142-499: An Air Defense Direction Center (ADDC) was a type of United States command post for assessing Cold War radar tracks, assigning height requests to available height-finder radars, and for "Weapons Direction": coordinating command guidance of aircraft from more than 1 site for ground-controlled interception ("weapons assignment"). As with the World War II Aircraft Warning Service CONUS defense network,
284-738: A Japanese colony for 35 years, was divided by the Soviet Union and the US into two occupation zones at the 38th parallel , with plans for a future independent state. Due to political disagreements and influence from their backers, the zones formed their own governments in 1948. The DPRK was led by Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang , and the ROK by Syngman Rhee in Seoul ; both claimed to be the sole legitimate government of all of Korea and engaged in border clashes as internal unrest
426-508: A Joint Security Area at Panmunjom . The conflict caused more than 1 million military deaths and an estimated 2 to 3 million civilian deaths, a larger proportion of civilian deaths than in World War II or the Vietnam War . Alleged war crimes include the mass killing of suspected communists by Seoul and the torture and starvation of prisoners of war by Pyongyang. North Korea became one of
568-588: A " manual air defense system " was used through the 1950s (e.g., NORAD / ADC used a " Plexiglass [ sic ] plotting board" at the Ent command center .) Along with 182 radar stations at "the end of 1957, ADC operated … 17 control centers ", and the Ground Observation Corps was TBD on TBD. With the formation of NORAD, several types of ADDCs were planned by Air Defense Command : Most ADDCs were replaced by Regional Operations Control Centers of
710-722: A German rebuilding effort set forth by western European countries in 1948, the US, Britain and France spearheaded the establishment of the Federal Republic of Germany from the three Western zones of occupation in April 1949. The Soviet Union proclaimed its zone of occupation in Germany the German Democratic Republic that October. Media in the Eastern Bloc was an organ of the state , completely reliant on and subservient to
852-501: A general attack across the 38th parallel, rather than a limited operation in Ongjin. Kim was concerned that South Korean agents had learned about the plans and that South Korean forces were strengthening their defenses. Stalin agreed to this change. While these preparations were underway in the North, there were clashes along the 38th parallel, especially at Kaesong and Ongjin, many initiated by
994-635: A general term, in his essay "You and the Atomic Bomb", published 19 October 1945 in the British newspaper Tribune . Contemplating a world living in the shadow of the threat of nuclear warfare , Orwell looked at James Burnham 's predictions of a polarized world, writing: Looking at the world as a whole, the drift for many decades has been not towards anarchy but towards the reimposition of slavery... James Burnham's theory has been much discussed, but few people have yet considered its ideological implications—that is,
1136-510: A major propaganda effort began in 1949 was Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty , dedicated to bringing about the peaceful demise of the communist system in the Eastern Bloc. Radio Free Europe attempted to achieve these goals by serving as a surrogate home radio station, an alternative to the controlled and party-dominated domestic press in the Soviet Bloc. Radio Free Europe was a product of some of
1278-579: A national political constitution on 17 July and elected Syngman Rhee as president on 20 July. The Republic of Korea (South Korea) was established on 15 August 1948. In the Soviet-Korean Zone of Occupation, the Soviets agreed to the establishment of a communist government led by Kim Il Sung. The 1948 North Korean parliamentary elections took place in August. The Soviet Union withdrew its forces in 1948 and
1420-626: A neutral Germany to prevent West Germany's incorporation into NATO, but his attempts were cut short after he was executed several months later during a Soviet power struggle. The events led to the establishment of the Bundeswehr , the West German military, in 1955. In 1949, CCP Chairman Mao Zedong 's People's Liberation Army defeated Chiang Kai-shek 's United States-backed Kuomintang (KMT) Nationalist Government in China. The KMT-controlled territory
1562-605: A new war". On 6 September 1946, James F. Byrnes delivered a speech in Germany repudiating the Morgenthau Plan (a proposal to partition and de-industrialize post-war Germany) and warning the Soviets that the US intended to maintain a military presence in Europe indefinitely. As Byrnes stated a month later, "The nub of our program was to win the German people ... it was a battle between us and Russia over minds ..." In December,
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#17328592204081704-628: A plan envisioning an economically self-sufficient Germany, including a detailed accounting of the industrial plants, goods and infrastructure already taken by the Soviets. In June 1947, in accordance with the Truman Doctrine , the United States enacted the Marshall Plan , a pledge of economic assistance for all European countries willing to participate, including the Soviet Union. Under the plan, which President Harry S. Truman signed on 3 April 1948,
1846-613: A secret 1950 document, the National Security Council proposed reinforcing pro-Western alliance systems and quadrupling spending on defense. Truman, under the influence of advisor Paul Nitze , saw containment as implying complete rollback of Soviet influence in all its forms. United States officials moved to expand this version of containment into Asia , Africa , and Latin America , in order to counter revolutionary nationalist movements, often led by communist parties financed by
1988-477: A source of intelligence. During the late 1970s and 1980s, the KGB perfected its use of espionage to sway and distort diplomacy. Active measures were "clandestine operations designed to further Soviet foreign policy goals," consisting of disinformation, forgeries, leaks to foreign media, and the channeling of aid to militant groups. Retired KGB Major General Oleg Kalugin , former head of Foreign Counter Intelligence for
2130-598: A telegram. Mao accepted the decision made by Kim and Stalin to unify Korea but cautioned Kim over possible US intervention. Soviet generals with extensive combat experience from World War II were sent to North Korea as the Soviet Advisory Group. They completed plans for attack by May and called for a skirmish to be initiated in the Ongjin Peninsula on the west coast of Korea. The North Koreans would then launch an attack to capture Seoul and encircle and destroy
2272-530: A unified and neutral Germany was undesirable, with Walter Bedell Smith telling General Eisenhower "in spite of our announced position, we really do not want nor intend to accept German unification on any terms that the Russians might agree to, even though they seem to meet most of our requirements." Shortly thereafter, Stalin instituted the Berlin Blockade (June 1948 – May 1949), one of the first major crises of
2414-412: Is overrun by unprovoked armed attack would start a disastrous chain of events leading most probably to world war." While there was hesitance by some in the US government to get involved, considerations about Japan fed into the decision to engage on behalf of South Korea. After the fall of China to the communists, US experts saw Japan as the region's counterweight to the Soviet Union and China. While there
2556-551: The Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic ". A week later, on 13 March, Stalin responded vigorously to the speech, saying Churchill could be compared to Adolf Hitler insofar as he advocated the racial superiority of English-speaking nations so that they could satisfy their hunger for world domination, and that such a declaration was "a call for war on the USSR." The Soviet leader also dismissed
2698-806: The Berlin Wall to prevent the citizens of East Berlin from fleeing to West Berlin , at the time part of United States-allied West Germany . Major crises of this phase included the Berlin Blockade of 1948–1949, the Chinese Communist Revolution of 1945–1949, the Korean War of 1950–1953, the Hungarian Revolution of 1956 and the Suez Crisis of that same year, the Berlin Crisis of 1961 ,
2840-799: The Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, and the Vietnam War of 1964–1975. Both superpowers competed for influence in Latin America and the Middle East , and the decolonising states of Africa , Asia , and Oceania . Following the Cuban Missile Crisis, this phase of the Cold War saw the Sino-Soviet split . Between China and the Soviet Union's complicated relations within the Communist sphere, leading to
2982-837: The Eastern Bloc . Cominform faced an embarrassing setback the following June, when the Tito–Stalin split obliged its members to expel Yugoslavia, which remained communist but adopted a non-aligned position and began accepting financial aid from the US. Besides Berlin, the status of the city of Trieste was at issue. Until the break between Tito and Stalin, the Western powers and the Eastern bloc faced each other uncompromisingly. In addition to capitalism and communism, Italians and Slovenes, monarchists and republicans as well as war winners and losers often faced each other irreconcilably. The neutral buffer state Free Territory of Trieste , founded in 1947 with
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#17328592204083124-637: The Joint Surveillance System ( FOC on December 23, 1980). Cold War The Cold War was a period of global geopolitical tension and struggle for ideological and economic influence between the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc , that started in 1947, two years after the end of World War II , and lasted until
3266-503: The KGB and involved in its intelligence operations, adhered to Moscow's line, although dissent began to appear after 1956. Other critiques of the consensus policy came from anti-Vietnam War activists , the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament , and the anti-nuclear movement . In early 1947, France, Britain and the United States unsuccessfully attempted to reach an agreement with the Soviet Union for
3408-506: The Kingdom of Greece in its civil war against Communist-led insurgents. In the same month, Stalin conducted the rigged 1947 Polish legislative election which constituted an open breach of the Yalta Agreement . The US government responded to this announcement by adopting a policy of containment , with the goal of stopping the spread of communism . Truman delivered a speech calling for
3550-556: The Sino-Soviet border conflict , while France, a Western Bloc state, began to demand greater autonomy of action. The Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia occurred to suppress the Prague Spring of 1968, while the United States experienced internal turmoil from the civil rights movement and opposition to United States involvement in the Vietnam War . In the 1960s–1970s, an international peace movement took root among citizens around
3692-718: The Soviet boycott of the Allied Control Council and its incapacitation, an event marking the beginning of the full-blown Cold War and the end of its prelude, as well as ending any hopes at the time for a single German government and leading to formation in 1949 of the Federal Republic of Germany and German Democratic Republic . The twin policies of the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan led to billions in economic and military aid for Western Europe, Greece, and Turkey. With
3834-560: The Soviet Union , while South Korea was supported by the United Nations Command (UNC) led by the United States . The conflict was thus the first major proxy war of the Cold War between the Soviet Union and US. Fighting ended in 1953 with an armistice but no peace treaty , leading to the ongoing Korean conflict characterized by phases of diplomacy and confrontation. After the end of World War II in 1945, Korea, which had been
3976-594: The Space Race . The US and USSR were both part of the Allies of World War II , the military coalition which had defeated Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan in 1945. After the war, the USSR installed satellite governments in the territories of Eastern and Central Europe it had occupied, and promoted the spread of communism to North Korea in 1948 and created an alliance with the People's Republic of China in 1949. The US declared
4118-795: The Truman Doctrine of " containment " in 1947 as communist-led uprisings led to the Greek Civil War and First Indochina War , launched the Marshall Plan in 1948 to assist in Western Europe's economic recovery, and founded the NATO military alliance in 1949 (which was matched by the Soviet-led Warsaw Pact in 1955). The Berlin Blockade took place, and Germany's occupation zones solidified into East and West Germany in 1949. The USSR tested its first nuclear weapon in August 1949, four years after
4260-593: The Turkish Straits crisis and Black Sea border disputes were also a major factor in increasing tensions. In September, the Soviet side produced the Novikov telegram, sent by the Soviet ambassador to the US but commissioned and "co-authored" by Vyacheslav Molotov ; it portrayed the US as being in the grip of monopoly capitalists who were building up military capability "to prepare the conditions for winning world supremacy in
4402-499: The United Nations Security Council Resolution 82 and 83 backed the defense of South Korea, although the Soviets were then boycotting meetings in protest of the fact that Taiwan (Republic of China), not the People's Republic of China , held a permanent seat on the council. A UN force of sixteen countries faced North Korea, although 40 percent of troops were South Korean, and about 50 percent were from
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4544-777: The Yalu River —the border with China. On 19 October, the Chinese People's Volunteer Army (PVA) crossed the Yalu and entered the war on the side of the north. UN forces retreated from North Korea in December, following the PVA's first and second offensive . Communist forces captured Seoul again in January 1951 before losing it to a UN counter-offensive two months later. After an abortive Chinese spring offensive , UN forces retook territory roughly up to
4686-654: The atomic bombing of Hiroshima . By 10 August, the Red Army had begun to occupy the north of Korea. On 10 August in Washington , US Colonels Dean Rusk and Charles H. Bonesteel III were assigned to divide Korea into Soviet and US occupation zones and proposed the 38th parallel as the dividing line. This was incorporated into the US General Order No. 1 , which responded to the Japanese surrender on 15 August. Explaining
4828-520: The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. The term cold war is used because there was no direct fighting between the two superpowers , though each supported opposing sides in major regional conflicts known as proxy wars . Aside from the nuclear arms race starting in 1949 and conventional military deployment , the struggle for dominance was expressed indirectly via psychological warfare , propaganda campaigns , espionage , far-reaching embargoes , sports diplomacy , and technological competitions such as
4970-450: The fall of the communist regimes of the Eastern Bloc in 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The Western Bloc included the US and a number of First World nations that were generally capitalist and liberal democratic but tied to a network of often authoritarian Third World states, most of which were the European powers' former colonies . The Eastern Bloc was led by
5112-639: The 38th parallel and establishing English as the official language during military control. On 8 September, US Lieutenant General John R. Hodge arrived in Incheon to accept the Japanese surrender south of the 38th parallel. Appointed as military governor, Hodge directly controlled South Korea as head of the United States Army Military Government in Korea (USAMGIK 1945–48). In December 1945, Korea
5254-400: The 38th parallel. Armistice negotiations began in July 1951, but dragged on as the fighting became a war of attrition and the north suffered heavy damage from U.S. bombing . Combat ended on 27 July 1953 with the signing of the Korean Armistice Agreement , which allowed the exchange of prisoners and created a 4-kilometre (2.5 mi) wide Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) along the frontline, with
5396-525: The Chinese Civil War, while US forces remained stationed in South Korea. By spring 1950, he believed that the strategic situation had changed: PLA forces under Mao Zedong had secured final victory, US forces had withdrawn from Korea, and the Soviets had detonated their first nuclear bomb , breaking the US monopoly. As the US had not directly intervened to stop the communists in China, Stalin calculated they would be even less willing to fight in Korea, which had less strategic significance. The Soviets had cracked
5538-412: The Chinese PLA during the war. North Korea also provided the Chinese Communists in Manchuria with a safe refuge for non-combatants and communications with the rest of China. The North Korean contributions to the Chinese Communist victory were not forgotten after the creation of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949. As a token of gratitude, between 50,000 and 70,000 Korean veterans who served in
5680-414: The Cold War was in its essence a war of ideas. The United States, acting through the CIA, funded a long list of projects to counter the communist appeal among intellectuals in Europe and the developing world. The CIA also covertly sponsored a domestic propaganda campaign called Crusade for Freedom . The rearmament of West Germany was achieved in the early 1950s. Its main promoter was Konrad Adenauer ,
5822-404: The Cold War, preventing Western food, materials and supplies from arriving in the West Germany's exclave of West Berlin . The United States (primarily), Britain, France, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and several other countries began the massive "Berlin airlift", supplying West Berlin with food and other provisions despite Soviet threats. The Soviets mounted a public relations campaign against
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5964-408: The Communist governments militarily. The fall of the Iron Curtain after the Pan-European Picnic and the Revolutions of 1989 , which represented a peaceful revolutionary wave with the exception of the Romanian revolution and the Afghan Civil War (1989–1992) , overthrew almost all of the Marxist–Leninist regimes of the Eastern Bloc. The Communist Party of the Soviet Union itself lost control in
6106-400: The KGB (1973–1979), described active measures as "the heart and soul of Soviet intelligence ." During the Sino-Soviet split , "spy wars" also occurred between the USSR and PRC. In September 1947, the Soviets created Cominform to impose orthodoxy within the international communist movement and tighten political control over Soviet satellites through coordination of communist parties in
6248-428: The Marshall Plan, seeing it as an effort by the US to impose its influence on Europe. In response, the Soviet Union established Comecon (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance) to foster economic cooperation among communist states. The United States and its Western European allies sought to strengthen their bonds and used the policy of containment against Soviet influence; they accomplished this most notably through
6390-410: The North. On 28 June, Rhee ordered the massacre of suspected political opponents in his own country. In five days, the ROK, which had 95,000 troops on 25 June, was down to less than 22,000 troops. In early July, when US forces arrived, what was left of the ROK was placed under US operational command of the United Nations Command . The Truman administration was unprepared for the invasion. Korea
6532-471: The PLA were sent back along with their weapons, and they later played a significant role in the initial invasion of South Korea. China promised to support the North Koreans in the event of a war against South Korea. By 1948, a North Korea-backed insurgency had broken out in the southern half of the peninsula. This was exacerbated by the undeclared border war between the Koreas, which saw division-level engagements and thousands of deaths on both sides. The ROK
6674-453: The ROK had 98,000 soldiers (65,000 combat, 33,000 support), no tanks (they had been requested from the U.S. military, but requests were denied), and a 22-plane air force comprising 12 liaison-type and 10 AT-6 advanced-trainer airplanes. Large U.S. garrisons and air forces were in Japan, but only 200–300 U.S. troops were in Korea. At dawn on 25 June 1950, the KPA crossed the 38th parallel behind artillery fire. It justified its assault with
6816-429: The ROK. The final stage would involve destroying South Korean government remnants and capturing the rest of South Korea, including the ports. On 7 June 1950, Kim called for a Korea-wide election on 5–8 August 1950 and a consultative conference in Haeju on 15–17 June. On 11 June, the North sent three diplomats to the South as a peace overture, which Rhee rejected outright. On 21 June, Kim revised his war plan to involve
6958-418: The ROKA launched a three-pronged assault on the insurgents in South Cholla and Taegu . By March 1950, the ROKA claimed 5,621 guerrillas killed or captured and 1,066 small arms seized. This operation crippled the insurgency. Soon after, North Korea made final attempts to keep the uprising active, sending battalion-sized units of infiltrators under the commands of Kim Sang-ho and Kim Moo-hyon. The first battalion
7100-446: The Russian Civil War further complicated relations, and although the Soviet Union later allied with Western powers to defeat Nazi Germany , this cooperation was strained by mutual suspicions. In the immediate aftermath of World War II, disagreements about the future of Europe, particularly Eastern Europe , became central. The Soviet Union's establishment of communist regimes in the countries it had liberated from Nazi control—enforced by
7242-426: The South Korean interior intensified; persistent operations, paired with worsening weather, denied the guerrillas sanctuary and wore away their fighting strength. North Korea responded by sending more troops to link up with insurgents and build more partisan cadres; North Korean infiltrators had reached 3,000 soldiers in 12 units by the start of 1950, but all were destroyed or scattered by the ROKA. On 1 October 1949,
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#17328592204087384-422: The South from 5,000 to 1,000. However, Kim Il Sung believed widespread uprisings had weakened the South Korean military and that a North Korean invasion would be welcomed by much of the South Korean population. Kim began seeking Stalin's support for an invasion in March 1949, traveling to Moscow to persuade him. Stalin initially did not think the time was right for a war in Korea. PLA forces were still embroiled in
7526-435: The South, armed by the U.S. military with mostly small arms, but no heavy weaponry. Several generals, such as Lee Kwon-mu , were PLA veterans born to ethnic Koreans in China. While older histories of the conflict often referred to these ethnic Korean PLA veterans as being sent from northern Korea to fight in the Chinese Civil War before being sent back, recent Chinese archival sources studied by Kim Donggill indicate that this
7668-617: The South. The ROK was being trained by the US Korean Military Advisory Group (KMAG). On the eve of the war, KMAG commander General William Lynn Roberts voiced utmost confidence in the ROK and boasted that any North Korean invasion would merely provide "target practice". For his part, Syngman Rhee repeatedly expressed his desire to conquer the North, including when US diplomat John Foster Dulles visited Korea on 18 June. Though some South Korean and US intelligence officers predicted an attack, similar predictions had been made before and nothing had happened. The Central Intelligence Agency noted
7810-421: The Soviet Union and its communist party , which had an influence across the Second World and was also tied to a network of authoritarian states. The Soviet Union had a command economy and installed similarly communist regimes its in satellites. United States involvement in regime change during the Cold War included support for anti-communist and right-wing dictatorships , governments, and uprisings across
7952-408: The Soviet Union was used to monitor dissent from official Soviet politics and morals. Although to an extent disinformation had always existed, the term itself was invented, and the strategy formalized by a black propaganda department of the Soviet KGB. Based on the amount of top-secret Cold War archival information that has been released, historian Raymond L. Garthoff concludes there probably
8094-592: The Soviet Union would not move against US forces in Korea. The Truman administration believed it could intervene in Korea without undermining its commitments elsewhere. On 25 June 1950, the United Nations Security Council unanimously condemned the North Korean invasion of South Korea with Resolution 82 . The Soviet Union, a veto-wielding power , had boycotted Council meetings since January 1950, protesting Taiwan 's occupation of China's permanent seat . The Security Council, on 27 June 1950, published Resolution 83 recommending member states provide military assistance to
8236-400: The Soviet Union, which at the time was undergoing the Era of Stagnation . This phase saw the new Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev introducing the liberalizing reforms of glasnost ("openness") and perestroika ("reorganization") and ending Soviet involvement in Afghanistan in 1989. Pressures for national sovereignty grew stronger in Eastern Europe, and Gorbachev refused to further support
8378-499: The Soviet Union. A number of self-proclaimed Marxist–Leninist governments were formed in the second half of the 1970s in developing countries , including Angola , Mozambique , Ethiopia , Cambodia , Afghanistan , and Nicaragua . Détente collapsed at the end of the decade with the beginning of the Soviet–Afghan War in 1979. Beginning in the 1980s, this phase was another period of elevated tension. The Reagan Doctrine led to increased diplomatic, military, and economic pressures on
8520-455: The Soviets accumulated after broken promises by Stalin and Molotov concerning Europe and Iran. Following the World War II Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran , the country was occupied by the Red Army in the far north and the British in the south. Iran was used by the United States and British to supply the Soviet Union, and the Allies agreed to withdraw from Iran within six months after the cessation of hostilities. However, when this deadline came,
8662-425: The Soviets agreed to withdraw from Iran after persistent US pressure, an early success of containment policy. By 1947, US president Harry S. Truman was outraged by the perceived resistance of the Soviet Union to American demands in Iran, Turkey, and Greece, as well as Soviet rejection of the Baruch Plan on nuclear weapons. In February 1947, the British government announced that it could no longer afford to finance
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#17328592204088804-404: The Soviets had permitted to retain democratic structures. The public brutality of the coup shocked Western powers more than any event up to that point, set in motion a brief scare that war would occur, and swept away the last vestiges of opposition to the Marshall Plan in the United States Congress. In an immediate aftermath of the crisis, the London Six-Power Conference was held, resulting in
8946-426: The Soviets remained in Iran under the guise of the Azerbaijan People's Government and Kurdish Republic of Mahabad . Shortly thereafter, on 5 March, former British prime minister Winston Churchill delivered his famous " Iron Curtain " speech in Fulton, Missouri . The speech called for an Anglo-American alliance against the Soviets, whom he accused of establishing an "iron curtain" dividing Europe from " Stettin in
9088-455: The Truman Doctrine marked the beginning of a US bipartisan defense and foreign policy consensus between Republicans and Democrats focused on containment and deterrence that weakened during and after the Vietnam War , but ultimately persisted thereafter. Moderate and conservative parties in Europe, as well as social democrats, gave virtually unconditional support to the Western alliance, while European and American Communists , financed by
9230-447: The U.S. initiated contacts with China in 1972 . In the same year, the US and USSR signed a series of arms control treaties limiting their nuclear arsenals, which eased tensions in a détente . In 1979, the toppling of pro-US governments in Iran and Nicaragua and a Soviet invasion of Afghanistan again raised fears of war. In 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev rose to leader of the USSR and expanded political freedoms in his country, which led to
9372-462: The U.S.'s first test , thus starting an arms race. A major proxy war was the Korean War of 1950 to 1953, which ended in stalemate. The Cuban Revolution of 1959 installed the first communist regime in the Western Hemisphere, and in 1962, the Cuban Missile Crisis began after deployments of U.S. missiles in Europe and Soviet missiles in Cuba; it is considered the closest the Cold War came to escalating into nuclear war . Another major proxy conflict
9514-428: The UK, and the US decided that "in due course, Korea shall become free and independent". At the Tehran Conference in 1943 and the Yalta Conference in February 1945, the Soviet Union promised to join its allies in the Pacific War within three months of the victory in Europe . Germany officially surrendered on 8 May 1945, and the USSR declared war on Japan and invaded Manchuria on 8 August 1945, two days after
9656-434: The US assistance, the Greek military won its civil war . Under the leadership of Alcide De Gasperi the Italian Christian Democrats defeated the powerful Communist – Socialist alliance in the elections of 1948 . All major powers engaged in espionage, using a great variety of spies, double agents , moles , and new technologies such as the tapping of telephone cables. The Soviet KGB ("Committee for State Security"),
9798-476: The US government gave to Western European countries over $ 13 billion (equivalent to $ 189 billion in 2016) to rebuild the economy of Europe . Later, the program led to the creation of the OECD . The plan's aim was to rebuild the democratic and economic systems of Europe and to counter perceived threats to the European balance of power , such as communist parties seizing control through revolutions or elections. The plan also stated that European prosperity
9940-440: The US in 1949. With the end of the war with Japan , the Chinese Civil War resumed in earnest between the Communists and the Nationalist -led government. While the Communists were struggling for supremacy in Manchuria, they were supported by the North Korean government with matériel and manpower. According to Chinese sources, the North Koreans donated 2,000 railway cars worth of supplies while thousands of Koreans served in
10082-419: The US was trying to buy a pro-US re-alignment of Europe. Stalin therefore prevented Eastern Bloc nations from receiving Marshall Plan aid. The Soviet Union's alternative to the Marshall Plan, which was purported to involve Soviet subsidies and trade with central and eastern Europe, became known as the Molotov Plan (later institutionalized in January 1949 as the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance ). Stalin
10224-615: The USAMGIK declared martial law . Citing the inability of the Joint Commission to make progress, the US government decided to hold an election under UN auspices to create an independent Korea. The Soviet authorities and Korean communists refused to cooperate on the grounds it would not be fair, and many South Korean politicians boycotted it. The 1948 South Korean general election was held in May. The resultant South Korean government promulgated
10366-477: The USSR. In this way, this US would exercise " preponderant power ," oppose neutrality, and establish global hegemony . In the early 1950s (a period sometimes known as the " Pactomania "), the US formalized a series of alliances with Japan (a former WWII enemy), South Korea , Taiwan , Australia , New Zealand , Thailand and the Philippines (notably ANZUS in 1951 and SEATO in 1954), thereby guaranteeing
10508-516: The United Nations, was split up and dissolved in 1954 and 1975, also because of the détente between the West and Tito. The US and Britain merged their western German occupation zones into " Bizone " (1 January 1947, later "Trizone" with the addition of France's zone, April 1949). As part of the economic rebuilding of Germany, in early 1948, representatives of a number of Western European governments and
10650-509: The United States a number of long-term military bases. One of the more significant examples of the implementation of containment was the United Nations US-led intervention in the Korean War . In June 1950, after years of mutual hostilities, Kim Il Sung 's North Korean People's Army invaded South Korea at the 38th parallel . Stalin had been reluctant to support the invasion but ultimately sent advisers. To Stalin's surprise,
10792-401: The United States announced an agreement for a merger of western German areas into a federal governmental system. In addition, in accordance with the Marshall Plan , they began to re-industrialize and rebuild the West German economy, including the introduction of a new Deutsche Mark currency to replace the old Reichsmark currency that the Soviets had debased. The US had secretly decided that
10934-462: The United States. Korean War Korean Demilitarized Zone established Together: 1,742,000 The Korean War (25 June 1950 – 27 July 1953) was an armed conflict on the Korean Peninsula fought between North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea; DPRK) and South Korea (Republic of Korea; ROK) and their allies. North Korea was supported by the People's Republic of China and
11076-504: The Warsaw Pact's primary function was to safeguard Soviet hegemony over its Eastern European satellites, with the pact's only direct military actions having been the invasions of its own member states to keep them from breaking away; in the 1960s, the pact evolved into a multilateral alliance, in which the non-Soviet Warsaw Pact members gained significant scope to pursue their own interests. In 1961, Soviet-allied East Germany constructed
11218-469: The Western agencies paid special attention to debriefing Eastern Bloc defectors . Edward Jay Epstein describes that the CIA understood that the KGB used "provocations", or fake defections, as a trick to embarrass Western intelligence and establish Soviet double agents. As a result, from 1959 to 1973, the CIA required that East Bloc defectors went through a counterintelligence investigation before being recruited as
11360-456: The accusation that the USSR was exerting increasing control over the countries lying in its sphere. He argued that there was nothing surprising in "the fact that the Soviet Union, anxious for its future safety, [was] trying to see to it that governments loyal in their attitude to the Soviet Union should exist in these countries." Soviet territorial demands to Turkey regarding the Dardanelles in
11502-595: The allocation of $ 400 million to intervene in the war and unveiled the Truman Doctrine , which framed the conflict as a contest between free peoples and totalitarian regimes. American policymakers accused the Soviet Union of conspiring against the Greek royalists in an effort to expand Soviet influence even though Stalin had told the Communist Party to cooperate with the British-backed government. Enunciation of
11644-476: The area to that end. The Truman administration still refrained from committing troops on the ground, because advisers believed the North Koreans could be stopped by air and naval power alone. The Truman administration was uncertain whether the attack was a ploy by the Soviet Union, or just a test of US resolve. The decision to commit ground troops became viable when a communiqué was received on 27 June indicating
11786-479: The area". As Rusk's comments indicate, the US doubted whether the Soviets would agree. Joseph Stalin , however, maintained his wartime policy of cooperation, and on 16 August, the Red Army halted at the 38th parallel for three weeks to await the arrival of US forces. On 7 September 1945, General Douglas MacArthur issued Proclamation No. 1 to the people of Korea, announcing US military control over Korea south of
11928-470: The border, starting in May 1949. Border clashes between South and North continued on 4 August 1949, when thousands of North Korean troops attacked South Korean troops occupying territory north of the 38th parallel. The 2nd and 18th ROK Infantry Regiments repulsed attacks in Kuksa-bong, and KPA troops were "completely routed". Border incidents decreased by the start of 1950. Meanwhile, counterinsurgencies in
12070-822: The border, these guerrillas launched an offensive in September aimed at undermining the South Korean government and preparing the country for the KPA's arrival in force. This offensive failed. However, the guerrillas were now entrenched in the Taebaek-san region of the North Gyeongsang Province and the border areas of the Gangwon Province . While the insurgency was ongoing, the ROKA and KPA engaged in battalion-sized battles along
12212-477: The bureau responsible for foreign espionage and internal surveillance, was famous for its effectiveness. The most famous Soviet operation involved its atomic spies that delivered crucial information from the United States' Manhattan Project , leading the USSR to detonate its first nuclear weapon in 1949, four years after the American detonation and much sooner than expected. A massive network of informants throughout
12354-693: The chancellor of West Germany, with France the main opponent. Washington had the decisive voice. It was strongly supported by the Pentagon (the US military leadership), and weakly opposed by President Truman; the State Department was ambivalent. The outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950 changed the calculations and Washington now gave full support. That also involved naming Dwight D. Eisenhower in charge of NATO forces and sending more American troops to West Germany. There
12496-487: The choice of the 38th parallel, Rusk observed, "Even though it was further north than could be realistically reached by U. S. [ sic ] forces in the event of Soviet disagreement ... we felt it important to include the capital of Korea in the area of responsibility of American troops". He noted that he was "faced with the scarcity of U.S. forces immediately available and time and space factors which would make it difficult to reach very far north before Soviet troops could enter
12638-542: The claim ROK troops attacked first and that the KPA were aiming to arrest and execute the "bandit traitor Syngman Rhee". Fighting began on the strategic Ongjin Peninsula in the west. There were initial South Korean claims that the 17th Regiment had counterattacked at Haeju; some scholars argue the claimed counterattack was instead the instigating attack, and therefore that the South Koreans may have fired first. However,
12780-622: The codes used by the US to communicate with their embassy in Moscow , and reading dispatches convinced Stalin that Korea did not have the importance to the US that would warrant a nuclear confrontation. Stalin began a more aggressive strategy in Asia based on these developments, including promising economic and military aid to China through the Sino-Soviet Treaty of Friendship, Alliance and Mutual Assistance . In April 1950, Stalin permitted Kim to attack
12922-508: The communist party. Radio and television organizations were state-owned, while print media was usually owned by political organizations, mostly by the local communist party. Soviet radio broadcasts used Marxist rhetoric to attack capitalism, emphasizing themes of labor exploitation, imperialism and war-mongering. Along with the broadcasts of the BBC and the Voice of America to Central and Eastern Europe,
13064-518: The communist victory in the Chinese Civil War, ethnic Korean units in the PLA were sent to North Korea. In the fall of 1949, two PLA divisions composed mainly of Korean-Chinese troops (the 164th and 166th ) entered North Korea, followed by smaller units throughout the rest of 1949. The reinforcement of the KPA with PLA veterans continued into 1950, with the 156th Division and several other units of
13206-441: The country and was banned following the 1991 Soviet coup attempt that August. This in turn led to the formal dissolution of the Soviet Union in December 1991 and the collapse of Communist governments across much of Africa and Asia. The Russian Federation became the Soviet Union's successor state, while many of the other republics emerged from the Soviet Union's collapse as fully independent post-Soviet states . The United States
13348-516: The country. The Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea was founded in 1919 in Nationalist China . It failed to achieve international recognition, failed to unite the nationalist groups, and had a fractious relationship with its US-based founding president, Syngman Rhee . From 1919 to 1925 and beyond, Korean communists led internal and external warfare against the Japanese. In China,
13490-563: The defense of Italy and Greece, and the country was first on the list of the National Security Council 's post-North Korea invasion list of "chief danger spots". Truman believed if aggression went unchecked, a chain reaction would start that would marginalize the UN and encourage communist aggression elsewhere. The UN Security Council approved the use of force to help the South Koreans, and the US immediately began using air and naval forces in
13632-509: The economic and military aid promised by the Soviets. Kathryn Weathersby cites Soviet documents which said Kim secured Mao's support. Along with Mark O'Neill, she says this accelerated Kim's war preparations. Chen Jian argues Mao never seriously challenged Kim's plans and Kim had every reason to inform Stalin that he had obtained Mao's support. Citing more recent scholarship, Zhao Suisheng contends Mao did not approve of Kim's war proposal and requested verification from Stalin, who did so via
13774-454: The formation of NATO , which was essentially a defensive agreement in 1949. The Soviet Union countered with the Warsaw Pact in 1955, which had similar results with the Eastern Bloc. As by that time the Soviet Union already had an armed presence and political domination all over its eastern satellite states, the pact has been long considered superfluous. Although nominally a defensive alliance,
13916-510: The former Fourth Field Army arriving in February; the PLA 156th Division was reorganized as the KPA 7th Division. By mid-1950, between 50,000 and 70,000 former PLA troops had entered North Korea, forming a significant part of the KPA's strength on the eve of the war's beginning. The combat veterans and equipment from China, the tanks, artillery, and aircraft supplied by the Soviets, and rigorous training increased North Korea's military superiority over
14058-527: The government and between 2,976 and 3,392 deaths. By May 1949, both uprisings had been crushed. Insurgency reignited in the spring of 1949 when attacks by guerrillas in the mountainous regions (buttressed by army defectors and North Korean agents) increased. Insurgent activity peaked in late 1949 as the ROKA engaged so-called People's Guerrilla Units. Organized and armed by the North Korean government, and backed by 2,400 KPA commandos who had infiltrated through
14200-624: The government in the South, under the condition that Mao would agree to send reinforcements if needed. For Kim, this was the fulfillment of his goal to unite Korea. Stalin made it clear Soviet forces would not openly engage in combat, to avoid a direct war with the US Kim met with Mao in May 1950 and differing historical interpretations of the meeting have been put forward. According to Barbara Barnouin and Yu Changgeng, Mao agreed to support Kim despite concerns of American intervention, as China desperately needed
14342-618: The government. At 02:00 on 28 June the ROK blew up the Hangang Bridge across the Han River in an attempt to stop the KPA. The bridge was detonated while 4,000 refugees were crossing it, and hundreds were killed. Destroying the bridge trapped many ROK units north of the river. In spite of such desperate measures, Seoul fell that same day. Some South Korean National Assemblymen remained in Seoul when it fell, and 48 subsequently pledged allegiance to
14484-749: The influence of China over Korea in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–95), ushering in the short-lived Korean Empire . A decade later, after defeating Imperial Russia in the Russo-Japanese War , Japan made the Korean Empire its protectorate with the Eulsa Treaty in 1905, then annexed it with the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1910 . The Korean Empire fell, and Korea was directly ruled by Japan between 1910–45. Many Korean nationalists fled
14626-751: The insurgent war and border clashes. The first socialist uprising occurred without direct North Korean participation, though the guerrillas still professed support for the northern government. Beginning in April 1948 on Jeju Island , the campaign saw arrests and repression by the South Korean government in the fight against the South Korean Labor Party, resulting in 30,000 violent deaths, among them 14,373 civilians, of whom ~2,000 were killed by rebels and ~12,000 by ROK security forces. The Yeosu–Suncheon rebellion overlapped with it, as several thousand army defectors waving red flags massacred right-leaning families. This resulted in another brutal suppression by
14768-493: The invasion force, the North had 114 fighters, 78 bombers, 105 T-34-85 tanks, and some 30,000 soldiers stationed in reserve in North Korea. Although each navy consisted of only several small warships, the North and South Korean navies fought in the war as seaborne artillery for their armies. In contrast, the South Korean population was estimated at 20 million, but its army was unprepared and ill-equipped. As of 25 June 1950,
14910-469: The kind of world-view, the kind of beliefs, and the social structure that would probably prevail in a state which was at once unconquerable and in a permanent state of "cold war" with its neighbours. In The Observer of 10 March 1946, Orwell wrote, "...after the Moscow conference last December, Russia began to make a 'cold war' on Britain and the British Empire." The first use of the term to describe
15052-429: The most heavily bombed countries in history, and virtually all of Korea's major cities were destroyed. No peace treaty has been signed, making the war a frozen conflict . In South Korea, the war is usually referred to as the "625 War" ( 6·25 전쟁 ; 六二五戰爭 ), the "625 Upheaval" ( 6·25 동란 ; 六二五動亂 ; yugio dongnan ), or simply "625", reflecting the date of its commencement on 25 June. In North Korea,
15194-414: The most prominent architects of America's early Cold War strategy, especially those who believed that the Cold War would eventually be fought by political rather than military means, such as George F. Kennan. Soviet and Eastern Bloc authorities used various methods to suppress Western broadcasts, including radio jamming . American policymakers, including Kennan and John Foster Dulles , acknowledged that
15336-541: The nationalist National Revolutionary Army and the communist People's Liberation Army (PLA) helped organize Korean refugees against the Japanese military, which had also occupied parts of China. The Nationalist-backed Koreans, led by Yi Pom-Sok , fought in the Burma campaign (1941-45). The communists, led by, among others, Kim Il Sung , fought the Japanese in Korea and Manchuria . At the Cairo Conference in 1943, China,
15478-464: The operation was conducted under the auspices of the UN. It has been sometimes referred to in the English-speaking world as "The Forgotten War" or "The Unknown War" because of the lack of public attention it received during and afterward, relative to the global scale of World War II, which preceded it, and the subsequent angst of the Vietnam War , which succeeded it. Imperial Japan diminished
15620-661: The policy change. Once again, the East Berlin communists attempted to disrupt the Berlin municipal elections , which were held on 5 December 1948 and produced a turnout of 86% and an overwhelming victory for the non-communist parties. The results effectively divided the city into East and West, the latter comprising US, British and French sectors. 300,000 Berliners demonstrated and urged the international airlift to continue, and US Air Force pilot Gail Halvorsen created " Operation Vittles ", which supplied candy to German children. The Airlift
15762-441: The political decision-making level on either side. Similarly, there is no evidence, on either side, of any major political or military decision that was prematurely discovered through espionage and thwarted by the other side. There also is no evidence of any major political or military decision that was crucially influenced (much less generated) by an agent of the other side. According to historian Robert L. Benson, "Washington's forte
15904-424: The presence of the Red Army —alarmed the US and UK. Western leaders saw this as a clear instance of Soviet expansionism, clashing with their vision of a democratic Europe. Economically, the divide was sharpened with the introduction of the Marshall Plan in 1947, a US initiative to provide financial aid to rebuild Europe and prevent the spread of communism by stabilizing capitalist economies. The Soviet Union rejected
16046-490: The report that contained the Haeju claim contained errors and outright falsehoods. KPA forces attacked all along the 38th parallel within an hour. The KPA had a combined arms force including tanks supported by heavy artillery. The ROK had no tanks, anti-tank weapons, or heavy artillery. The South Koreans committed their forces in a piecemeal fashion, and these were routed in a few days. On 27 June, Rhee evacuated Seoul with some of
16188-462: The source of the term, Lippmann traced it to a French term from the 1930s, la guerre froide . The roots of the Cold War can be traced back to diplomatic and military tensions preceding World War II. The 1917 Russian Revolution and the subsequent Treaty of Brest-Litovsk , where Soviet Russia ceded vast territories to Germany, deepened distrust among the Western Allies. Allied intervention in
16330-494: The southward movement by the KPA but assessed this as a "defensive measure" and concluded an invasion was "unlikely". On 23 June UN observers inspected the border and did not detect that war was imminent. Chinese involvement was extensive from the beginning, building on previous collaboration between the Chinese and Korean communists during the Chinese Civil War. Throughout 1949 and 1950, the Soviets continued arming North Korea. After
16472-463: The specific post-war geopolitical confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States came in a speech by Bernard Baruch , an influential advisor to Democratic presidents, on 16 April 1947. The speech, written by journalist Herbert Bayard Swope , proclaimed, "Let us not be deceived: we are today in the midst of a cold war." Newspaper columnist Walter Lippmann gave the term wide currency with his book The Cold War . When asked in 1947 about
16614-479: The term " Chosŏn War" ( Chinese : 朝鮮戰爭 ; pinyin : Cháoxiǎn Zhànzhēng ) is sometimes used unofficially. The term " Hán (Korean) War" ( Chinese : 韓戰 ; pinyin : Hán Zhàn ) is most used in Taiwan (Republic of China), Hong Kong and Macau . In the US, the war was initially described by President Harry S. Truman as a " police action " as the US never formally declared war on its opponents, and
16756-509: The war is officially referred to as the Fatherland Liberation War ( Choguk haebang chŏnjaeng ) or the " Chosŏn [Korean] War" ( 조선전쟁 ; Chosŏn chŏnjaeng ). In mainland China, the segment of the war after the intervention of the People's Volunteer Army is commonly and officially known as the "Resisting America and Assisting Korea War" ( Chinese : 抗美援朝战争 ; pinyin : Kàngměi Yuáncháo Zhànzhēng ), although
16898-411: The world, while Soviet involvement in regime change included the funding of left-wing parties , wars of independence , revolutions and dictatorships. As nearly all the colonial states underwent decolonization and achieved independence in the period from 1945 to 1960, many became Third World battlefields in the Cold War. At the end of World War II, English writer George Orwell used cold war , as
17040-473: The world. Movements against nuclear weapons testing and for nuclear disarmament took place, with large anti-war protests . By the 1970s, both sides had started making allowances for peace and security, ushering in a period of détente that saw the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks and the 1972 visit by Richard Nixon to China that opened relations with China as a strategic counterweight to
17182-497: Was 'signals' intelligence - the procurement and analysis of coded foreign messages." leading to the Venona project or Venona intercepts, which monitored the communications of Soviet intelligence agents. Moynihan wrote that the Venona project contained "overwhelming proof of the activities of Soviet spy networks in America, complete with names, dates, places, and deeds." The Venona project
17324-412: Was a strong promise that West Germany would not develop nuclear weapons. Widespread fears of another rise of German militarism necessitated the new military to operate within an alliance framework under NATO command. In 1955, Washington secured full German membership of NATO. In May 1953, Lavrentiy Beria , by then in a government post, had made an unsuccessful proposal to allow the reunification of
17466-547: Was administered by a US–Soviet Union Joint Commission , as agreed at the Moscow Conference , to grant independence after a five-year trusteeship. Waiting five years for independence was unpopular among Koreans, and riots broke out. To contain them, the USAMGIK banned strikes on 8 December and outlawed the PRK Revolutionary Government and People's Committees on 12 December. Following further civilian unrest,
17608-414: Was almost entirely trained and focused on counterinsurgency, rather than conventional warfare. They were equipped and advised by a force of a few hundred American officers, who were successful in helping the ROKA to subdue guerrillas and hold its own against North Korean military (Korean People's Army, KPA) forces along the 38th parallel. Approximately 8,000 South Korean soldiers and police officers died in
17750-547: Was also fearful of a reconstituted Germany; his vision of a post-war Germany did not include the ability to rearm or pose any kind of threat to the Soviet Union. In early 1948, following reports of strengthening "reactionary elements", Czech Communists executed a coup d'état in Czechoslovakia (resulting in the formation of the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic (9 May 1948)), the only Eastern Bloc state that
17892-433: Was as much a logistical as a political and psychological success for the West; it firmly linked West Berlin to the United States. In May 1949, Stalin backed down and lifted the blockade. In 1952, Stalin repeatedly proposed a plan to unify East and West Germany under a single government chosen in elections supervised by the United Nations, if the new Germany were to stay out of Western military alliances, but this proposal
18034-599: Was captured on 28 June, and by early August, the Republic of Korea Army (ROKA) and its allies were nearly defeated, holding onto only the Pusan Perimeter in the peninsula's southeast. On 15 September, UN forces landed at Inchon near Seoul, cutting off KPA troops and supply lines. UN forces broke out from the perimeter on 18 September, re-captured Seoul, and invaded North Korea in October, capturing Pyongyang and advancing towards
18176-581: Was contingent upon German economic recovery. One month later, Truman signed the National Security Act of 1947 , creating a unified Department of Defense , the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), and the National Security Council (NSC). These would become the main bureaucracies for US defense policy in the Cold War. Stalin believed economic integration with the West would allow Eastern Bloc countries to escape Soviet control, and that
18318-544: Was fomented by communist groups in the south. On 25 June 1950, the Korean People's Army (KPA), equipped and trained by the Soviets, launched an invasion of the south. In the absence of the Soviet Union's representative, the UN Security Council denounced the attack and recommended member states to repel the invasion. UN forces comprised 21 countries, with the US providing around 90% of military personnel. Seoul
18460-463: Was kept highly secret even from policymakers until the Moynihan Commission in 1995. Despite this, the decryption project had already been betrayed and dispatched to the USSR by Kim Philby and Bill Weisband in 1946, as was discovered by the US by 1950. Nonetheless, the Soviets had to keep their discovery of the program secret, too, and continued leaking their own information, some of which
18602-502: Was left as the world's sole superpower. In February 1946, George F. Kennan 's " Long Telegram " from Moscow to Washington helped to articulate the US government's increasingly hard line against the Soviets, which would become the basis for US strategy toward the Soviet Union for the duration of the Cold War. The telegram galvanized a policy debate that would eventually shape the Truman administration 's Soviet policy. Washington's opposition to
18744-442: Was no US policy dealing with South Korea directly as a national interest, its proximity to Japan increased its importance. Said Kim: "The recognition that the security of Japan required a non-hostile Korea led directly to President Truman's decision to intervene ... The essential point ... is that the American response to the North Korean attack stemmed from considerations of U.S. policy toward Japan." Another consideration
18886-401: Was not included in the strategic Asian Defense Perimeter outlined by United States Secretary of State Dean Acheson . Military strategists were more concerned with the security of Europe against the Soviet Union than that of East Asia . The administration was worried a war in Korea could quickly escalate without American intervention. Diplomat John Foster Dulles stated: "To sit by while Korea
19028-770: Was not the case. Rather, the soldiers were indigenous to China, as part of China's longstanding ethnic Korean community, and were recruited to the PLA in the same way as any other Chinese citizen. According to the first official census in 1949, the population of North Korea numbered 9,620,000, and by mid-1950, North Korean forces numbered between 150,000 and 200,000 troops, organized into 10 infantry divisions, one tank division, and one air force division, with 210 fighter planes and 280 tanks, who captured scheduled objectives and territory, among them Kaesong, Chuncheon , Uijeongbu , and Ongjin. Their forces included 274 T-34-85 tanks, 200 artillery pieces, 110 attack bombers, 150 Yak fighter planes, and 35 reconnaissance aircraft. In addition to
19170-540: Was now restricted to the island of Taiwan , the nationalist government of which exists to this day. The Kremlin promptly created an alliance with the newly formed People's Republic of China. According to Norwegian historian Odd Arne Westad , the communists won the Civil War because they made fewer military mistakes than Chiang Kai-Shek made, and because in his search for a powerful centralized government, Chiang antagonized too many interest groups in China. Moreover, his party
19312-403: Was parity in the quantity and quality of secret information obtained by each side. However, the Soviets probably had an advantage in terms of HUMINT (human intelligence or interpersonal espionage) and "sometimes in its reach into high policy circles." In terms of decisive impact, however, he concludes: We also can now have high confidence in the judgment that there were no successful "moles" at
19454-498: Was reduced to a single man over the course of engagements by the ROKA 8th Division . The second was annihilated by a two-battalion hammer-and-anvil maneuver by units of the ROKA 6th Division , resulting in a toll of 584 KPA guerrillas (480 killed, 104 captured) and 69 ROKA troops killed, plus 184 wounded. By the spring of 1950, guerrilla activity had mostly subsided; the border, too, was calm. By 1949, South Korean and US military actions had reduced indigenous communist guerrillas in
19596-486: Was still useful to the American program. According to Moynihan, even President Truman may not have been fully informed of Venona, which may have left him unaware of the extent of Soviet espionage. Clandestine atomic spies from the Soviet Union, who infiltrated the Manhattan Project at various points during WWII, played a major role in increasing tensions that led to the Cold War. In addition to usual espionage,
19738-414: Was the Vietnam War of 1955 to 1975, which ended in defeat for the U.S. The USSR solidified its domination of Eastern Europe with the crushing of the Hungarian Revolution in 1956 and the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Both powers used economic aid in an attempt to win the loyalty of non-aligned countries , such as India . After the Sino-Soviet split between the USSR and China in 1961,
19880-482: Was the Soviet reaction if the US intervened. The Truman administration was fearful a Korean war was a diversionary assault that would escalate to a general war in Europe once the US committed in Korea. At the same time, "[t]here was no suggestion from anyone that the United Nations or the United States could back away from [the conflict]". Yugoslavia —a possible Soviet target because of the Tito-Stalin split —was vital to
20022-625: Was turned down by the Western powers. Some sources dispute the sincerity of the proposal. Britain, France, the United States, Canada and eight other western European countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty of April 1949, establishing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). That August, the first Soviet atomic device was detonated in Semipalatinsk , Kazakh SSR . Following Soviet refusals to participate in
20164-483: Was weakened during the war against Japan . Meanwhile, the communists told different groups, such as the peasants, exactly what they wanted to hear, and they cloaked themselves under the cover of Chinese nationalism . Confronted with the communist revolution in China and the end of the American atomic monopoly in 1949, the Truman administration quickly moved to escalate and expand its containment doctrine. In NSC 68 ,
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