CHAPTER 23: THE UNITED STATES AND THE COLD WAR (1945-1953)
- Freedom Train (September 16, 1947): traveling exhibition w/ 133 historical documents
that embarked on a tour across American cities
- Truman wanted to contrast American freedom w/ the destruction of liberty by
Hitler → direct government = propaganda so did through American Heritage
Foundation
- Staff members at the National Archives wanted to include the Wagner Act of
1935 (right to unions) and Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms speech → conservative
American Heritage Foundation removed them; also deleted 14th and 15th
amendments
- Cancelled visits to segregated cities
- Cold War: tensions between Soviet Union and U.S. led to unease about racial
inequality
- Containment: Truman’s policy to combat Soviet power but rooting out
disloyal people from government employment
Origins of the Cold War
❖ The Two Powers
➢ U.S. was world’s greatest power (manufacturing capacity, atomic bomb) →
national security depended on security of Europe and Asia (global economic
reconstruction)
➢ Soviet Union: only power that could rival the U.S. (occupied most of Eastern
Europe) → communism gained prestige after transforming Soviet Union
■ Still hurt from war → Stalin couldn’t take any new military action but still
wanted to influence Eastern Europe
❖ The Roots of Containment
➢ First confrontation in Middle East: Soviets had occupied parts of Iran to pressure
the country into giving access to oil fields
■ British and American pressure → Stalin withdrew forces
➢ Soviet installed procommunist governments in Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria
(claimed it wasn’t different than America in Latin America or British empire)
➢ Long Telegram (1946): American diplomat George Kennan in Moscow warned
Truman that Soviets were not a normal government → communism led to them to
wanting worldwide power
■ Laid foundation for containment policy (prevent further expansion)
➢ Iron Curtain: Winston Churchill declared that this had descended across Europe
separating the free West and communist East
➢ Truman Doctrine (1947): president officially embraced Cold War
❖ The Truman Doctrine
➢ Britain couldn’t support governments in Greece and Turkey due to economic
decline → communism threatened to take them over (strategic gateway to Europe
and oil-rich Middle East)
■ Truman needed to convince Congress and the public to aid these
governments → emphasized defense of freedom, U.S. was leader of free
world
■ Bipartisan support for containment of communism
■ Set precedent for American aid to any anticommunist regimes and creation
of new security bodies w/o democratic oversight (Atomic Energy
Commission, National Security Council, Central Intelligence Agency)
❖ The Marshall Plan
➢ Marshall Plan: Secretary of State George C. Marshall pledged contributions of
billions of dollars to the financial recovery of Europe → chaos in France and Italy
had strengthened their communist parties
■ Positive vision to go alongside containment (fight against hunger, poverty)
■ One of the most successful foreign aid programs in history → western
European production skyrocketed past prewar levels
■ Soviet Union refused to participate → Eastern Europe became even more
divided from the west
➢ General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT): between U.S. and 23 western
nations, stimulate freer trade and created market for American goods/investment
❖ The Reconstruction of Japan
➢ General Douglas MacArthur (supreme commander in Japan) helped them adopt
new democratic constitution → gave women right to vote, renounced the policy
of war (only self-defense)
➢ U.S. helped economic reconstruction → initially wanted to dissolve industrial
corporations that contributed to war but abandoned to build industrial base as
foundation for anticommunist strength in Asia
❖ The Berlin Blockade and NATO
➢ France, Britain, U.S. took control of some parts of Germany and divided Berlin,
changed currency in their zones to be different than Soviet (wanted to create new
West German government)
■ Soviets cut off road and rail traffic to Berlin → 11 month airlift to city,
Stalin lifted blockade and Truman administration won a victory
■ Two new nations emerged → East and West Germany (Berlin still
divided)
➢ Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb in 1949
➢ North Atlantic Treat Organization (NATO): U.S., Canada, and 10 western
European nations formed mutual defense against further Soviet attacks
➢ Warsaw Pact (1955): Soviets formed their own Eastern European alliance
❖ The Growing Communist Challenge
➢ Mao Zedong led communists to victory in Chinese civil war → U.S. refused to
recognize new People’s Republic of China and blocked its UN seat
➢ NSC-68: National Security Council approved permanent military building for the
U.S. to pursue a global crusade against communism
❖ The Korean War
➢ Communist North Korea invaded anticommunist South Korea (undemocratic) in
1950 to reunify country → Truman persuaded UN Security Council to authorize
use of force to repel invasion
■ Americans did the bulk of fighting → army (under General Douglas
MacArthur) soon occupied most of North Korea and aimed to unite the
country under pro-American government
■ Too near to Chinese border → troops intervened and drove back American
troops (Truman denied another push north for fear of all-out war, removed
MacArthur who criticized him publicly)
■ Korean War: settled with stalemate around 38th parallel (original
boundary), no formal peace treaty ending it
● Made it clear that Cold War was global conflict (not just Europe)
❖ Cold War Critics
➢ Criticized turning foreign policy into ideological crusade → everything would be
considered a contest w/ the Soviet Union and require lots of resources
■ Would intervene in affairs of nations that weren’t directly connected to
Moscow
❖ Imperialism and Decolonization
➢ Decolonization: Liberal Democrats and Black leaders urged Truman to promote
this worldwide but eliminating colonies and empires
■ Cold War developed → backed away from telling European allies to grant
self-government to their colonies
■ Any anticommunist nation could join the U.S. alliance no matter how
repressive they were to their own people
The Cold War and the Idea of Freedom
- National security agencies encouraged Hollywood to produce anticommunist movies
(The Red Menace 1949, I Married a Communist 1949) and urged film scripts to be
changed to remove any negative aspects of American history
- CIA secretly funded overseas publications, conferences, concerts, art exhibits to improve
international image of American race relations (specifically sent Black performers)
❖ Freedom and Totalitarianism
➢ Totalitarianism: aggressive ideologically driven states that sought to subdue all of
civil society to their control (used to describe fascist Italy and Nazi Germany) →
became term for Soviet side in the Cold War
■ Exaggerated totality of government control over private life
➢ Anything associated w/ Moscow or socialism was considered opposite of freedom
■ American Medical Association called Truman’s proposal for national
health insurance “socialized medicine” in PR campaign to defeat it
❖ The Rise of Human Rights
➢ Allies put German officials on trial for crimes against humanity → led to prison
terms and executions for many Nazi officials
➢ University Declaration of Human Rights (1948): drafted by Eleanor Roosevelt’s
committee, approved by the UN; identified a broad range of rights to be enjoyed
by people everywhere (speech, religion, protection against government; right to
standard of living, housing, education, medical care, etc.)
■ Document had no enforcement mechanism but opened a nation’s treatment
of its own citizens to outside evaluation
❖ Ambiguities of Human Rights
➢ U.S. and Soviet Union refused to accept outside interference from UN in their
internal affairs
■ NAACP petitioned UN to investigate racism in U.S. → outside
jurisdiction
➢ During Cold War, both countries emphasized different parts of the Universal
Declaration while ignoring others
The Truman Presidency
❖ The Fair Deal
➢ Fair Deal: Truman’s revival of the New Deal focused on improving the social
safety net and standard of living for ordinary Americans
■ Increase minimum wage, enact national health insurance, expand public
housing, Social Security, aid to education
❖ The Postwar Strike Wave
➢ Operation Dixie: AFL and CIO launched campaign to bring unionization to the
South and combat anti-labor conservatives
■ Inflation soared after removal of price controls → worker’s real income
dropped and sparked largest strike wave and walkouts
❖ The Republican Resurgence
❖ Postwar Civil Rights
❖ To Secure These Rights
❖ The Dixiecrat and Wallace Revolts
The Anticommunist Crusade
❖ Loyalty, Disloyalty, and American Identity
❖ The Spy Trials
❖ McCarthy and McCarthyism
❖ An Atmosphere of Fear
❖ The Uses of Anticommunism
❖ Anticommunist Politics
❖ The Cold War and Native Americans
❖ Cold War Civil Rights