Cold War: Proxy Wars and Global Tensions

• Military alliances formed due to the start of the Cold War to provide mutual protection among member states.
• The threat of nuclear war prevented the United States and the Soviet Union from engaging in direct conflict.
• Proxy wars, like those in Korea and Vietnam, resulted in millions of deaths.
• In a proxy war, major powers support conflicts between other nations without directly fighting.
• Proxy wars highlighted the political and philosophical differences between the superpowers.
• The superpowers confronted each other in Cuba, Central American countries, and Angola.
• Military, economic, and nuclear influence created global tension for decades after World War II.

Allied Occupation of Germany

• Disagreement among the Allies after World War II concerned the occupation of Germany.
• The Allies agreed to divide Germany among France, Great Britain, the United States, and the Soviet Union.
• The Western Allies aimed to combine their zones into a single state based on democratic principles.

Berlin Blockade

• The Allies also divided Berlin into four zones.
• The Western zones formed a free city within the Soviet zone.
• The Soviets blockaded the Western zones to prevent supply movement by land.
• The Western Allies initiated the Berlin Airlift instead of risking military conflict.
• Between February 1948 and May 1949, Allies flew supplies into Western zones until the Soviets lifted the blockade.

Two Germanys

• After the blockade, Germany split into two states.
• West Germany became the Federal Republic of Germany.
• East Germany became the German Democratic Republic.
• The division of Europe into East and West was complete.

Berlin Wall

• Many East Germans wanted to move to West Germany due to its prosperity and democratic lifestyle.
• Around 2.5 million East Germans fled to the West between 1949 and 1961.
• The East German and Soviet governments aimed to keep people in East Germany.
• They initially set up barbed-wire fences patrolled by guards.
• In August 1961, fences in Berlin were replaced with the Berlin Wall.
• Between 1961 and 1989, approximately 150 people were killed trying to escape over the Berlin Wall.

NATO, the Warsaw Pact, and Other Alliances

• The Soviet Union dominated Eastern European countries after World War II.
• Communist governments subjected their people to suppression and the Soviet economic system.
• Western European countries feared communist dominance.
• Several Western nations formed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in April 1949.
• NATO pledged mutual support and cooperation against conflicts and wars.
• Original NATO members included Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and the United States.
• The Soviet Union created the Warsaw Pact in 1955 as a response to NATO.
• Original Warsaw Pact members included Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union.
• Warsaw Pact nations combined their armed forces and based their army leaders in Moscow.
• These nations were known as the communist bloc.
• Albania withdrew from the Warsaw Pact in 1968 and became closer to China.
• Yugoslavia, under Josip Broz Tito, never joined the Warsaw Pact.
• Ethnic divisions caused Yugoslavia to break apart into countries like Slovenia, Serbia, and Croatia in the 1990s.
• In 1954, Australia, France, Great Britain, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Thailand, and the United States formed the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO).
• The Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) was formed by Great Britain, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, and Turkey to prevent the spread of Communism in the Middle East.
• The United States was not a full member of CENTO but joined its military committee.
• The United States formed alliances with more than 40 states during the Cold War.
• Smaller alliances offered easier influence and negotiation compared to the United Nations.

Proxy Wars

• The Cold War involved proxy wars in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
• Proxy wars involved smaller countries acting as stand-ins for the two superpowers.
• These wars combined local issues with the international conflict over communism.
• Proxy wars often resulted in millions of deaths.
• The Korean War and Vietnam War were major confrontations.
• Both countries were split into northern and southern sections.
• Communist governments ruled the northern sections of both countries.

Korean War

• The Korean Peninsula was divided after World War II.
• The Soviets occupied the north, while the United States and its allies occupied the south.
• The Korean War (1950–1953) began when North Korea invaded South Korea.
• The UN voted to defend South Korea militarily.
• The Soviet Union did not veto the resolution due to boycotting Security Council meetings over China's seat.
• UN military forces came from 16 member countries, with the United States providing the largest number and commander, General Douglas MacArthur.
• The Soviet Union sent money and weapons to North Korea but did not send troops.
• The UN forces pushed back North Koreans but faced Chinese intervention.
• After three years of fighting and four million casualties, the war ended in a stalemate.
• Korea remained divided with a demilitarized zone.

Vietnam War

• U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower sent military advisors to South Vietnam to prevent a communist takeover.
• President John F. Kennedy increased the number of advisors from 1,000 to 16,000.
• Some U.S. citizens thought losing the confrontation in Vietnam would weaken U.S. prestige.
• The United States supported the undemocratic South Vietnamese ruler, Ngo Dinh Diem.
• In 1963, Buddhist monk Thich Quang Duc protested the South Vietnamese government's favoring of Catholics over Buddhists.
• A military coup, with U.S. support, overthrew Diem.
• In 1964, President Lyndon Johnson sent more U.S. troops to South Vietnam.
• Johnson believed in the domino theory, fearing communist rule in Southeast Asia.

The Bay of Pigs Crisis

• Fidel Castro overthrew Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista in 1959 and set up a communist dictatorship.
• The new government nationalized foreign-owned industries in 1960.
• The United States broke off trade with Cuba and cut diplomatic ties due to economic losses for its citizens.
• Castro accepted Soviet aid and aligned Cuba's foreign policy with that of the Soviet Union.
• In 1961, President John F. Kennedy supported a group of Cuban exiles to invade Cuba and overthrow Castro; the Bay of Pigs invasion failed and strengthened the Cuba-Soviet alliance.

The Cuban Missile Crisis

• The Soviets began supporting Cuba with arms and military advisors in response to the Bay of Pigs.
• Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev shipped nuclear missiles to Cuba in 1962.
• The United States had placed nuclear missiles in Turkey in 1961.
• In October 1962, U.S. intelligence discovered that more missiles were heading to Cuba.
• Kennedy ordered the U.S. Navy to prevent the missiles from reaching Cuba, calling it a "quarantine".
• Khrushchev called back the Soviet ships and removed the missiles; in return, the United States pledged to remove its missiles from Turkey.
• In 1963, the two countries established a Hot Line for direct communication.

Test-Ban Treaty

• Worldwide concerns existed about deaths and environmental harm from nuclear war or testing.
• In 1963, the Soviet Union, the United States, and over 100 other states signed the Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty.
• France and China did not sign the agreement.
• The agreement outlawed testing nuclear weapons above ground, underwater, and in space.
• The goal was to reduce radiation exposure.
• Underground testing remained legal.
• In 1968, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty called on nuclear powers to prevent the spread of military nuclear technology and materials to non-nuclear countries.

Angola

• The Portuguese colony of Angola gained independence in 1975 after 14 years of armed struggle.
• Angola faced greater ethnic conflict than Vietnam due to European colonial powers setting borders without regard for traditional regions.
• Angola was a multiethnic empire with three distinct cultural groups: the Mbundu, Ovimbundu, and Bankongo.
• Each group fought for independence and desired to control diamond mines.
• The USSR and Cuba backed the Mbundu tribe.
• South Africa backed the Ovimbundu tribe.
• The United States backed the Bankongo tribe.
• Civil war broke out upon independence.
• In 2002, the rivals agreed on a cease-fire after 27 years of fighting.
• Threats of violence from militant separatist groups remained.

Contra War

• In Nicaragua, the Sandinistas ended the 43-year dictatorship by the Somoza family in 1979.
• Conservative opponents of the Sandinistas, known as Contras, tried to overthrow them from 1981 to 1988.
• The United States heavily backed the Contras with covert support to isolate the Sandinistas.
• The Contra War resulted in tens of thousands of Nicaraguan deaths.
• The war ended after the Tela Accord in 1989 and the demobilization of the Contra and Sandinista armies.

Antinuclear Weapon Movement

• The nuclear arms race led to the antinuclear weapons movement.
• One of the first movements developed in Japan in 1954 against U.S. nuclear weapon testing in the Pacific Ocean.
• In 1955, over one-third of Japan's population signed a petition against nuclear weapons.
• In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the antinuclear weapons movement expanded to the United States and Western Europe.
• On June 6, 1982, about one million people demonstrated in New York City against nuclear weapons.