World History
Postwar World, Cold War, Independence of Colonies, Global Interdependence
Chapter 33: Restructuring the Postwar World
Guide Questions:
1. What led to the global competition of the United States and Soviet Union?
2. How did events turn out in China after World War 2?
3. How did Asia become an arena for actual wars during the Cold War?
4. How did the Cold War divide the world?
5. What led to the thawing of the Cold War
Cold War: Superpowers Face Off
○ Allies Become Enemies
■ Two major powers at the time, US and Russia, had been facing conflicts
and disagreements between each other
■ The US was mad that Russia made a nonaggression pact with Germany
■ Stalin blamed the Allies for not invading Germany earlier
■ The leaders of the US, Great Britain and the Soviet Union met at the
Soviet Black Sea Resort of Yalta. This was called the Yalta Conference.
■ In this conference, they agreed on how they should divide Germany, Make
the Germans pay for the war costs to Russia (Like life loss) and plan on a
war against Japan.
■ Stalin promised free elections on the eastern Europeans, but Churchill
was skeptical about it.
■ The US and the Soviet Union joined together with 48 other countries to
form the United Nations (UN) and was meant to protect the members
from aggression.
■ Five members (US, USSR, China, Britain, France) of the 11-member body
called the Security Council had the highest power.
■ It is also important to take note of the effects of the war between the two
powers, the US had very little casualties compared to the Soviets and
unlike the Soviet Union, their territory was barely affected.
■ The effects of the war between the US and the Soviet Union that split the
postwar goals of the two into two different ones.
○ Eastern Europe's Iron Curtain.
■ The Soviet Union's past was full of invasions from the west. So they
decided to make a buffer zone between the west and their territory.
■ They made several countries a puppet government and broke the Yalta
Conference agreement in giving them free elections, and instead turned
them into communism.
, ■ Harry S. Truman succeeded Franklin Roosevelt's after his death and was
the one who had to deal with Stalin
■ Germany had been divided into two sections, The eastern part, including
half of Germany's capital, Berlin, became part of the iron curtain while the
western part became the Federal Republic of Germany.
○ United States Tries to Contain Soviets.
■ The US-Soviet Relation worsened.
■ President Truman adopted a foreign policy called containment.
■ It was basically meant to stop Communism from influencing more and
more countries, so policies like forming alliances and helping the weak
countries to resist communism.
■ The Truman Doctrine was implemented to support Turkey and Greece
reject communism.
■ This sparked controversies as some (more or less their opponents)
objected to the US interference with other nations
■ Most of Western Europe suffered from the effects of war and the
condition of the countries would likely end up in a communism
government.
■ In response to this, US Secretary of State George Marshall implemented
the Marshall plan.
■ Basically this plan consisted of US giving economic aid to all of the
countries that needs aid. (Even the countries that were once part of the
iron curtain that broke away from Soviet domination like Yugoslavia.)
■ They even got the countries in the iron curtain to envy the other countries
but Stalin had them in control.
■ At the time, even though Berlin was within the Soviet occupation zone, it
was divided among the western and eastern powers.
■ The Soviets feared the reunification of Germany and the rising fame of
capitalism in Europe.
■ The Soviets cut off the supplies the west gave to western Berlin, in
response to this, they started flying food and supplies to them (this was
called the Berlin Airlift) for 11 months until the Soviets admitted defeat
and lifted the blockade.
○ The Cold War Divides the World
■ The conflicts marked the Cold War or the struggle over political
differences.
■ The superpowers used spying, propaganda, diplomacy and secret
operations against each other.
■ This divided the world into two sides. Which further pushed world
alliances in the future, nearly half a decade later.
■ The Berlin Blockade scared western nations and made them form a
defensive military alliance called North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) and consisted of Ten western European nations + US and Canada
, The Soviets saw this and formed their own alliance called Warsaw Pact
■
and consisted of the Soviet Union, Eastern Germany, Czechoslovakia,
Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Albania.
■ A wall between Berlin built by the East Germans served as a symbol for
the division of the world.
■ China and India both remained neutral.
■ The cold war got more tense as Nuclear weapons came into play, even
though the US made its atomic bombs, The Soviets exploded its first
nuclear weapon.
■ President Truman authorized work on a thermonuclear weapon in 1950.
■ The hydrogen bomb, a weapon thousands of times more powerful than
the A-bomb, has its power from fusion of atoms instead of splitting them.
■ The US made their first H bomb in 1952 and the Soviets shortly after
tested their own bomb.
■ Dwight D. Eisenhower became US president in 1953, he appointed the
anti-communist John Foster Dulles as his secretary of state and resulted
in brinkmanship.
■ Brinkmanship is the willingness to go to the edge of war.
■ They started building their own military forces and weapons that would
go on for four decades.
■ The soviets announced the development of a rocket that could go great
distances, an intercontinental ballistic missile or ICBM
■ They used this to create the first ever satellite or Sputnik.
■ The US felt like they were falling behind, so they invested in science
education and a year later, They launched their own satellite.
■ Eisenhower was scared that the Soviets would launch a surprise attack, so
they tried to make an agreement in which Soviets said no
■ They started sending spies and were later caught by the soviets. This
further worsened the condition of the war.
● Communists Take Power in China
○ Communists vs Nationalists
■ The Communists won over the peasants' loyalty by promoting literacy and
food production.
■ The Nationalists got money from the US but most went to corrupt powers.
■ They also saved up their power for the conflict against the communists
and waited til Japan's surrender.
■ When the civil war continued, the Nationalists had an advantage of a
better army and more support. However, they did little to win popular
support.
■ The communists' better trained army and public support helped win the
war. This further fueled the anti-communism feelings of the west.
, ○ The Two Chinas Affect the Cold War
■ Jiang Jieshi fled to Taiwan and the US helped him set up a Nationalist
government on the Island called the Republic of China.
■ Soviets gave the communism China aid and they pledged to help each
other when attacked.
■ In the early years of Mao's reign, the troops expanded into territories that
served as a border for the Soviet Union.
■ In a brutal assault, China took control of Tibet and promised autonomy to
Tibetans, who followed their leader, Dalai Lama. When the control
tightened, Dalai Lama fled to India.
■ This resulted in a resentment between India and China.
○ The Communists Transform China.
■ When the communists took power, they aimed to strengthen rule and to
restore China as a powerful nation.
■ Chinese communists set up two parallel organizations, the Communist
and national government in which Mao headed till 1959.
■ Mao wanted to reshape China's economy based on Marxists socialism.
■ Under the Agrarian Reform Law of 1950, Mao seized the holdings of
landlords. Killing those who resisted and then divided the land to the
peasants.
■ Governments forced peasants to join collective farms.
■ Mao launched a five-year plan that set high production goals for industry
(familiar?).
■ The Great Leap Forward was implemented to increase the size of
collective farms and call them communes. Peasants had to live together
while owning nothing. This ultimately resulted in a famine and the poor
planning and inefficiency slowed growth. (hmm dapat The Great Leap
Backward ih)
■ Meanwhile, the relation between China and the Soviets began to fade
since both wanted to spread communism, in their own way so oof.
■ Because of this, more problems arose
■ Mao's power started to be reduced and other leaders moved away from his
ideas.
■ Mao was eager to revive a revolution, so he did. He urged China's young
people to join him. They formed militia units called Red guards.
■ They caused a cultural revolution in an intent to give the society of
peasants and workers equal rights.
■ Intellect was considered useless and the heroes are the ones who work
hard with their bare hands. They had to "purify" intellects by giving them
hard labor in remote villages.
■ This resulted in chaos, Mao admitted that the revolution had to stop.
Zhou Enlai, Chinese communist party founder, began to restore order.
Postwar World, Cold War, Independence of Colonies, Global Interdependence
Chapter 33: Restructuring the Postwar World
Guide Questions:
1. What led to the global competition of the United States and Soviet Union?
2. How did events turn out in China after World War 2?
3. How did Asia become an arena for actual wars during the Cold War?
4. How did the Cold War divide the world?
5. What led to the thawing of the Cold War
Cold War: Superpowers Face Off
○ Allies Become Enemies
■ Two major powers at the time, US and Russia, had been facing conflicts
and disagreements between each other
■ The US was mad that Russia made a nonaggression pact with Germany
■ Stalin blamed the Allies for not invading Germany earlier
■ The leaders of the US, Great Britain and the Soviet Union met at the
Soviet Black Sea Resort of Yalta. This was called the Yalta Conference.
■ In this conference, they agreed on how they should divide Germany, Make
the Germans pay for the war costs to Russia (Like life loss) and plan on a
war against Japan.
■ Stalin promised free elections on the eastern Europeans, but Churchill
was skeptical about it.
■ The US and the Soviet Union joined together with 48 other countries to
form the United Nations (UN) and was meant to protect the members
from aggression.
■ Five members (US, USSR, China, Britain, France) of the 11-member body
called the Security Council had the highest power.
■ It is also important to take note of the effects of the war between the two
powers, the US had very little casualties compared to the Soviets and
unlike the Soviet Union, their territory was barely affected.
■ The effects of the war between the US and the Soviet Union that split the
postwar goals of the two into two different ones.
○ Eastern Europe's Iron Curtain.
■ The Soviet Union's past was full of invasions from the west. So they
decided to make a buffer zone between the west and their territory.
■ They made several countries a puppet government and broke the Yalta
Conference agreement in giving them free elections, and instead turned
them into communism.
, ■ Harry S. Truman succeeded Franklin Roosevelt's after his death and was
the one who had to deal with Stalin
■ Germany had been divided into two sections, The eastern part, including
half of Germany's capital, Berlin, became part of the iron curtain while the
western part became the Federal Republic of Germany.
○ United States Tries to Contain Soviets.
■ The US-Soviet Relation worsened.
■ President Truman adopted a foreign policy called containment.
■ It was basically meant to stop Communism from influencing more and
more countries, so policies like forming alliances and helping the weak
countries to resist communism.
■ The Truman Doctrine was implemented to support Turkey and Greece
reject communism.
■ This sparked controversies as some (more or less their opponents)
objected to the US interference with other nations
■ Most of Western Europe suffered from the effects of war and the
condition of the countries would likely end up in a communism
government.
■ In response to this, US Secretary of State George Marshall implemented
the Marshall plan.
■ Basically this plan consisted of US giving economic aid to all of the
countries that needs aid. (Even the countries that were once part of the
iron curtain that broke away from Soviet domination like Yugoslavia.)
■ They even got the countries in the iron curtain to envy the other countries
but Stalin had them in control.
■ At the time, even though Berlin was within the Soviet occupation zone, it
was divided among the western and eastern powers.
■ The Soviets feared the reunification of Germany and the rising fame of
capitalism in Europe.
■ The Soviets cut off the supplies the west gave to western Berlin, in
response to this, they started flying food and supplies to them (this was
called the Berlin Airlift) for 11 months until the Soviets admitted defeat
and lifted the blockade.
○ The Cold War Divides the World
■ The conflicts marked the Cold War or the struggle over political
differences.
■ The superpowers used spying, propaganda, diplomacy and secret
operations against each other.
■ This divided the world into two sides. Which further pushed world
alliances in the future, nearly half a decade later.
■ The Berlin Blockade scared western nations and made them form a
defensive military alliance called North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO) and consisted of Ten western European nations + US and Canada
, The Soviets saw this and formed their own alliance called Warsaw Pact
■
and consisted of the Soviet Union, Eastern Germany, Czechoslovakia,
Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria and Albania.
■ A wall between Berlin built by the East Germans served as a symbol for
the division of the world.
■ China and India both remained neutral.
■ The cold war got more tense as Nuclear weapons came into play, even
though the US made its atomic bombs, The Soviets exploded its first
nuclear weapon.
■ President Truman authorized work on a thermonuclear weapon in 1950.
■ The hydrogen bomb, a weapon thousands of times more powerful than
the A-bomb, has its power from fusion of atoms instead of splitting them.
■ The US made their first H bomb in 1952 and the Soviets shortly after
tested their own bomb.
■ Dwight D. Eisenhower became US president in 1953, he appointed the
anti-communist John Foster Dulles as his secretary of state and resulted
in brinkmanship.
■ Brinkmanship is the willingness to go to the edge of war.
■ They started building their own military forces and weapons that would
go on for four decades.
■ The soviets announced the development of a rocket that could go great
distances, an intercontinental ballistic missile or ICBM
■ They used this to create the first ever satellite or Sputnik.
■ The US felt like they were falling behind, so they invested in science
education and a year later, They launched their own satellite.
■ Eisenhower was scared that the Soviets would launch a surprise attack, so
they tried to make an agreement in which Soviets said no
■ They started sending spies and were later caught by the soviets. This
further worsened the condition of the war.
● Communists Take Power in China
○ Communists vs Nationalists
■ The Communists won over the peasants' loyalty by promoting literacy and
food production.
■ The Nationalists got money from the US but most went to corrupt powers.
■ They also saved up their power for the conflict against the communists
and waited til Japan's surrender.
■ When the civil war continued, the Nationalists had an advantage of a
better army and more support. However, they did little to win popular
support.
■ The communists' better trained army and public support helped win the
war. This further fueled the anti-communism feelings of the west.
, ○ The Two Chinas Affect the Cold War
■ Jiang Jieshi fled to Taiwan and the US helped him set up a Nationalist
government on the Island called the Republic of China.
■ Soviets gave the communism China aid and they pledged to help each
other when attacked.
■ In the early years of Mao's reign, the troops expanded into territories that
served as a border for the Soviet Union.
■ In a brutal assault, China took control of Tibet and promised autonomy to
Tibetans, who followed their leader, Dalai Lama. When the control
tightened, Dalai Lama fled to India.
■ This resulted in a resentment between India and China.
○ The Communists Transform China.
■ When the communists took power, they aimed to strengthen rule and to
restore China as a powerful nation.
■ Chinese communists set up two parallel organizations, the Communist
and national government in which Mao headed till 1959.
■ Mao wanted to reshape China's economy based on Marxists socialism.
■ Under the Agrarian Reform Law of 1950, Mao seized the holdings of
landlords. Killing those who resisted and then divided the land to the
peasants.
■ Governments forced peasants to join collective farms.
■ Mao launched a five-year plan that set high production goals for industry
(familiar?).
■ The Great Leap Forward was implemented to increase the size of
collective farms and call them communes. Peasants had to live together
while owning nothing. This ultimately resulted in a famine and the poor
planning and inefficiency slowed growth. (hmm dapat The Great Leap
Backward ih)
■ Meanwhile, the relation between China and the Soviets began to fade
since both wanted to spread communism, in their own way so oof.
■ Because of this, more problems arose
■ Mao's power started to be reduced and other leaders moved away from his
ideas.
■ Mao was eager to revive a revolution, so he did. He urged China's young
people to join him. They formed militia units called Red guards.
■ They caused a cultural revolution in an intent to give the society of
peasants and workers equal rights.
■ Intellect was considered useless and the heroes are the ones who work
hard with their bare hands. They had to "purify" intellects by giving them
hard labor in remote villages.
■ This resulted in chaos, Mao admitted that the revolution had to stop.
Zhou Enlai, Chinese communist party founder, began to restore order.
