American Stories:
A History of the United States
Second Edition
Chapter
28
The Onset of
the Cold War
1945–1960
American Stories: A History of the United States, Second Edition
Brands • Breen • Williams • Gross
Churchill, Truman, and Stalin during the Potsdam
Conference in July 1945.
The Onset of the Cold War
1945–1960
•
•
•
•
The Cold War Begins
Containment
The Cold War Expands
The Cold War at Home
The Potsdam Summit
• Truman, Churchill and Stalin meet in
1945: Reparations crucial issue
• Potsdam marks end of wartime alliance
• For next decade, Russia and U.S. vie to
control postwar Europe
The Cold War Begins
The Cold War Begins
• Control of postwar Europe
• Economic aid
• Nuclear disarmament
The Division of Europe
• 1945: Russians occupied eastern
Europe, American troops occupied
western Europe
• Soviet Union sought eastern European
buffer
The Division of Europe (cont’d)
• U.S. demanded national selfdetermination through free elections
throughout Europe
• Stalin converted eastern Europe into a
system of satellite nations
Map 28.1 Europe after World War II The
heavy red line splitting Germany shows in graphic
form the division of Europe between the Western
and Soviet spheres of influence. “From Stettin in
the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic,” said Winston
Churchill in a speech at Fulton, Missouri, in 1946,
“an iron curtain has descended across the
Continent.”
The Atomic Dilemma
• 1943: Nuclear race between U.S. and
U.S.S.R.
• 1946: Baruch Plan
 Rapid reduction of U.S. military force
 Gradual reduction favored U.S. atomic
monopoly
• Soviet Union
 Larger conventional army than U.S.
 Immediate abolition of atomic weapons
Containment
Containment
• 1947: George C. Marshall appointed
Secretary of State
• Dean Acheson: England’s former role as
arbiter of world affairs
• George Kennan: Called for
“containment of Russia’s expansive
tendencies”
The Truman Doctrine
• 1947: Truman sought funds to keep
Greece, Turkey in western sphere of
influence
• Truman Doctrine: “Support free peoples
who are resisting attempted
subjugation by armed minorities or
outside pressure”
• Doctrine an informal declaration of cold
war against the Soviet Union
The Marshall Plan
• 1947: George Marshall proposed aid
for rebuilding European industries
• Russia refused aid
• 1948: Marshall Plan adopted by
Congress
• Plan fostered western European
prosperity
The Western Military Alliance
• 1949: North Atlantic Treaty
Organization
 Military alliance included U.S., Canada,
most of western Europe
 U.S. troops stationed in Europe
• NATO intensified Russia’s fear of the
West
The Berlin Blockade
•
•
•
•
June, 1948: Russians blockade of Berlin
Truman ordered airlift to supply the city
1949: Russians end blockade
U.S. political victory dramatized division
The Berlin airlift of 1948–1949 broke the Soviet
blockade. Called Operation Vittles, it provided food
and fuel for West Berliners. Here, children atop a
pile of rubble wave to an American cargo plane
flying overhead.
The Cold War Expands
The Cold War Expands
• 1947: U.S.-Russian arms race
accelerated
• Conflict expanded to Asia
The Military Dimension
• 1947: National Security Act
 Department of Defense unified armed
forces
 Central Intelligence Agency coordinated
intelligence-gathering
 National Security Council advised president
The Military Dimension (cont’d)
• Defense budget devoted to air power
• 1949: First Russian atomic bomb
exploded, U.S. began hydrogen bomb
development
The explosion of a U.S. test bomb over an
uninhabited island in the Pacific on November 1,
1952, demonstrated to the world the fearsome
power of the hydrogen bomb. This early H-bomb
could destroy a city the size of Washington, D.C.
The Cold War in Asia
• 1945: U.S. consolidates hold on Japan,
former Japanese possessions in Pacific
• 1949: Victory of Mao Tse-tung brings
China into Soviet orbit
• Truman refused recognition of
Communist China, began building up
Japan
The Korean War
• June 25, 1950: Communist North
Korean forces invaded U.S.-influenced
South Korea
• Truman made South Korea’s defense a
U.N. effort, sent in U.S. troops
 U.S. routed Korean forces in South
 Attempt to unify Korea drew in China
 U.S. pushed back to South, war a
stalemate
• Result: Massive American rearmament
Map 28.2 The Korean War, 1950–1953 After
a year of rapid movement up and down the Korean
peninsula, the fighting stalled just north of the 38th
parallel.
The Cold War at Home
The Cold War at Home
• New Deal economic policies
undermined
• Fears of Communist subversion
• Republicans used anticommunism to
revive their party
Truman’s Troubles
• Obstacles to Truman’s Fair Deal reforms
 Apathetic public
 Inflation
 Labor unrest
• 1946: Republicans won Congress
Truman Vindicated
• Taft-Hartley Act outlawed certain union
tactics
 Truman vetoed, Republicans overrode
his veto
Truman Vindicated (cont’d)
• 1948 election: Truman thought
unelectable
 Northern liberals supported Henry
Wallace’s Progressive candidacy
 Southern Democrats supported “Dixiecrat”
Strom Thurmond
Truman Vindicated (cont’d)
• 1948 election: Truman thought
unelectable (cont’d)
 Republican Thomas Dewey overconfident
and ran bland campaign, failed to
challenge Truman on Cold War because of
the Berlin Crisis
 Roosevelt coalition reelected Truman on
domestic issues
Map 28.3
The Loyalty Issue
• House Un-American Activities
Committee investigated Communist
subversion in government
• Truman responded with loyalty program
• Alger Hiss case
• Democrats blamed for
 “Losing” China to Communism
 Russia’s development of a hydrogen bomb
McCarthyism in Action
• 1950: Senator Joseph McCarthy
launched anticommunist campaign
• Innocent overwhelmed by accusations
• Attacks on privileged bureaucrats
 Supported by Midwest Republicans
 Attracted Irish, Italian, Polish workers to
Republicans
Senator Joseph McCarthy maintained a stream of
unsubstantiated charges, always ready to make
new accusations of communist infiltration before
the preceding ones could be proven untrue.
The Republicans in Power
• 1952: Eisenhower captures White
House for Republican Party
• July 27, 1953: stalemate accepted in
Korea
• Eisenhower dealt passively with
McCarthy
• 1954: Attack on Army discredited
McCarthy who is then censured
Eisenhower’s landslide victories in 1952 and 1956
seemed to prove his slogan that Americans did,
indeed, “like Ike,” as expressed on this campaign
pennant.
Eisenhower’s landslide victories in 1952 and 1956
seemed to prove his slogan that Americans did,
indeed, “like Ike,” as expressed on this campaign
pennant.
TABLE 28.1
The Election of 1952
Conclusion:
The Continuing Cold War
Conclusion:
The Continuing Cold War
• January, 1961: Eisenhower warned
against growing military-industrial
complex
• Post-war era marked by Cold War
rather than peace and tranquility
Timeline