The Cold War: A History in Documents (Pages from History)

161 Pages·2003·16.35 MB·English

by  Allan M. Winkler

The Cold War
A History in Documents
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The Cold War
A History in Documents
Allan M.Winkler
OXFORD
UNIVERSITY PRESS
For Karen Winkler Moulton
OXFORD General Editors
UNIVERSITY PRESS
Sarah Deutsch
Oxford New York Associate Professor of History
University of Arizona
Auckland Bangkok Buenos Aries Cape Town Chennai
Carol Karlsen
Dar es Salaam Delhi Hong Kong Istanbul Karachi Kolkata
Kuala Lumpur Madrid Melbourne Mexico City Mumbai Nairobi Professor of History
Sao Paulo Shanghai Singapore Taipei Tokyo Toronto University of Michigan
Robert G. Moeller
Copyright © 2000 by Allan M. Winkler
Professor of History
First published as an Oxford paperback in 2003
University of California, Irvine
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Jeffrey N. Wasserstrom
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Associate Professor of History
Indiana University
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
West Milford, N.J., Public Schools
Winkler, Allan M.
The Cold War: a history in documents / Allan M. Winkler.
p. cm. — (Pages from history)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Summary: Uses contemporary documents to explore the development of
the Cold War struggle, the consequences in the 1950s and 1960s, and the
lasting effects on American social and cultural patterns.
ISBN 0-19-512356-5 (hardcover) 0-19-516637-X (paperback)
1. Cold War—Sources. 2. World politics—1945—Sources. 3. United
States—Foreign relations—Russia—Sources. 4. Russia—Foreign relations—
United States—Sources. [1. Cold War—Sources. 2. World politics— Cover: Civil Defense drills in schools during the
1945—Sources.] I. Title. II. Series. 1950s taught children to lie down with their
D842 .W56 2000 heads covered to prepare for a possible emergency.
909.8—dc21
Frontispiece: In i969, the United States ful-
00-027270
filled President John F. Kennedy's promise to land
a man on the moon. Pictures transmitted from the
579864
moon itself during the landing fascinated people
around the world.
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper Title page: A mushroom cloud from an atomic
bomb test at the Bikini atoll in the Pacific Ocean
in 1946.
Contents
6 WHAT IS A DOCUMENT? Chapter Five
8 HOW TO READ A DOCUMENT 107 CATASTROPHE IN VIETNAM
108 French Colonial Rule
10 Introduction 110 War in Indochina
113 The Geneva Conference
Chapter One 115 Nation Building in Vietnam
17 EARLY ANTAGONISM 122 Horrors of War
18 Origin of the Atomic Bomb 125 Antiwar Movement
20 Tensions and Strategies 128 Vietnamization
26 The Truman Doctrine 130 Reuinification
29 The Marshall Plan
32 A Soviet Bomb Chapter Six
34 The China White Paper 133 AN END AT LAST
36 NSC-68 133 The Nuclear Test Ban
39 War in Korea Treaty of 1963
136 SALT Treaties
Chapter Two 140 Reagan's Nuclear Strategy
45 THE ANTICOMMUNIST 143 An End to the Cold War
CRUSADE
46 Hollywood and HUAC 146 TIMELINE
50 Chambers vs. Hiss 148 FURTHER READING
56 The Rosenbergs on Trial 150 CREDITS
60 Senator Joe McCarthy
155 INDEX
64 Cultural Responses
66 Army vs. McCarthy
Chapter Three
71 TO THE BRINK
72 Eisenhower's Inaugural Address
73 Liberation of Captive Peoples
76 The Domino Theory
80 Unstable Peace
85 Kennedy's Inaugural Address
87 Bay of Pigs
89 Standing Up to the Soviets
91 The Cuban Missile Crisis
Chapter Four: Picture Essay
97 THE ATOM UNLEASHED
6 THE COLD WAR
What Is a Document?
T
o the historian, a document is,
quite simply, any sort of histori-
cal evidence. It is a primary
source, the raw material of his-
tory. A document may be more than the
expected government paperwork, such as a
treaty or passport. It is also a letter, diary,
will, grocery list, newspaper article, recipe,
memoir, oral history, school yearbook, map,
chart, architectural plan, poster, musical
score, play script, novel, political cartoon,
painting, photograph—even an object.
Using primary sources allows us not
just to read about history, but to read his-
tory itself. It allows us to immerse ourselves
in the look and feel of an era gone by, to
understand its people and their language,
whether verbal or visual. And it allows us
Cartoon
to take an active, hands-on role in (re)con- This political cartoon addresses the issue of church and
structing history. state. It illustrates the Supreme Court's role in balancing
the demands of the First Amendment of the Constitution
Using primary sources requires us to
and the desires of the religious population.
use our powers of detection to ferret out
the relevant facts and to draw conclusions
from them; just as Agatha Christie uses the
scores in a bridge game to determine the
identity of a murderer, the historian uses
facts from a variety of sources—some, per-
haps, seemingly inconsequential—to build
a historical case.
The poet W. H. Auden wrote that his-
Illustration
tory was the study of questions. Primary
Illustrations from
sources force us to ask questions—and children's books,
such as this
then, by answering them, to construct a
alphabet from the
narrative or an argument that makes sense New England
to us. Moreover, as we draw on the many Primer, tell us
how children were
sources from "the dust-bin of history," we
educated, and
can endow that narrative with character, also what the
religious and
personality, and texture—all the elements
moral values of
that make history so endlessly intriguing. the time were.
WHAT IS A DOCUMENT? 7
Treaty
A government document such as this
1805 treaty can reveal not only the
Map
details of government policy, hut
A i788 British map of
information about the people who
India shows the region prior
signed it. Here, the Indians' names
to British colonization, an
were written in English translitera-
indication of the kingdoms
tion by U.S. officials; the Indians
and provinces whose ethnic
added pictographs to the right of
divisions would resurface
their names.
later in India's history.
Literature
The first written version of the Old English epic Beowulf,
from the late 1Oth century, is physical evidence of the tran-
sition from oral to written history. Charred by fire, it is
also a physical record of the wear and tear of history.
8 THE COLD WAR
How to Read a Document
Caricature
Cartoonists often exaggerate certain features of the figure they are
drawing. In this cartoon, the artist's rendering of Stalin's big, bushy mus-
E tache, his most prominent characteristic, indicates that this is without
question the Soviet leader. Americans, who knew of the way Stalin liqui-
very document in this book relates to the
dated his political opponents, believed that he would stop at nothing to
bitter conflict between the United States
achieve his ends, and the mustache and archly pointed eyebrows give
and the Soviet Union that lasted for
the Soviet ruler a sinister look.
nearly half a century after World War II.
The cold war was all consuming and affected not
Symbols
only political and diplomatic affairs but social and
economic issues as well. Some of the documents The artist uses symbols to represent the issues under consideration. In
in this collection come from government records; this cartoon, the paper Stalin is holding titled "U.S. Aggression" repre-
sents the accusatory message he proclaimed to the rest of the world.
others come from the world of popular culture. All
The coffins piled high contain the names of various Eastern European
of them help us understand the origins and conse-
countries the Soviet Union brought under its tight control. Americans
quences of the struggle.
worried about those nations trapped behind what British statesman
As you read this book, ask yourself about
Winston Churchill called the "iron curtain," and this cartoon reminds
the source and message of each document. The readers of their fate. Such symbols highlight the irony of Stalin accusing
same questions apply whether you are looking at a the United States of doing precisely what the Soviet Union had done.
letter or a photograph or a cartoon: Who was the
author and who was the intended audience? What
was the creator of the document trying to say?
The cartoon and the photograph on the
opposite page are examples of two kinds of cold
war documents. They frame the period chronolog-
ically. Political cartoons often use humor or satire
to make a point but may still have a serious mes-
sage. The caricature from the early years of the
cold war of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin standing on
a pile of coffins shows how one artist viewed the
ruthless efforts of the Soviet Union to control all of Subject
eastern Europe. American commentators often This 1992 photograph shows Boris Yeltsin, President of Russia, standing
focused on Soviet repression and brutality in with the American President and his wife in the aftermath of the cold
enforcing the communist party line, and this car- war. As the Soviet Union fragmented into its component parts, Russia
toon—with its hostile view of Stalin—is typical of emerged as the most important of the republics and Yeltsin was the most
many such images. The photograph from the end influential leader in that part of the world. But now, instead of hostility,
of the cold war of Russian leader Boris Yeltsin the Russian and American leaders show real friendliness toward one
another. They appear open and relaxed, in shirtsleeves, without more
standing in front of the White House with Presi-
formal suit jackets.
dent George Bush and his wife Barbara creates a
much friendlier impression. No longer are the two
leaders adversaries; now they appear as compan- Interpretation
ions. Yeltsin's arms circle the Bushes, and with the This photograph sends an important message to the world. The infor-
dogs standing in front, this picture looks like it mality of the pose conveys the sense that relations between Russia and
could be a family Christmas card to the world. the United States are now comfortable, and the hostilities that lasted so
This book also includes many other less long are now over. Yeltsin's arms encircling George and Barbara Bush
graphic documents, such as letters, telegrams, make this seem like a family portrait, while the presence of the dogs,
who were an important part of the Bush household, underscores this
transcripts of government hearings, and popular
impression. At the same time, the location of the protagonists in front of
songs. These provide a sense of what government
the White House, home of the American President, emphasizes that this
leaders were thinking as they made crucial deci-
scene is unfolding on American turf, since the United States emerged
sions, and of how ordinary people viewed the
victorious in the cold war.
choices their leaders made. No one document can
explain the period. Taken together, the documents
can help us understand the dramatic confronta-
tion that dominated the second half of the 20th
century.
HOW TO READ A DOCUMENT 9