paper 2: all topics Flashcards
case study Korea 1:
-Korea was the first real Cold War conflict, the Berlin Blockade was the first confrontation, but the Cold War became a ‘hot war’ in Korea
-often referred to as the ‘forgotten war’, received little public attention long-term as Second World War preceded and was bigger, and Vietnam war came shortly after and caused far more social upheaval in America
-a huge conflict despite its lack of attention, 2-3 million dead civilians, over a million military casualties and involved 100s of thousands of US soldiers
background to conflict-end of second world war:
-Korea had been ruled by Japan until the end of the Second World War, at the end of the war, Korea was temporarily divided (not unlike Germany) into two occupation zones:
-Soviet occupied North
-American occupied South
-border at the ‘38th parallel’
-as relations between the two worsened however, unification seemed less likely
-in 1948, separate independent states were set up in the North and South
conflict between north and south Korea:
-the two governments set up despised each other:
-South Korea (Republic of Korea) was setup under Syngman Rhee, was not very democratic but was staunchly anti-communist, enough to get US support
-North Korea (Democratic People’s Republic) was set up under Kim II-Sung who was a soviet-trained and backed communist running a I-party state
-both leaders believed that they had the right to rule all of Korea and wanted the peninsula reunified
-given their hostility however there was no chance at all of the two countries peacefully unifying
why did war break out?
-in the summer of 1950, Kim II-Sung made his move and decided to invade the South, he did this in order to unify Korea and eliminate, what he considered to be, the illegitimate government in the South
-whilst this seems a rash move in hindsight, at the time he had good reason to believe he would be successful:
-he was backed by both Stalin and Mao (USSR and China) and had been heavily armed by the Soviets with tanks, artillery, planes-was stronger than the south
-the proximity of Korea to China and the soviets having the bomb made it seem unlikely the US would act in response
-additionally Korea was far away and likely would not be a defense priority for the US
how did the US respond?
-contrary to Kim’s beliefs, the US were determined to get involved and stop the South being taken over, this was because:
-they were now committed to the policy of containment, communism was also seen as always directed by Moscow, so this was not a faraway conflict but a soviet plan
-linked to the domino theory, the total fall of Korea would lead to fall of other US-backed nations, e.g: new Chinese gov in Taiwan and Japan (big US trade partner post-war)
-when the US became involved, however, it was not on their own, but instead an official intervention/action by the newly formed United Nations (UN/UNO)
how did the UNO become involved?
-Truman would have intervened in Korea no matter what happened, but to make things look better he wanted the UNO to get involved officially instead
-Truman immediately took the matter to the UN security council and began applying pressure to pass a resolution to call for military action
-therefore even though it was clearly a US-led operation, UN voted in favour, which meant the anti-communist forces were a coalition of 15 countries
-normally this should not have been possible as the USSR had a veto power on the council
-however, USSR had been boycotting UN meetings over previous issue of whether to allow communist China to join, therefore were not available at meetings to use veto power
events of the Korean war:
-June to Sep 1950: northern communists invade south and quickly overwhelm them and occupied most of the peninsula
-Sep to Oct 1950: UN forces land in two locations, Pusan and Inchon and communists driven back beyond 38th parallel within weeks
-Oct 1950: despite initial containment objective being achieved, UN forces (directed by Truman and General MacArthur) pushed on into the north
events of the Korean war: 2.0
-Nov 1950: feeling threatened by the US push, the chinese government intervened and sent 200,000 soldiers to cross the border UN forces were pushed back into south Korea, the chinese army was well equipped and more accustomed to the fighting conditions
-Truman accepted that containment and protection of south Korea was good enough and ignored advice by MacArthur to invade China
-June 1951: stalemate around 38th parallel, led to peace talks and eventual armistice in 2 years later
outcomes of the war:
success for the US:
1. achieved initial short-term aim of protecting south from communism and halting invasion-successful ‘containment’
2. showed the world US was willing to confront communism by force
failures of the US:
1. US failed to achieve later expanded aims of re-uniting Korea under democratic, non-communist rule, however chinese intervention foiled this and future threat of north would remain
2. conflict exposed major tensions between US leaders of foreign policy and the sacked MacArthur received a heroic welcome when he returned
case study 2: Cuban Missile Crisis:
-the most famous and significant of the Cold War ‘close calls’
-tension between the US and USSR reached its most dangerous level during the 13 days of the c.m.c in October 1962
-it was the closest the sides came to an all out war and potentially apocalyptic nuclear war
changing US relationship with Cuba:
-after gaining independence from Spain in 1898, Cuba was under significant economic influence and control of the US
-the US was a key buyer of Cuba’s main raw export, Sugar and also the main source of the countries manufactured goods and imports. US companies were heavily involved in Cuba and owned most major companies
-the country also essentially became the ‘naughty playground’ of rich US businessmen and the corrupt Cuban government was essentiallly a puppet
-the gov. was also a brutal dictatorship that used repression to keep control of the increasingly discontent population living in poverty.
Cuban Missile Crisis: background
-in 1959 the Batista regime was forcibly overthrown by a socialist revolutionary, Fidel Castro, promising to restore power to the people and end American controlled corruption (NOT Soviet linked, totally independent!)
-soon after taking over, he began to nationalise foreign-owned companies and also redistributing agricultural land to peasants (previously foreign owned too)
-US responded by imposing economic sanctions and stopped all trade with them: a huge blow considering they were by far their largest trade partner. Castro responds by signing a trade agreement of $100 million with USSR leader Krushchev!
-march 1960, Eisenhower approved a plan to remove Castro from power by force
The Bay of Pigs incident:
-new US president, John F Kennedy, in 1961. Inherits issues of previous government, including how to deal with Cuba
-pushes ahead with plans drawn up by previous government of invading Cuba by landing US-trained Cuban exiles, supported by US air strikes painted to overthrow Castro and install a new government
-however, to mantain plausible deniability, Kennedy had scaled back initial extent of air strikes and also chose to have the exiles land in an isolated beach known as the Bay of Pigs
the Bay of Pigs failure:
-the plan was an embarrassing failure:
1. the US failed to control the air and take out the Cuban airforce
2. the exiles were unable to land as they were immediately fired upon and were expected due to the poor secrecy of the plan
-troops were captured and paraded by Castro who became more popular due to his repelling of an American invasion
-additionally, despite their attempts to hide involvement, it was clear the US was behind the invasion AND that they had deliberately tried to hide this
impact of the Bay of Pigs:
-there were two significant effects of the incident:
1. Kennedy looked weak- as the youngest ever President, already has question marks over his experience and judgement, the failure hurt his image even more. Additionally, his half-hearted invasion attempt made Castro and Krushchev believe he was weak and easy to push around
2. USSR-Cuba alliance deepens- the USSR had already been secretly supplying Cuba with weapons, but the invasion alarmed Cuba and this was massively stepped up and announced publicly! The USSR made Cuba the best equipped army in Latin America with missiles, tanks, jet bombers/fighters and more!
the USSR arms Cuba:
-the US were alarmed by the Soviets arming Cuba, however, as long as they were only conventional weapons they would have to tolerate the situation
-the far greater alarm and danger came in September 1962 when report began to emerge in the US of nuclear missiles potentially being brought to Cuba
-on 14th October 1962, American spy planes took detailed photographs over missiles sites in Cuba which confirmed their worst fears- the USSR was building nuclear missile sites in Cuba!
why did Krushchev place missiles in Cuba?
- To defend Cuba: the revolution in Cuba was an unexpected gift for the USSR to have a communist nation on the US’ doorstep-similarly, the US would never simply accept the situation and would always try to remove Castro, therefore drastic action was needed to preserve the government
- Closing the ‘missile gap’: the US had a muchgreater number of long-range ICBMs and also had missiles placed in Europe which would strike the USSR. By placing missiles in Cuba this evened the gap and made it harder for the US to threaten the USSR
- To bargain with the US: Krushchev wanted to extract some concessions from the US and was giving himself a bargaining chip to use, this was arguably encouraged further by Kennedy indecision and weakness with the Bay of Pigs-Krushchev felt he could push him!
