The Cold War
1945-1952
Postwar Setting, 1945-1946
• WWII changed from Isolationist to
military superpower
• Demobilization and Reconversion
▫ End of the War
 “Alive in ’45”
 “no boats, no votes”
 1947
 22nd Amendment to limit
presidential terms to 2
▫ Costs
 Psychological
 Divorce rate increased
 Feared unemployment
 Women back to “women’s jobs”
▫ Reinforcement of women in
the home
• GI Bill of Rights
▫ 1944 Serviceman’s Readjustment
Act
▫ Designed to:
 Forestall expected recession
 Reward soldiers, help transition
soldiers back
 Reduce fear of female competition
▫ Gave:
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Priority for jobs
Occupational guidance
Unemployment (52 weeks)
Low-interest loans (VA)
Paid education
▫ Results:
 HUGE economic boom/expansion
 2.2 million attended college
 Huge cost to government
 $14.5 billion between 1945-1960
 Repaid in taxes
Truman’s Domestic Program
• Legislation
▫ 21 point program
▫ Included national healthcare coverage
▫ Increased minimum wage
▫ Bill to maintain full employment
▫ Watered down version passed
▫ Employment Act 1946
 Only legislation passed
 Committed to economic growth
 Goal full employment
▫ “Peace is Hell”
• Inflation
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Demand outran supply
Severe problem
OPA, Truman lost control
Weak measures
▫ Truman asked Congress to continue
price controls to check inflation
▫ Congress didn’t agree, inflation up
25%
▫ Labor strikes
 United Mine Workers 45 days
 4.5 million striked, wanted increased
wages
 Truman used soldiers to operate
• Loss of support
▫ “To err is Truman”
 Everyone against him
 Anti-communists
 Labor
 Civil Rights
 Women
Truman’s Domestic Program
• 80th Congress
▫ Conservative majority
▫ Reversal of New Deal
▫ Support of creation of Israel
▫ Wagner Act 1935
 Restricted unionist activities
 GOP tore it apart
 Public unhappy with inflation/strikes
▫ Taft-Hartley Act 1947
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Banned closed shop
Loyalty oaths
“cooling off” periods
Labor now special-interest
Truman vetoed, Congress wins
 Called it “slave-labor bill”
• Civil Rights
▫ Truman realized that race issue made
U.S. look weak abroad
▫ 1946 – used executive power to
establish Committee on Civil Rights
▫ Jackie Robinson
▫ 1945 Walter White- NAACP
 Wants equality, fair practices
▫ “Dixiecrat” Revolt
 Democrat convention
 35 walked out
 Nominated Strom Thurmond for
President
 Leads to Truman’s 1948 executive order
to bar discrimination in federal
employment (military and federal
government)
 Morgan v. Virginia (interstate bus)
 Shelley v. Kraemer (housing)
 Both found segregation
unconstitutional
Threat of Communism
• Heading to Cold War
▫ 1946: Destiny of Eastern Europe and Poland
in question
▫ Conflict centered around intense rivalry b/w
Soviet Union and U.S.
▫ Creation of U.N. 1945
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Hope fore future
U.S., G.B., France, China, Soviet Union
▫ Permanent seats, veto power
▫ Meant to maintain national security
• Stalin’s Plans
▫ Buffer zone in Eastern Europe
▫ Soviet sphere of influence
▫ Puppet governments in Albania and
Yugoslavia
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“free elections” favored communists
• Truman’s Plans
▫ Russia in its borders
▫ Acceptance of communism would betray
WWI and WWII vets
▫ Didn’t want to be “soft”
▫ Demanded free elections in Poland
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Britain demanded too
• Iron Curtain
▫ Satellite nations
 Closed to US trade
 “no lasting peace with Capitalism”
 Argued needed to protect Russia from
invasion
▫ George Kennan
 US policy must be to “contain”
 Impossible to negotiate with Stalin
 Military, economic, and diplomatic
strategies to prevent communism from
spreading = containment theory
▫ Churchill
 1946 “Iron Curtain”
 Anglo-speaking alliance
▫ Truman
 Iran 1946
 Soviets occupied
 U.S. threatened to send troops
 Both groups rush to develop atomic
bombs
 Cold War begins
Containment
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Policy created by
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General George C. Marshall
Deam Acheson
George Kennan
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Iran 1946
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Greece and Turkey 1947
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British needed help
George C. Marshall pressured Congress to help
$400 million assistance
Truman Doctrine
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Developed in response to 2 threats
• Communist uprising in Greece/ Turkey
• Soviet demand for dardenelles
Active US engagement to contain communism
Military and financial aid
National Security Act 1947
 National Security Council
 CIA
 Dept of Defense
Marshall Plan
 Plan to restore European Economies
 Resistance to Communism
 George C. Marshall’s plan
 Successful, $17 billion in aid
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Truman’s Strategy
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Development of atomic weapons
Strengthen traditional military power
Military alliances
Military and economic aid to allies
Espionage network
Propaganda offensive
The Marshall Plan
• After war:
▫ Europe short of food, in debt
▫ Harsh winter 1946-1947
• Plan
▫ Created by George C. Marshall
▫ Goal to revive European economies and
strengthen democratic governments
▫ Congress approved $17 billion
European Recovery Program
 Was offered for ALL of Europe,
 Eastern Europe refused
• Effects
▫ Worked!
▫ Europe self-sufficient by 1950s
▫ Ended Communist threat in Western
Europe
▫ Deepened rift with Soviet Union
Confrontation in Germany
• Stalin’s progression
▫ Hungry/Czechoslovakia 1947/48
 Brutal Coup
• Then set sights on Germany
• Berlin June 1948
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1st real crisis
4 demilitarized zones
Allies zones united
1948: Stalin blocks rail and highway routes
into Berlin
 Trying to force Allies to accept Communist
Berlin
• Truman’s response
▫ Operation Vittles
 Berlin Airlift
 Sent 60 bombers to England (B-29s)
 Hinted use of atomic weapons
 May 1949 blockade ends
 Allies create Federal Republic of
Germany
▫ Reaffirms containment
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Public opinion supported
• Alliances
▫ North Atlantic Treaty (NATO) 1949
 Marked formal end of isolation
 Broke Washington’s warning of
alliances with foreign nations
 Collective security
 Mutual defense pact
 1st peacetime alliance
 Gen. Eisenhower 1st Supreme
Commander
 Nuclear umbrella
• Stalin’s Response
▫ Created German Democratic Republic
(East Germany)
▫ Exploded 1st atomic bomb 1949
▫ Warsaw Pact 1955
 Alliance of satellite states
Re-election 1948
• Election
▫ Republicans think Democrats will split
over race issue
▫ Nominees
 New Progressive Party
 Nominee- Henry Wallace
▫ Thought foreign policy was too aggresive
 Dixiecrats
 Nominee- Strom Thurmond
▫ Anti-civil rights
 Republicans
 Nominee- Thomas Dewey
▫ Expected to win
▫ Cautious campaign and unexciting
 Truman-Democrats
 “man without a chance”
 Toured country by rail
 “Give ‘em hell” speeches
▫ Attached “do nothing” conservative
congress
• Inaugural address 1949
▫ Fair Deal
 Ambitious reform program
 Proposed civil rights, national health care
legislation, federal aid to education, etc.
 Belief in continual economic growth
 Funds for public housing & new farm
program
• Congress
▫ Most of it blocked
▫ Expanded existing programs
 Raised minimum wage (from .40-.75 cents)
 Increased social security
 Available to more workers
 Displaced Persons Act
 205,000 Jews
▫ Did not accept new programs
• Failure
▫ Set US apart from Europe
Cold War in Asia
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Japan
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China
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Under control of the U.S.
• Tried former Japs for war crimes
Democratic success
▫ Set up parliamentary democracy
▫ Emperor still head of state but gave up divinity
▫ New constitution renounced war
MacArthur in charge
Strengthened Japanese economy and government
Occupation ended 1952
 US retained bases
US failed
Mao Ze Dong successful
People’s Republic of China
 “Red China”
 Communism appealed to landless peasants
 US refused to recognize
 China signed pact with Russia 1950
 U.S. recognized Kai-Shek in Taiwan
 Americans shocked
Indochina
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France needed help
US crushes commies in Philippines
▫ Becomes independent republic
▫ U.S. still retains bases
• 1947 – Loyalty Review Board
Nuclear Fear
• Truman pressured to created
• Investigated federal employees b/w 1947- 1951
• Thousands lost jobs
• Soviets even the score
▫ Atomic bomb 1949
• American hysteria
▫ Air raid practice
▫ Bomb shelters
▫ Sky watchers
• Truman’s answer
▫ Development of H-bomb 1950
▫ “Mike” 1952
 10X Hiroshima (Marshall Islands)
 Soviet’s answered with own H
• NSC-68
▫ Emphasized Soviet strength and aggressive
intentions
 “world domination”
▫ Urged military defense
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Increase army
Increase nuclear arsenal
4x defense budget
Increase CIA actions
Korean War 1950-1953
• June 24, 1950
▫ North Korea invades South
▫ 38th parallel
• “Greece of the East”
▫ Step up to Communism
▫ Didn’t seek congress
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Truman called special session of U.N.
security council
▫ UN authorized action
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“police action”, not an act of war
• War Action
▫ MacArthur in charge
▫ Crosses into North Korea
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Beginning of war difficult, MacArthur
changes war with brilliant amphibious
assault at Inchon
▫ Tide turns when China enters war
▫ Stalemate
• Attempt at Peace
▫ Spring 1951
▫ MacArthur criticizes Truman
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Wanted to fight and bomb China
▫ April 10, 1951 MacArthur fired
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Supported by Joint Chiefs of Staff
• Armistice not signed until 1953
▫ Korea divided
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But containment worked!
• Consequences
▫ Lives
 54, 246 US dead
 103,284 US wounded
▫ Cost
 $54 billion
▫ Politics
 Accelerated NSC-68
 Defense budget spending increased
 Atomic stockpile increased
 Worldwide military bases
 Indochina
 U.S. paid for 3/4th of France’s war
in Indochina
 Enhanced powers of Presidency
 Precedent for war
 Second economic boom
 Added fuel to second “Red Scare”
Anti-Communism Hysteria
• Loyalty and Security
▫ Widespread Fear
 US Communist Party
 Amerasia incident
 Raid on communist magazine
 Exposed leaks in the
government
 Canada exposes network
▫ Executive Order 9835, 1947
 Federal Employee Loyalty
Program
 Barred members of
Communist Party
• Smith Act 1940
• Illegal to adovocate to teach
overthrow of government by
force
• Upheld by Dennis et al v.
United States
Anti-Communism Hysteria
• Crusade
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Hoover
 Colleges center of “red” prop.
 “Zeal for Democracy” campaign
1947 House Un-American Activities
Committee (HUAC)
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• Rosenbergs’
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Originally created to seek out Nazi’s
 Attacked Hollywood, “blacklisted”
 Prosecuted leaders of US Communist
Party, union members
• McCarthyism
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Symbol of liberal establishment
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Joseph McCarthy
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• Alger Hiss
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Feb 1950
Klaus Fuchs arrested, atomic secrets
Trail led to Rosenbergs
Found guilty March 1951
 Executed June 19. 1953
Member of the state department
 Accused by Whittaker Chambers
Questioned by Sen. Richard Nixon
 Claimed to be innocent
 Indicted for perjury
 “Pumpkin Papers”
 Micro-film copies of papers in
pumpkin
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Republican Senator from Wisconsin
▫ Falsely claimed to be a war hero
Used tactic for re-election
▫ Power based on people’s fear
List of “205” officials
Symbol for personal attacks on individuals by
means of indiscriminate allegations
Army-McCarthy hearings 1954
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Exposed
Censured for his “witch-hunt”
Hysteria subsided
• McCarthy’s end
▫ Edward R. Murrow attacks
▫ Hearings proved he was a fraud
• Results
▫ 1950 McCarran Internal Security Act
 Vetoed by Truman
 Forced organizations deemed
communist to register with Dept. of
Justice
• Unlawful to advocate or support
establishment of totalitarian
government
 Authorized arrest and detention during
National emergency
▫ McCarran-Walter Immigration Act and
Nationality Act of 1952
 Vetoed by Truman
 Maintained quotas
 Prevented homosexuals from
entering country
 Power to deport those suspected of
communism
Election of 1952
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Public apprehension
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Loyalty in government
Korea stalemate
Truman didn’t seek election
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We want Ike!!
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Democrats
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Ike didn’t agree with domestic solutions
Nominated Adlai Stevenson
 Popular senator from Illinois
 Thought 20 years of democrat rule enough
 Out of touch with people
 Truman shadow
Republicans
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Jokingly called it a promotion
Nominates Dwight D. Eisenhower
 War hero
 Pledged to end stalemate
 Spotless reputation for integrity
Running mate Richard Nixon
 Balanced Conservative
 “Checkers” speech
 Slush-fund
Results
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Ike wins White House
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Wins over pledge to end Korean War
Narrow Republican control of houses
Ends 1st phase of Cold War