IB1 Thursday 6/5

LESSON 6/5: I continued to cover the Cold War today. First I went through the different periods of the Cold War:

Periods of the Cold War (Version 1):
1945-47 Start of the Cold War
1947-53 The Cold War at its height
1953-57 Thaw 1
1958-62 Freeze 1
1963-68 Thaw 2
1969-75/79 Detente
1975/79-85 Freeze 2
1989-91 End of the Cold War

Periods of the Cold War("Wikipedia"):
1917-38 Pre-Cold War
1939-45 World War II and Post-War
1947-53 From "Containment" through the Korean War
1953-62 Crisis and escalation
1962-79 From confrontation through détente
1979-85 The "Second Cold War"
1985-91 End of the Cold War

Then I covered some main crisis:
1948 Coup in Czechoslovakia
1948-49 Berlin Blockade
1950-53 Korean War
1960-61 Berlin Crisis (Berlin Wall)
1962 Cuban Missile Crisis
1963-75 Vietnam War
1973 Coup in Chile
1979-89 War in Afghanistan

Different views of the Cold War:

THE ORTHODOX VIEW
Started among US and Western historians in the late 1940's and early 1950's like Arthur Schlesinger Jr. "The Soviet Union bore primary responsibility for the outbreak and the continuation of the Cold War"

• Communist aggression
• Russian expansionism/imperialism
• "Spheres of Interest"

EVIDENCE:

• The Iron Curtain was established by the USSR
• The USSR was behind the Coup in Czechoslovakia
• The USSR was behind the Berlin Blockade 1948
• USSR sponsored states that were the aggressors in "Proxy Wars" (like North Korea)

THE REVISIONIST VIEW
US historians developed this view in the later 1950's and the 1960's. Important historian D.F. Fleming. "The United States initiated and sustained the Cold War".

• USSR prioritized defense
• USSR also prioritized security
• USA misunderstood and over-reacted to Soviet actions

EVIDENCE:

• The Russian Civil War - the Western Powers supported the "White" against the Bolsheviks
• The land war during WWII was fought by Russia. Russia therefore took huge casualties.
• Stalin followed the deal made with Winston Churchill (British Prime Minister during WWII) in Moscow 1944 - the "Percentage Agreement"
• USA created the Truman Doctrine (before COMINFORM), the Containment policy, the Marshall Plan (before COMECON), NATO (before the Warsaw Pact)

Here ended the lesson with me handing out your essays. See you tomorrow.

HOMEWORK 7/5: No homework