Unit 11: The Cold War and European Unity, 1945-Present
Chapters 30/31 (McKay) Study Guide
Part I
Identifying Key Terms
Notable People
Harry Truman
Nikita Khrushchev
Alexander Dubcek
Leonid Brezhnev
John F. Kennedy
Lyndon B. Johnson
Richard Nixon
Willy Brandt
Ronald Reagan
Betty Friedan
Margaret Thatcher
Mikhail Gorbachev
Lech Walesa
Boris Yeltsin
Slobodan Milosevic
Terms and Events
Potsdam Conference
Truman Doctrine
Marshall Plan
COMECON
Berlin Airlift
Containment
Korean War
Vietnam War
Denazification
Mutual Deterrence
NATO
Warsaw Pact
Berlin Wall
Eastern Bloc
Cuban Missile Crisis
Rapprochement
Decolonization
Nonalignment
Suez Crisis
Apartheid
De-Stalinization
Stalinization
Part II
Nationalization
Christian Democrats
Fifth Republic
EEC – Common Market
Guest Workers
Postcolonial Migration
Welfare State
Social Security
Socialized Medicine
Consumer Revolution
Family Allowances
Abstract Expressionism
Pop Art
Permissive Society
Feminism
New Left
Second Vatican Council
OPEC
Brezhnev Doctrine
Détente
Prague Spring
Eurocommunism
Helsinki Conference
Solidarity
Stagflation
INF Treaty (1987)
Domino Theory
Postmodernism
Post structuralism
Postindustrial Society
Perestroika
Glasnost
Revolutions of 1989
Shock Therapy
Ethnic cleansing (Bosnia)
Multiculturalism
Globalization
Treaty of Maastricht
European Union
Review Questions
Directions: Check your understanding of this chapter by answering the following questions in about
four-five well written and effective sentences each.
1. Why were the United States and the Soviet Union suspicious of each other after World War
II, and what events between 1945 and 1949 heightened the tensions between the two
nations?
2. How and why did the Cold War become a global affair after 1949?
3. Why and how did the European colonies in Africa, the Middle East, and Asia gain
independence between 1945 and 1965? In you answer, you should also refer to the influence
of the Cold War on this process of decolonization.
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4. What was the pattern of postwar rebuilding and development in the Soviet Union and the
Eastern Bloc?
5. Why did western Europe recover so successfully, and what were the sources of postwar
stability?
6. How did large-scale changes in social structures and relations contribute to European
stability on both sides of the Iron Curtain?
7. What were the similarities and differences in the political, economic, and social history of
Eastern Europe and Western Europe between 1945 and 1965?
8. How did social and political changes in the 1960s contribute to growing criticism of the
postwar consensus that had emerged in the 1950s?
9. What were the major political developments in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe
between 1965 and 1985?
10. How did the economic decline in the 1970s contribute to fundamental social and political
change in the 1980s in western Europe and North America?
11. What were the main events in the Cold War between 1965 and 1985, and how important was
the role of détente in those events?
12. What were the major social and cultural developments in the Western world between 1965
and 1985?
13. What are the similarities and differences between the feminist movement of the nineteenth
century and the post-World War II feminist movement?
14. What internal and external factors weakened communist power in the Eastern Bloc, and how
did Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev try to reform the system from above? What role did he
play in the demise of the USSR?
15. Why did anticommunist revolutions sweep through eastern Europe in 1989, and what were
the immediate consequences?
16. What are the major political developments in Western Europe since 1985?
17. How and why did the Cold War end?
18. What are the major developments in the women’s movement since 1985, and what problems
have immigrants created for European society?
19. What major Western cultural trends have emerged since 1985?
20. How did Russia and the former Eastern Bloc countries meet the challenges of
postcommunist reconstruction and political and economic reform?
21. What are the defining features of globalization, and how did changing international
structures transform European societies?
22. How did population decline and large-scale immigration lead to demographic changes in
contemporary Europe, and what were the main results of growing ethnic diversity?
23. What key problems faced European societies in the twenty-first century, and how did
European states and peoples deal with these critical issues?
24. In what ways were the major social, economic, and political developments in the second half
of the twentieth century similar to those in the first half of the twentieth century? In what
ways were they different?
Part III Chronological Awareness
Directions: Place the following events in the correct chronological order. Provide the year of each
event. Since the events are given to you in a sequence that is out of chronological order, please
reorder the events correctly. In the event that one or more of the events listed below do not have a
single year in which it took place, provide the appropriate date ranges. Rewrite this list in the
correct chronological order, providing the year of the event, occurrence, or trend.
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1. Cuban Missile Crisis
2. Warsaw Pact founded
3. Building of the Berlin Wall
4. Founding of Israel
5. OPEC oil embargo
6. Prague Spring
7. Fall of the Berlin Wall
8. Treaty of Maastricht
9. Formation of the EEC – Common Market
10. Suez Crisis
Part IV Multiple Choice Practice
Directions: Each of the questions or incomplete statements below is followed by five suggested
answers or completions. Select the one that is best in each case, and then write the letter and the
answer of your choice on your study guide.
1. The creation of the French Fifth Republic was greatly influenced by
a. An inability to develop a nuclear arms program.
b. The growing political power of the French Communist Party.
c. Continued hostility between France and Germany.
d. American dominance over the French economy.
e. Domestic strife concerning military engagements abroad.
2. Which statement best describes the Berlin Airlift?
a. It was a response to Soviet attempts to prevent the formation of a West German state.
b. Its success led to the downfall of both Winston Churchill and Harry Truman.
c. It succeeded largely because of a US threat to use atomic weapons.
d. The Soviets responded to the crisis by constructing a wall around Berlin.
e. The Soviets relented days after the airlift began.
3. The Warsaw Pact was formed in response to
a. American involvement in Vietnam.
b. British and French dominance in Africa and the Middle East.
c. West German economic success.
d. The formation of a military alliance among Western nations.
e. The aftermath of the Korean War.
4. The policies of British PM Margaret Thatcher can best be described as
a. A decrease in government social welfare spending and taxation.
b. A return to pre-war colonialism.
c. An attempt to cooperate more closely with trade unions.
d. An increase in government involvement in social welfare programs.
e. A drifting apart of Britain and the United States.
5. The Soviet Union responded to the “Prague Spring” by
a. Initiating a blockade of West Berlin to prevent further defections.
b. Sending troops into Czechoslovakia.
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c. Constructing missile bases in Cuba to thwart an American invasion.
d. Invading Budapest in order to overthrow the Nagy regime.
e. Cutting off trade routes between East Germany and Czechoslovakia.
6. The Brezhnev Doctrine called for
a. Soviet intervention in any threatened socialist state.
b. A Soviet boycott of all Western consumer goods.
c. Soviet missile deployment in East Germany.
d. A Soviet boycott of the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.
e. Continued Soviet support of détente.
7. All of the following statements describe the modern welfare state EXCEPT
a. The state has a duty to provide for the basic social needs of its people.
b. The state should engage in the privatization of major industries.
c. The state should raise taxes so as to be able to provide inexpensive housing and free
medical care.
d. The state should cooperate with trade unions to promote the welfare of the labor
movement.
e. The state should nationalize major industries.
8. All of the following prompted reforms initiated by Mikhail Gorbachev EXCEPT
a. severe economic problems in the Soviet Union, including a downturn in the standard of
living.
b. an ideological rivalry with the People’s Republic of China.
c. rising costs of military action in central Asia.
d. problems associated with the rigid structure of Soviet bureaucracy.
e. a lack of technological progress in the Soviet Union.
9.
All of the following contributed to the collapse of the Soviet Union EXCEPT
a. the radical reforms of Mikhail Gorbachev.
b. the rise of nationalist movements within the Soviet Union.
c. the creation of a new Soviet parliament.
d. the appointment of Boris Yeltsin as head of the Communist Party.
e. a growing technological gap between the East and the West.
10. Which of the following ethnic groups was responsible for the “ethnic cleansing” in Yugoslavia?
a. Serbs
b. Albanians
c. Bosnians
d. Croats
e. Macedonians
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