#34
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Ike in the
Cold War
TWO NATIONS LIVE
ON THE EDGE
An H-bomb test conducted by America
near Bikini Island in Pacific Ocean, 1954
• After World War II, the U.S. and
U.S.S.R. competed in developing
atomic and hydrogen bombs
• The Soviets tested their first
atomic bomb in 1949
• The U.S. began work on a bomb
67 times stronger than the
atomic bomb dropped on
Hiroshima – the hydrogen bomb
(13) THE WARSAW PACT
To counter the U.S. defense alliance (NATO), in 1955
the Soviets formed their own mutual defense
alliance known as the Warsaw Pact
NATO
WARSAW
NEUTRAL
Eisenhower’s
Foreign Policy
a. Made no basic changes in the
containment policy
b. Republicans pressured him to reduce
government spending
c. Eisenhower and Secretary of State John
Foster Dulles developed a strategy
called massive retaliation.
d. Massive Retaliation meant
threatening to respond to Soviet
aggression anywhere in the world
with a nuclear attack.
e. Brinkmanship meant willing to “go
to the brink” of all-out war to
contain communism
f. Dulles’ policy was pure bluff –
neither Dulles or Eisenhower
ever seriously considered
dropping a nuclear bomb
g. To do so would have been
suicidal!
(3)End of the Korean War
a. Eisenhower campaigned to end the
Korean War
b. Eisenhower and Dulles hinted
to the Chinese and North
Koreans – “peace or else”
c.
June 1953 – a truce was signed – no
final treaty has ever been signed!
d. U.S. soldiers remain at the
DMZ of the 38th Parallel
Demilitarized Zone
(buffer zone)
of the
th
38 Parallel
Strengthening of Communism
a. East Germany (1953)
and Hungary (1956)
both revolted (civil
wars, revolutions)
against their
communist
governments – but
Eisenhower did not
intervene!
THE HUNGARIAN
UPRISING
The Soviets responded to the Hungarian
revolt with tanks
• Dominated by the Soviet
Union since the end of WWII,
the Hungarian people rose up
in revolt in 1956- they wanted
a Democracy
• Led by Imre Nagy, the liberal
Communist leader of Hungary,
the people demanded free
elections and the end of Soviet
domination
The Soviets’ response
was swift and brutal –
30,000 Hungarians were
killed (including Nagy) as
the Soviets reasserted
control
b. France was forced out of Vietnam
(Vietnam was a French colony known
as French Indochina since the 1860s)
in 1954 by Communist forces
led by Ho Chi Minh.
(9) The Geneva Accords of 1956
divided Vietnam along the 17th
Parallel – Communist North
Vietnam and Democratic South
Vietnam.
North Vietnam=Communist
South Vietnam = Democratic
(7) Domino Theory
• The domino effect is a chain reaction that
occurs when a small change causes a similar
change nearby, which then will cause another
similar change…
Why would America care about
Vietnam? Way over there… on the
other side of the world?
If Vietnam falls to communism…
so will their neighbor… and their
neighbor… and …
(5) Army-McCarthy Hearings
• Remember…
• 1950, Senator Joseph R.
McCarthy of Wisconsin charged
the state department was
riddled with traitors. These
accusations created a sense of
hysteria across the country
• 1954 – one of McCarthy’s assistants
was drafted into the army – McCarthy
tried unsuccessfully to get him excused
from service
• McCarthy announced an investigation
of “ subversive (communist spy)
activities” in the US Army
• Resulted in the televised ArmyMcCarthy Hearings
Senator Joseph
McCarthy
• Millions of people
watched the empty
charges of McCarthy
which eventually led to
his demise
• McCarthy was
censured (a slap on the
hand) by the Senate – he
remained a senator until
his death in 1957
•The fear of
communist infiltration
relaxed in the US
THE COLD WAR SPREADS
• With the threat of the powerful
communist Soviet Union and the Cold
War looming, President Truman soon
recognized the need for a centralized
intelligence system, even in peacetime.
• As the Cold War heated up, the U.S.
depended more and more on
information compiled by the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA)
• The CIA began attempts to weaken or
overthrow foreign governments that
"We went all over the
world and we did what we
were unfriendly to the U.S. (not
wanted. God, we had fun."
something the Soviets would exactly
approve of...)
-- Al Ulmer, chief of the CIA's
1950’s Far East division
COVERT (secret) ACTIONS
IN THE MIDDLE EAST
• One of the first covert
operations occurred in the
Middle East
The last Shah of Iran
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
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- In Iran the U.S.
orchestrated the return
of the pro- U.S.
Shah of Iran in 1953
Covert Operations
in Latin America
An approach launched in the 1950's, when confident WWII
vets set out to stop Communism with a new kind of warfare
that would eventually be called counterinsurgency.
It is well known that the CIA engineered a coup in Guatemala
in 1954, and that Americans lavished training and equipment
on US-friendly Governments.
• In 1954, the CIA also took covert actions in
Guatemala (a Central America country just
south of Mexico)
• The U.S. believed Guatemala was on the
verge of becoming Communist, so the CIA
trained an army which invaded the small
country
• The actions eventually failed as a military
dictator rose to power
LONG after its humiliations in the U-2 and Bay of Pigs fiascos, the C.I.A.
continued reaching into its bag of tricks to assure that Guatemala would
not become a failure.
''It's one of the saddest chapters of American
relations with Latin America,'' said Frederick
Hitz, the C.I.A. inspector general from 1990 to
1998. ''The United States felt responsible for
what it started by removing their communistfriendly leader, and essentially we were trapped.
We started something and didn't know how to
get off the train.''
Following an
investigation of the
matter, in 1995 the
Clinton Administration's
Intelligence Oversight
Board, expressed
bewilderment. ''The
board asked itself: the
cold war's over -- what
are we doing down
there?''
A Thaw in
the Cold
War?
(4) Stalin died in 1953 –
Nikita Khrushchev
became the Soviet
Premier
b. Many thought there
might be a “thaw in
the cold war” due to a
new Soviet leader.
Did Stalin die of natural causes
or was Stalin killed
• Official Cause of Death….
Brain Hemorrhage or Stroke
• The story- Stalin went to bed one night after
drinking and was later (20 hours later- they were afraid to
go in and check on him) found by his advisors/guards
laying in a urine soaked bed unable to speak.
Their fear of the leader was the reasoning
behind their inaction towards Stalin's state.
• Conspiracy?? Stalin was injected
with poison by the guard
Khrustalev, under the orders of his
master, KGB chief Lavrenty Beria,
because he was about to plunge
the Soviet Union into a war its
people were in no position to
fight…
What do you believe?
Now- with a new Soviet Leader…
In July 1955 –(4)The Geneva Summit
Meeting of world leaders met to
discuss a possible end to the Cold War.
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(15) Suez Canal Crisis
a. Egypt (backed by USSR) invaded
Israel in 1956 and seized
control of the Suez Canal
b. Israel fought back – joined by
Great Britain and France – both
wanted to reopen the canal.
c. Eisenhower was in a
dilemma – the U.S.
backed Israel and
were allies with Great
Britain and France.
d. Eisenhower rejected
using force to regain
the canal – he
demanded the 3
nations withdraw
from Egypt.
e. Soviets demanded the same, and Egypt kept
control of the Suez Canal (not much of a
thaw….)
f. USSR will enjoy a much closer relationship
with the Arab nations after this  We
countered this with (18) the Eisenhower
Doctrine (1957), which pledged military aid
to any Middle Eastern country fighting
communism.
(19) Sputnik and the Cold War
Space Race
a. October 4, 1957 – the Soviets launched the first
satellite into space- they “intellectually” beat the
US
(1 point for the soviets)
b. Sputnik (Russian word for “traveling
companion”)
c. Sputnik traveled around earth at
18,000 miles an hour, circling the
globe every 96 minutes
d. November, the Russians launched
Sputnik II – dog onboard!
Sputnik 1 and Sputnik 2
Russian Satellites
(25) National Aerospace and Aeronautics
(NASA) was created in 1958 to promote
space research and show that Americans
were intellectually capable.
d. The U.S. had MANY
embarrassing feats –
but finally launched a
small satellite in
February 1958.
(8) Congress passed the National Defense
Education Act because Americans were
determined to catch up to the Soviets –to
ensure American students were studying
math and science.
g. NDEA: $887 million in loans to needy college
students for the improvement of teaching
the sciences and languages.
U-2 PLANES
SPY
ON SOVIETS
• In the late 1950s, the
CIA began secret
high-altitude spy
missions over Soviet
territory
• The U-2’s infra-red
cameras took
detailed pictures of
Soviet troop
movements &
missile sites
(28)U-2 Affair
a. 1960 – the Soviets shot
down an American U-2 spy
plane.
b. Eisenhower denied that we
had a plane on a spying
mission.
c. Khrushchev revealed that the
pilot had survived – and they
knew EXACTLY what he’d been
doing!
d. GREAT embarrassment
to the Eisenhower
administration.
e. Powers had parachuted
into Soviet territory, was
captured and sentenced
to 10-years in prison
d. Powers was released
in 1962 in exchange
for convicted Soviet
spy Rudolph Abel
d. Ike promised flights would stop
but would not apologize. There
was no more thawing of the
Cold War between Ike and
Khrushchev after this!
e. To the rest of the world…this
made America look like the
aggressor nation
f. Because of this incident, the
1960s opened with tension between
the two superpowers as great as
ever
(26) Communism in Cuba?
• On January 8, 1959,
Fidel Castro's
Communist Friendly
army rolled
victoriously into
Havana, Cuba only 90
miles from the US. As
news of the fall of Batista's
government spread through
Havana, The New York Times
described the scene as one of
jubilant crowds pouring into
the streets and automobile
horns honking.
(27) Alaska
• The 49th State
in added in
1959.
Purchased from
USSR in 1867 for
its strategic
location and
vast natural
resources
(27) Hawaii
• 50th State,
also added in
1959
• Location!!!