The Truman Doctrine
The Truman Doctrine
• Truman’s advisors believed that U.S.S.R. was
exhausted from WWII, but could easily push
western allies out from Germany to establish a
communist government
• Communist parties in Europe and Japan seized
on post-war struggles to make political gains
• In response, Truman issued the Truman Doctrine
that stated “it must be the policy of the United
States to support free peoples who are resisting
attempted subjugation by armed minorities or
by outside pressures (communists)”
The Marshall Plan
• Sec. of State George Marshall announces the
European Recovery Plan (Marshall Plan)
• It was designed to rebuild Europe
• Soviets refuse to join and make their own
plan called the Mutual Economic Assistance
(Comecon) which focused on rebuilding their
satellite states
The Marshall Plan
• Because industrial capabilities of European
powers were limited, most of the money
spent through the Marshall plan ($13.5
billion) was used to purchase American made
goods
• This provides an economic boost to the U.S.
• Recovery in Japan was based on a similar
strategy
Berlin Airlift
• In response to western Allies attempts to
merge their 3 zones of occupation in
Germany into a unified state (West Germany),
Soviets cut off ground access to western
sections of Berlin
• Western nations, wary of triggering a war with
the U.S.S.R. begin the Berlin Airlift to resupply
the Germans living in their zones of Berlin
• 11 months later, U.S.S.R. lifts blockade
American Responses
• In response to Soviet aggressions, Congress
reinstates the draft in 1948 and increases
defense spending by 30%
• The National Security Act of July 1947 creates
the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the
National Security Council (NSC)
• CIA is tasked with intelligence gathering and
covert operations
• NSC joins diplomatic and military advisors in one
group
• The Department of Defense is created in 1949 to
oversee the army, navy and air force
NATO and the Warsaw Pact
• April 1949, 10 European nations, the U.S. and
Canada sign the North Atlantic Treaty as a
mutual defense pact (What does this mean?)
• Signatories of the treaty make up the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)
• U.S. troops are deployed to western Europe
as a defense mechanism to any incursion by
the U.S.S.R.
• ANZUS Pact with Australia and New Zealand
was Pacific version of NATO
NATO and the Warsaw Pact
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Original NATO countries
Belgium • Luxembourg
Canada • Netherlands
Denmark • Norway
France • Portugal
Iceland • United Kingdom
Italy
• United States
Original Warsaw Pact countries
• Soviet Union • Hungary
• Albania
• East Germany
• Poland
• Czechoslovakia
• Romania
• Bulgaria
Homework
Create a comic (hand drawn or on the computer) that tells
the story of the origins of the Cold War.
Be sure to include:
• Communism’s rise in the U.S.S.R.
• U.S.S.R.’s relationship with the Western Allies during WWII
• The differing views on Europe’s future following the war
• How the U.S. and U.S.S.R. solidified alliances through NATO
and the Warsaw Pact
• The fundamental differences between the U.S.’s capitalist
and U.S.S.R.’s communist economic theories and how they
wanted to spread their beliefs to other countries (e.g.
Korea, Vietnam, China, etc…)
• Anything else you find relevant (or amusing, because after
all I need to read 90 of these things)
Extra Credit
1. Read the introduction on page 342 titled “Famine in
Ukraine” in the Sources of the Western Tradition
textbook
2. Read the essay that follows on page 343 by Miron Dolot
titled “Execution by Hunger”
3. Reflect on the story for a day
4. Write an essay approximately 2 pages long (double
spaced, 12 point Times New Roman font) that uses the
content of Dolot’s story to illustrate how collectivization
and its consequences were an effective tool of
punishment aimed at Ukraine’s defiance of the
Bolsheviks during their rise to power.