know assure the
destruction of the other it might make
them think twice about starting a war or
would uh would make war such a uh such a
a costly uh uh Enterprise that it might
deter either side from from that and
might make them forc to like see more
peaceful uh options um this was only
made even uh more real by newer
Technologies to deliver weapons now back
at the ending of World War II um the
atomic bombs that were used in Japan
those were delivered by airplanes uh
things like hydrogen bombs are way
bigger than what was used uh in Japan so
the technology really has has uh taken
off but what also changed was the way to
deliver these weapons and both the
Soviets and the Americans de developed
what were known as ICBM as this stood
for
inter
Continental
ballistic
missiles and these could
deliver say
nuclear weapons
over long
distances um so you wouldn't need to
have a command airplane to drop a bomb
like they did in Japan you could just
shoot a missile that missile could be
armed or or you know could be armed with
a nuclear weapon and it could go more or
less across the world um some of this
technology was we'll say h
technology was
aided by Nazi
scientists um the Nazis had been
developing rocket technology during the
end of World War II they had um shot
some over to Great Britain and so some
of the information that was used by Nazi
scientists was uh eventually
Incorporated in in the United States uh
to further develop this uh this
technology but outside of advancements
to military technology maybe one of the
more distinctive features of the Cold
War is the space race and the Space Race
becomes in some ways kind of it own mini
little Battleground as far as the cold
war is uh is concerned so recall in
terms of the overall objective we use
this quote before the hearts and
Minds because at the end of the day the
cold war is about ideology and that is
who can do a better job of convincing
the world that their system is superior
and one thing that the Space Race could
do was that um it was in some sense a uh
technological
competition uh to
see
which
ideology was
Superior
you know if the Soviets could make
tremendous advancements in space
technology you know if they were the
ones who could build a world that looked
like the Jetson then people around the
world would say yeah you know the
Soviets have the right model and if the
Americans could do it then people would
be convinced that yeah maybe capitalism
and democracy that that is the right
model so this competition over space uh
was used in a way to try and convince
the rest of the world that one system
had a better uh uh one side or one
country had a better system than the
than the other um T typically we point
to the launching of sputnic one as the
beginning of the Space Race this is the
first
satellite launched into
space into
space and this was launched by the
Soviet
Union
uh at the time when Sputnik was launched
it really scared Americans because there
was a feeling that we here in the United
States were getting left behind and the
Soviets were advancing so much in terms
of their technology they had launched
this satellite into space a lot of
people were even afraid that that might
might be something like a weapon even uh
but in response the United States began
to pour a lot of resources and a lot of
time into their own space technology to
show the world that essentially we could
beat the Soviets as far as space
exploration was concerned um in response
the United States founded NASA the
National
Aeronautics and
Space
Administration and you know the
goal was to
beat
Soviet technology
specifically in space right in
space so with that both you know the
Americans they eventually lost launched
their own satellite into uh into space
but you know the Soviets uh you know
they were you know really some of the
early Victors uh in in the face R uh in
the Space Race uh the
Soviets hit the moon
first right so they got the first
satellite uh they hit the moon they
launched the
first dog in
space first person in
space and so that provoked the US which
you know had lost couple of these things
but was very quickly on the heels of the
Soviets as far as technology goes so uh
Yuri gagaran he was the he was a what
they called a cosmonaut Soviet astronaut
uh this was the
first man in
space and he was from the Soviet
Union three weeks later Alan Shepard
came the first
American in
space
um this prompted at the time in
1960 president
kenned
promised the
first man on the
moon so for you know the
1950s typically we would say that the
Space Race Was Won by the Soviets in the
50s right they had had all these
achievements but uh President Kennedy
when he was elected in 1960 he made it a
goal that uh we the United States we
would eventually win the Space Race by
promising to land a man on the Moon by
the time the decade was over section
four the Cold War Red Scare mcarthism
and liberal anti-communism so this
section focuses a little bit more on
what the impact of the Cold War was at
home
and what we find is that Americans were
very concerned uh afraid even of the
threat that the Soviet Union posed and
often times we might even say that the
Cold War sent Americans into a panic we
we use this term Red Scare to describe
we'll call this
American
fears of communism
uh
during the 1950s and the 1950s even
though the Cold War lasts all the way
until 1989 typically the 1950s are the
the height of the Red Scare now
sometimes you might also see this appear
as the second Red Scare because there
was actually a an earlier Red Scare and
if you're curious
red that is the color of the Soviet
flag so sometimes you might even just
use the term red as a Fillin for
Communists um but there's actually an
earlier uh Red Scare the first one and
this one was in the
1920s
after World War I and that was when the
Soviet Union first came to power so
sometimes you do see this Red Scare
differentiated between this one
I think your textbook tries to
differentiate the two by calling this
the Cold War Red Scare uh so that way we
know we're talking about the one taking
place in the 1950s and there is no
single person that best represents the
Red Scare than Joseph McCarthy Joseph
McCarthy is the
personification of the Red Scare and
we'll say about Joseph McCarthy who is a
senator from
Wisconsin
and he
took
advantage of the
fears of
Communism he very famously
claimed to
have
a list of
oops list of
2005 communist
spies Communists in the US
government and when he came out with
this accusation saying look I have a
list of 205 Communists that are actively
sabotaging the country um he was never
able to to substantiate those claims he
never actually provided the evidence but
Americans were so afraid that they
essentially went along with it and
Joseph McCarthy managed to build a
career off of this um other ways in
which the United States sought to root
out any sort of communist influence at
home was through organizations such as
hak Hua uh HUAC this sounds for the
house an
American
activities activities or activity
Activities
Committee and what's interesting is that
the H Act was actually established
during World War II where unamerican
activities in World War II would have
been associated with Japan and Germany
but it lasted into the Cold War era and
became a major mechanism for
investigating communist ISM at home
we'll just say about it
held
hearings
about
communism at
home and there were several other laws
that were passed in order to deal with
potentially the threat of Communism at
home one good example is the McCaron act
which required
uh communist
organizations to register with the
government you know there were a lot
more things like you know loyalty
Oaths um you know there were you know
Americans were clearly shaken uh and
affected by the uh by the Cold War um
sometimes the Cold War and the Red Scare
get compared to something like a Witch
Hunt the idea is that sort of a frenzy
is whipped up that the potential
Boogeyman out there is not really there
but one you know yes it's true American
did get definitely a little bit out of
hand with uh you know the accusations of
people being communists and whatnot
certainly but one thing to keep in mind
is that you know with the Soviet Union
and the United States um they were
dealing with potentially very
destructive Weaponry in something like
Atomic we um that the Soviets and the
Americans did actually spy on one
another so in in some ways yes it was
like a Witch Hunt looking for something
that's not there but not quite exactly
because Espionage did EX
and nuclear weapons did exist and in
hindsight we can look backwards and say
yeah well none of those weapons were
used so what was everyone so panicked
about but at that time uh you know they
didn't entirely know that um an example
where the Red Scare really had a uh a
significant out outcome was in the case
of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg this was a
couple
used
of spying
oops for the Soviet
Union and they were eventually found
guilty of
it now the husband Julius Rosenberg he
did have access to information top
secret information by working with the
military it's less clear exactly how
involved his wife was um at the time
though the evidence wasn't all that
strong but because the the fear was
there and the Panic was there it led to
them being found guilty uh and they were
both
executed in
1953 one of the more high-profile cases
of Espionage involved that of aler his
this was the highest
US government
official the
accused of being a Soviet
spy um essentially you had a another uh
person who was spying who had defected
excuse me a Soviet spy who had defected
to the United States and he named aler
his as someone who had sold the uh the
Soviet Union Secrets um but by the time
that aler hit was brought to to court to
uh to face his charges the statute of
limitations had expired so he couldn't
be charged with certain crimes and
eventually the only charge that he was
uh hit with was perjury which is like I
think just lying or something along
those lines but um you know he was a
very high ranking official and the
accusations against him did seem
credible so in the cases of Julius and
Ethel Rosenberg and the cases of aler
his Americans had specific people to
point to to say look yes Espionage is
taking place and maybe just maybe we
should believe McCarthy when uh you know
when he makes those various accusations
now there were other members of Congress
and other politicians who did take
advantage of this one was Richard Nixon
and Richard Nixon before he became vice
president before he became president he
really
built a political
career say
going after people like his but more or
less
suspected
Communists at home when he started to
rise through the ranks as a politician
Richard Nixon uh did not quite to the
level of uh McCarthy in terms of maybe
his accusations but certainly in terms
of uh popularity so all of this right
you know everything from the who act to
the Loyalty o to registering Communists
with the government the cases of Julius
and Ethel Rosenberg his etc etc this all
gave McCarthy much more leverage in his
accusations and it made it more and more
difficult for others to challenge him in
fact McCarthy's accusations and
McCarthy's actions were so Infamous that
he gets his own term McCarthyism which
in some sense McCarthyism we have a a
definition here but it's in some sense
it could be you know
accusations based on little
to no evidence right it's it's you know
the practice of just making wild
accusations about stuff with actually
without any any evidence to prove it
and it gets a lot of momentum because
people are just too afraid to speak out
I mean if you were to be one to
challenge McCarthy McCarthy might turn
towards you and turn the mob towards you
and say look maybe you're a communist
and then that would put you on the
outside looking in uh we have a
definition of McCarthyism here in
1950 um in terms of of uh what it meant
quote the means by which a handful of
men disguise this Hunters of subversion
cynically subvert the instruments of
Justice in order to help their own
political Fortune so um in was this
Freda kirwe um I think she would say
that you know McCarthy knew what he was
doing right he knew he was lying and was
doing that politically to advance his
own political uh political career now
what was the status of Communism in the
United States was there a threat um was
there a lot of support was there a lot
of sympathy well you could go all the
way back to you know World War I and
maybe even before to find some of the
earlier uh organizations communist
organizations in the United States the
cpusa was the Communist
Party
USA and it was founded during the first
redcare in 1921 and so uh communist
organizations had existed in the United
States even before the Cold War was
officially
underway but cpusa was and this was true
more or less I would say of of communist
organizations very limited in terms of
popularity right limited popularity so
uh it existed prior to the Cold War but
only around 80,000 members the textbook
say uh States in terms of who actually
belong to it um during the Great
Depression though communism became a
little bit more popular you know because
the perceived failure of capitalism uh
it made people in the United States you
know think and and and think more
favorably of Communism and so during the
1930s the popular front was formed and
this was an
effort to in some ways you know maybe
blend is not the right word but we'll
use blend effort to blend
communism and American values
um maybe to
make communism
mainstream you know to have it be much
less of a
radical cringe idea and bring it a
little bit more into the mainstream and
again from the 1930s the popular front
did become uh somewhat successful but it
did
collapse
in 1939 we might just say I'll just put
popular
during Great
Depression so communism as an ideology
never really you know projected itself
into mainstream American politics and in
fact even during the Cold War all sides
of the political aisle were hostile to
Communism including those on the liberal
side and the textbook gives a good
example here of an organization that was
what we might describe as a
anti-communist liberal organization and
that is Americans for Democratic action
or Ada this was we'll call a
liberal maybe even and
Progressive anti-communism
anti-communist
organization so uh one of the things
that this section uh wants to do or
wants to uh you know communicate is to
say that or to make the point that
anti-communism
was
bipartisan and bipartisan or
partisanship means political party so
both the
Republicans and
Democrats were against uh
go ahead
and rewrite
that
Republicans and
Democrats um and so what that meant was
that if you were accused of being a
communist there was there really wasn't
a lot of people out there who were
willing to sacrifice their reputation to
uh you know speak on on on your
behalf um the pursuit of Communists in
the United States was from the
Republicans it was from the Democrats it
was from liberals it was from
conservatives it was from you know the
apparatus that was established to fight
the Cold War like the CIA but it was
also internal Jay Edgar Hoover who was
the
director of the FBI and the FBI is
generally concerned with crime in the
United States he directed a lot of his
effort towards battling communist and so
we might say director of the FBI uh
sought to
battle communism all right so to use the
FBI to root out any potential uh any
potential
influences now of the people who were
accused or of the institutions that were
accused of Communism probably the big
three I would say one was the government
and of course Joseph McCarthy was very
vocal about um you know exposing
communist spies in the government uh
another one was
universities in fact a lot of University
professors were accused of spreading
communist rhetoric and often times
universities came under the purview of
cold Warriors looking to root out
Communists or even the FBI and
interestingly enough we might not
imagine this but also Hollywood the film
industry because if this is a war for
the hearts and minds of people around
the world Hollywood might be the most
powerful institution because of their
ability to make movies and TV shows that
could send messages around the world and
so of some of the institutions that were
investigated by organizations like the
hak the house on American Activities
Committee um they would bring uh forward
members of Hollywood including people
like Walt Disney and Ronald Reagan who
at the time was an actor but later on
would become president of the United
States now when 10 of these individuals
refuse us to answer the questions that
were put forward by the hak the most
famous of them being quote are you now
or have you ever been a member of the
Communist party which was typical for a
hak investigation when 10 of these
individuals said I'm not going to tell
you because I have the right to uh uh I
have the right against
self-incrimination I don't have to say
it it's my uh my right as American
citizen they were blacklisted these 10
people became known as the Hollywood 10
so these were 10 people
we'll say who
invoked their American
rights when
questioned about being
communist and these hearings of
Hollywood actors
um they were very popular I mean just
think about any celebrity trial right
people wanted to see celebrities being
questioned and so became almost an
entire spectacle within within itself
but when these 10 people said look
that's none of your business essentially
um they were what we call
blacklisted and whether or not you were
somebody in the government or somebody
in a university or somebody in Hollywood
if you got accused of Communism that
could ruin your career and black it just
means that nobody was willing to hire
you because they didn't want to uh they
didn't potentially want to run the risk
of being labeled uh communist or or
anti-American now the anti-communist
frenzy did reach a pinnacle um but not
before um you know altering I would say
American culture in in a pretty
significant way um and one way that the
Red Scare had its influence was the way
in which it tied in with religion uh
very much the way in which Americans
viewed uh communism capitalism and
religion was that you know the
Soviets they were considered atheists
right or you know as it says Godless
that communism was Godless and in some
sense in order for the United States to
contrast itself with the Soviet Union um
that meant that the you know to be
American was to be a theist or to be for
god um and you know there's some basis
in this you know Carl Marx very famously
said religion is the opiate of the
people um that uh the Soviets or
communism seeks to unite all workers
together regardless of religion and so
in that way religion is just like an
obstacle to be getting you know gotten
rid of before we reach the egalitarian
uh you know Utopia um so Americans
implemented this right in their culture
and um you know one uh uh one way that
we can uh point to her or an evidence
that we can point to is that in was it
1954 under
God was
added to the Pledge of Allegiance and
that was originally not on there and in
1956
In God We
Trust uh
became the US
motto and this was an effort by the
United States to portray itself as you
know if you're on the side of capitalism
if you're on the side of democracy
you're on the side of God and the
Soviets are uh essentially the uh you
know essentially the Godless now
eventually though Joseph McCarthy would
um the the public become privy to uh to
McCarthy's action so all of this allowed
for McCarthy to make more outlandish
accusations right each time that people
believed him he just accused the next
hireup of being communist that was
until McCarthy took on the US Army which
ended up being his uh being his
downfall um we'll say
McCarthy
used the US
Army of
being
infiltrated by
Communists and when he did that the
United States Congress opened up
hearings and gave McCarthy a chance to
prove it on live TV we'll say
hearings were
held for
McCarthy to
prove his
accusations and when he was put you know
in front of Congress and when he was put
in front of the entire public
McCarthy was exposed as a
fraud completely discredited him as a
politician completely discredit his
ideas in some ways you might say that
Americans after exposing McCarthy not
entirely but you know snapped out of uh
you know the Red Scare in in some sense
section five
decolonization and the global reach of
the American Century so the Cold War
coincides with another very important
Global event and that is
decolonization which in short is the end
of
imperialism um we talked uh a little bit
uh in an earlier chapter about
imperialism how the industrial nations
of the world conquered the entire Globe
um that comes to an end after World War
II right World War II is the ending of
the imperialistic world order the
British give up their empire the French
lose their empire and what we have is
after
1945 80 Nations or 80
countries gain
independence and if we want to use use
an American example um I don't know if
it's mentioned anywhere but in
1946 the Philippines became an
independent country so there's even an
American example of uh giving up or
losing their colonies in this case the
Philippines so with 80 new countries
around the world this created in some
sense kind of like a battle ground for
American and Soviet influence because
the question was what way uh what
ideology communism or capitalism would
these nations Embrace we sometimes use
this term the third world to describe
these countries so these are mostly
newly independent
nations and for the time being they are
neither we's say
communist or
capitalist
and these nations essentially become a
Battleground for
US and Soviet
influence so you know what's interesting
about the cold war is that this is a
chapter or period in American history
where you really have to know a lot more
about world history right we get
introduced you know covering American
history up until this point we're going
to introduce a lot of new parts of the
world and a lot of new countries here
and that is reflective of the fact that
the Cold War really is uh really is
global and the fact that imperialism
ended it left a vacuum right for
American uh expansion to uh reach in
those areas um so we already know um
some of the defining uh principles of
American diplomacy like containment like
the Truman Doctrine but we'll add one
more thing here that your textbook
mentions uh this gen uh kind of just
gives us a little bit more understanding
why the United States was so aggressive
we might say in uh in the world um that
is domino theory so domino theory is the
theory that if one
nation Falls to
Communism all
surrounding
Nations
will fall to
Communism like a uh series of dominoes
so you know this belief that the
Americans had just made it so that
American intervention was more important
right that we can't simply sit back and
allow one country to fall because when
one country Falls that's one problem but
then all the countries around them are
now susceptible and that could be three
problems and three problems turn into
nine problems so it just gives us a
little bit more of a of an understanding
why there's such
um a reaction to intervene as soon as
possible now as the United States is
projecting its influence further and
further across the world as the arms
race is underway the Soviets and the
Americans are building bigger and bigger
and bigger militaries bigger and bigger
and Bigg bigger arsenals some Americans
are becoming concerned about this um
militarization and in fact the American
that is most closely associated with the
uh critique of this arms buildup
is in fact Dwight D Eisenhower himself
who in
1961 gives a speech warning Americans
about what's called the
military-industrial complex and we can
go ahead and just Define the
military-industrial complex as the US
military um pretty much and it's
supporting
Industries right so we don't just mean
when we say military-industrial complex
it's not just you know the Air Force and
the Army and the Navy it's but it's all
of the all the corporations and
businesses that produce stuff for the
military it's all the research and
Science and Technology the scientists
the funding um the space programs right
in some ways so um because the United
States had dedicated so many resources
to the Cold War and to its own military
there were some Americans Eisenhower
included that feared
the
growth could
threaten us Liberties right that the
military could become so influential
that it could have a detrimental effect
on American citizens and Eisenhower when
he left office in 1961 gave a speech
called the military-industrial complex
speech um there's a little quote from
here it says the military-industrial
complex's influence is quote economic
political and even spiritual felt in
every city state house and every Office
of the federal government and Eisenhower
being a war hero from World War II
americaas Americans were much more
likely to take his uh you know his
advice now with that being said uh as
we'll discover in the next couple of
chapters here the uh military buildup
continues to move forward it's something
that doesn't uh slow down into the 1970s
but at least people like Eisenhower were
aware of maybe some of the consequences
that such a military buildup would have
so the United States would continue to
fight the Cold War in uh again in these
third world Nations or in the third
world via proxy wars we identified proxy
wars before but these are uh
conflicts where Americans
and
Soviets fight each
other indirectly right indirectly and
that is the uh key point the Soviets and
the Americans are never fighting each
other directly in these conflicts but
they're going through other nations and
we already learned about two of them one
was in Korea and the other one was in in
Vietnam and there are plenty of other
examples to include in fact so so many
examples that you can't really include
uh you know all of them in this uh in
this section so proxy wars definitely
are a a feature um once again this term
hearts in Minds uh you know I've
mentioned it several times so far but it
uh it goes to show you just the scope of
the war so for example in this
competition over hearts and Minds one of
the ways in which the Americans sought
to promote the American way of Life by
was advertising things like consumer
goods we might just say about hearts and
Minds that the Cold
War uh maybe was
also f with
culture you know in fact one of the uh
one of the most effective tools that the
United States had in the Cold War was
promoting the American way of life
American consumption you know it's I
think we get into this next chapter but
you know it was buying a car buying a TV
blue jeans rock and roll music Coca-Cola
that you know promoting this American
lifestyle of heavy heavy heavy
consumption there are a lot of people
that wanted that material standard of
living and you could have something like
an advertisement Exposition be held in
another country and that was in some
roundabout way you know advertising and
selling Coca-Cola was in some way
fighting the Cold War right in sort of
this uh this cultural sense but there
was also one feature when it came to the
cold war that Americans had to overcome
and we're going to talk more about this
in relation to civil rights and that was
the hypocrisy that was the hypocrisy
between
freedom and
liberty versus things like racial
discrimination and Jim Crow you know on
the one hand how could the United States
be promoting Liberty you know Truman
talked about free peoples around the
world yet have a system of Jim Crow in
the South that systematically
disenfranchises African-Americans and so
Americans would have to resolve this
hypocrisy maybe you know maybe finally
right maybe once and for all um and in
fact the Soviet Union was keenly aware
of this in fact some of the most
effective
anti-American propaganda that the Soviet
used or Soviet Union used was to point
out the type of discriminatory and
racial policies that the United States
played back are used back at home so
it's uh it's no accident I would say
that the Civil Rights Movement happens
at a time when Americans are also
actively promoting this image of freedom
and liberty at home and to solve one of
those problems thus becomes a means to
solve the other