chapter 37 domestic issues and cold war in the...

Chapter 37

Domestic Issues and Cold

War in the 1950s

Goal

How successfully did Eisenhower

address Cold War fears?

Election of 1952

Dem – Adlai Stevenson – IL gov

Rep - Dwight D. Eisenhower

Popular WWII hero

Running Mate: Richard Nixon

Accused of taking gifts and doing special

favors

“Checkers Speech”

Nixon’s “Checkers” Speech

Campagin

“I Like Ike”

Nixon attacked Dems for corruption, soft

on Communism

TV influence - Ike appeared in short,

tightly-scripted TV spots

Last minute – said he would go to Korea

personally to end war

Results: Eisenhower defeated Stevenson 442-89

-Ike’s characteristics: sincere, fair, liked affection of people,

wanted harmony more than justice, grandfatherly stability

President Dwight D. Eisenhower 1953-1961

Republican

Presidential Rankings: C-Span Survey, 2009

1. Abraham Lincoln

2. Franklin Roosevelt

3. George Washington

4. Theodore Roosevelt

5. Harry Truman

6. John Kennedy

7. Thomas Jefferson

8. Dwight Eisenhower

9. Woodrow Wilson

10. Ronald Reagan

11. Lyndon Johnson

12. James Polk

13. Andrew Jackson

14. James Monroe

15. Bill Clinton

16. William McKinley

17. John Adams

18. George H.W. Bush

19. John Quincy Adams

20. James Madison

21. Grover Cleveland

22. Gerald Ford

23. Ulysses Grant

24. William Taft

25. Jimmy Carter

26. Calvin Coolidge

27. Richard Nixon

28. James Garfield

29. Zachary Taylor

30. Benjamin Harrison

31. Martin Van Buren

32. Chester Arthur

33. Rutherford Hayes

34. Herbert Hoover

35. John Tyler

36. George W. Bush

37. Millard Fillmore

38. Warren Harding

39. William Harrison

40. Franklin Pierce

41. Andrew Johnson

42. James Buchanan

Korea

End of Korean War - visited and

threatened nukes = ceasefire in 1953

A “New Look” in Foreign Policy

Sec of State John Foster Dulles – not just

stop but roll back communist gains,

liberate captive people, balance budget w/

less military spending

– Contradictory goals?

A “New Look” in Foreign Policy

Answer: policy of boldness

Strategic Air Command – airfleet of

superbombers equipped with nuclear

bombs

– More “bang for the buck”

Army and navy takes backseat to nukes

Paralyzing impact at cheaper cost

Ended up too rigid and too expensive

Massive Retaliation

Any Soviet or Chinese aggression

would be countered with a U.S.

nuclear attack

John Foster

Dulles

Time Magazine

Man of the

Year, 1955

An H-bomb would wreak total destruction on an area 20 miles

in diameter plus additional destruction and radiation well

beyond the circle

Soviet development of the hydrogen bomb

made “massive retaliation” less practical

Both sides would lose in a thermonuclear

war

MAD became an important deterrent for

nuclear war for the next four decades

Brinksmanship: never backing down even

if it meant going to brink of nuclear war

-all prepare for nuclear war – bomb shelters

Goal

How successfully did Eisenhower

address Cold War fears?

Source: U.S.

News and

World Report,

May 27, 1955

Vietnam

Ho Chi Minh (leader) fought to liberate Vietnam from

French colonialism

US supported self-determination, but changed as Vietnam

becomes more communist during the Cold War

By 1954 – US taxpayers paying 80% of costs for French

to stay ($1bil a year)

French crumble under Viet Minh guerilla pressure -

defeated at Dien Bien Phu in 1954

Dulles, Nixon, Chairman of Jt. Chiefs of Staff want

American bombers to bail out French – Ike holds back

Cold War in Asia

Geneva Conference (1954) – Geneva Accords

Split Vietnam in ½ at 17th parallel

Ho Chi Minh agrees, Vietnam-wide elections in 2 years

Pro-West govt in South under Ngo Dinh Diem

Elections never held

US didn’t sign it but promised economic and military aid to Diem autocratic regime if they make social reforms

17th Parallel

Vietnam in

1954

(Saigon)

Diem’s failure to hold elections began a civil war in 1956

Eisenhower and

Secretary of State

John Foster Dulles

(from left) greet South

Vietnam's President

Ngo Dinh Diem at

Washington National

Airport, May 8, 1957

Warsaw Pact

included all countries controlled by the

Soviets behind the Iron Curtain

Counter to NATO

Thaw in the Cold War?

Nikita Khrushchev emerged after Stalin’s

death in 1953

Sought “peaceful coexistence” with

the Western democracies

Khrushchev set out to improve

living conditions in

the USSR

Goal was to out-

compete the West

economically rather

than resorting to

war

USSR agreed to leave Austria in 1955

Geneva Summit, July 1955

First peace conference since 1945

U.S., U.S.S.R., Britain and France

discussed European security and

disarmament

-- No concrete agreements reached, but

optimistic

1956 – Khurshchev denounced Stalin’s actions

Hungarian Uprising, 1956

With the thaw, Eastern Bloc nations

began to seek more freedom

Soviets crushed uprising

US says no to appeals for help

Army and navy not ready due to nuclear

buildup instead – nuclear sledgehammer

too heavy to use in a minor crisis

Open Skies?

Mutual inspection of US and SU –

Khrushchev says no!

Cold War in the Middle East

Iran, 1953

-began resisting power of W. companies

controlling oil

-CIA engineered a coup in 1953 – installed

shah of Iran Mohammed Reza Pahlevi

-left a bitter legacy of resentment – Pahlevi

became a repressive dictator

1979, the Iranian Revolution saw

the overthrow of the Shah and capture

of 50 U.S. hostages

who were held for

444 days

President Eisenhower and

Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi

Gamal Abdel Nasser – president of Egypt in 1956

Needs funds to build Aswan Dam on Nile for irrigation

and power

GB and US offer $ - Nasser courts Soviets and recognizes

communist China – US withdraws offer

Nasser nationalizes Suez Canal

October 1956 – GB, France, Israel attack Egypt

US expected to get involved – Ike says no

UN has to come in to restore order

Suez Crisis, 1956

Crisis in

the Suez

Canal

Eisenhower Doctrine (1957)

US military and economic aid to Middle

Eastern nations threatened by communism

– In Egypt, the problem was nationalism, not

communism

Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (1960)

S. Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Iran, Venezuela –

control oil prices and wealth

OPEC

The Continuing Cold War -1958 – Scientists urge stopping nuclear tests – polluting

atmosphere

March – Soviets proclaim suspension, Oct – US does

Distrust and suspicion

Lebanon (July, 1958) – Egyptians and communists

threaten Lebanon

Asks for aid under Eisenhower Doctrine – several 1000

troops sent and restored order w/o bloodshed

South East Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO)

Intended to be the “NATO” of Southeast Asia

U.S. pledged to prevent communism in Vietnam & Taiwan

U.S. sent military advisers to help South Vietnam

Domino Theory dictated U.S. policy in Southeast Asia

-if one country in a region fell to communism, they all would

-MUST get involved

Taiwan Strait Crisis China began shelling islands in Taiwan Strait

controlled by Chiang Kai-shek (in Taiwan after

Fall of China)

China claims islands of Quemoy & Matsu

Eisenhower sent US 7th fleet to aid Taiwan

Cold War in Latin America

Guatemalan leader Jacobo Árbenz

Guzman

Guatemala, 1954

-President Guzman had nationalized 500,000 acres

belonging to the United Fruit Co. of Boston,

showing strong communist sympathies

-CIA supported coup to overthrow Guzman once he

accepted arms from Soviet Union

-World opinion condemned US role in coup

Guatemalan rebels,

supported by the

CIA, overthrew

socialist leader

Jacobo Árbenz

Guzman in 1954.

Election of 1956

Rep - Dwight D. Eisenhower

Health issues, but nation is prosperous

Dem – Adlai Stevenson

-Platform – Ike didn’t govern, only golfed,

fished, and hunted

Votes: 457 to 73

Space Race

Sputnik I & II - Soviet satellite launched on Oct

4, 1957 (184 pds, 1,120 pds with dog)

Rattled US self-confidence

If Soviets can launch heavy objects into space,

they can fire intercontinental ballistic missiles

Rocket fever in US

National Aeronautics & Space Administration

(NASA) - $ billions to missile development

Many failures, some televised

Explorer 1 – US satellite launched

1960 – several satellites and tested own ICBMs

Schools focused on math and science

The R-7 rocket carrying Sputnik

“Awake at Last,” Edwin Marcus, 1957

U.S. technological superiority now

seemed over.

The U.S. public demanded that the

missile gap be eliminated

“What was

That?” Thomas

Flannery, Baltimore Sun,

1957

National Defense Education Act, 1958

-$887 mil in loans to college students in

grants to improve teaching science

Berlin Crisis, 1958

Khrushchev issued an ultimatum – gave western

powers 6 mo. to leave city – refused

Visitations eased Cold War conflict

Nixon visits SU (1958)

Kitchen Debate – the virtues of consumerism are

better than Soviet economic planning

Khrushchev visits US (1959)

Discussion of disarmament – no plan in place

Camp David – Khrushchev takes back ultimatum

Eisenhower and Khrushchev at

Camp David, 1959

U-2 incident -May 1960 – US U-2 spy plane shot down

over the USSR – pilot taken hostage

-Resulted in the worst U.S.-Soviet

relations since the Stalin era

A U-2 spy plane (similar to the one shot down)

Pilot Francis Gary Powers in Soviet custody

-Incident occurred 10 days before the

planned Paris Summit

-Eisenhower admitted he authorized

the flight but refused to apologize

-Khrushchev called off the summit

Wreckage of Francis Gary Powers’ U-2 spy plane

Fulgencio Batista – ironfisted dictator of Cuba since 1930s

1959 – Fidel Castro ousted Batista in revolution

Denounced US imperialism, took US properties and pursued a land-distribution program

Castro in Cuba

Castro with

Argentine

revolutionary,

Che Guevara,

in 1961

Castro and revolutionaries during the 1959 revolution

US cut off sugar imports from Cuba

Castro made his dictatorship a satellite of SU

Anti-Castro Cubans headed for US (Florida) – 1

mil between 1960-2000

US broke diplomatic relations and imposed a

strict embargo on trade

Invoke Monroe Doctrine to keep SU out?

Khrushchev said Monroe Doc is dead

If Cuba is attacked, SU will shower US with missiles

Castro and Khrushchev in 1961

U.S. began plotting the overthrow of Castro

Eisenhower’s Farewell Address

(1961): warned Americans of the

dangerous growth of the military-

industrial complex

Admired for dignity, decency, good will,

moderation

More aggressive in last years – vetoed 169

times

No moral crusade for civil rights

Despite being a general – restraint in use of

military power

Legacy