Total Pageviews

Sunday, 29 March 2015

5 How effectively did the USA contain the spread of Communism?

America and events in Korea, 1950-53

-          38th parallel is the separation between communist north and non-communist Korea
-          June 1950 North Korean forces invaded the South, this was to show Soviet strength towards America
-          To prevent the fall of South Korea, containment was called for
-          Truman sent armed forces  in aid
-          UN forces were sent in due to no Soviet leader being present to veto the decision, which pushed North Korea back the parallel
-          Communism has been contained and then the UN forces pushed further into the north
-          China sent 300,000 ‘People’s Volunteers’ to help the north

-          The war had reached a stalemate
-          This was the first war between the east and the west, direct contact between capitalism and communism

America and events in Cuba, 1959–62

-          In 1959, Fidel Castro took power in Cuba
-          In April 1961 the CIA encouraged an attempt by anti-Castro Cuban exiles to invade Cuba.   It failed miserably, greatly embarrassing Kennedy. This attempt became named as “The Bay of Pigs”

-          On August 1962, 30 Soviet ships arrived in Cuba with nuclear weapons
-          American towns were within range from Cuba which was now a worry to the US as now their “early warning system” was useless
-          24 October the blockade began and Cuba was ringed by 100 American warships
-          Kennedy received two letters from Khrushchev and was confused, he replied to the softer first letter
-          The crisis finished, Russian bombers left Cuba, and Kennedy lifted the naval blockade.

-          Overall Kennedy “won” the crisis gaining prestige sound relations were formed with Russia, but secretly Kennedy had to remove US nuclear weapons from Turkey

American involvement in the Vietnam War

-          Vietnam was divided by communism in the north and anti-communists in the south
-          The US believed in the “domino theory”, South Vietnam depended on aid from the USA and the collapse of one country in South-East Asia will lead to the collapse of other. In addition Vietnam other countries under threat were Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Japan
-          American continuously bombed north Vietnam however these methods did not work just angered the inhabitants of the north more
-          The Tet offensive killed 50,000 communist however it made a mockery of America due to soldiers managing to get into the American embassy
-          My Lai was the first tragic incident released to the American public showing scenes of American soldiers massacring civilians
-          The bombing of Vietcong was unsuccessfully it spread the war to Cambodia encouraging the rise of communism
-          Cease fire came on January 1973 neither side could see any side of victory

‘Détente’ was introduced to strive for an agreement of peace with communist
-          Created better relations with China
-          Increased trade with superpowers
-          Reduced tension with Germany
-          Produced an agreement to avoid confrontation


Vietnamization was a policy of the Richard Nixon
-          The policy entailed to end U.S. involvement in the war and "expand, equip, and train South Vietnam's forces and assign to them an ever-increasing combat role,
-          During this time steadily reducing the number of U.S. combat troops fighting

-          American military tactics failed which resulted in them ‘losing’ the war
-          Guerrilla tactics were partly the reason why US were unsuccessful. Guerrillas did not wear uniforms they were hard to spot in the jungle. They attacked and then disappeared back into the jungle
-          These ‘foreign’ tactics to the young American soldiers wore down their morale and made them very frustrated. 


No comments:

Post a Comment