Cold War Vocabular

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1. Cold War• A struggle over political

differences between the United States

(Democracy and Capitalism) and the

Soviet Union (Communism and Socialism) without

actually going to war with each other.

2. Korean Conflict (War)• This conflict was fought

from 1950 – 1953. The Soviet Union backed

North Korea who urged the population to adopt communism. The United

States backed South Korea. The struggle

ended in a stalemate.

3. Vietnam Conflict (War)The U.S. supported

South Vietnam with troops, money, and

supplies to prevent it being taken over by communist backed North Vietnam. It

ended in a cease-fire agreement.

4. Cuban Missile Crisis• U.S. and the Soviet Union

engaged in a tense, 14-day political and military

standoff in October 1962 over the installation of nuclear-armed Soviet

missiles in Cuba bringing the world to the brink of a

nuclear war.

*U.S blockaded Cuba and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev offered to remove the missiles in exchange for the U.S. promising not to invade

Cuba. Kennedy also secretly agreed to remove U.S. missiles from Turkey.

5. Embargo• An order, usually

proclaimed by a president or the government of a

country, to prohibit trade with another

country.

*After Cuba allowed the Soviet Union to place missiles trained on the U.S., President Kennedy placed an embargo on their country which lasted for

several years.

6. Containment Theory (of

Communism)• The policy or process of preventing the

expansion of communism.

*The US wanted to stop the Soviet Union’s expansion through limited military and non-military means in areas of the world that were of strategic importance to the US. This policy caused the United States to become involved in the Korean and Vietnam conflicts.

7. Blockade• To cut off an area or

country by means of troops or warships to stop

supplies or people from coming in or going out; to close off a country’s ports.

*In order to enforce the embargo the U.S. placed on Cuba, for allowing Soviet missiles to be placed in their country, the U.S. created one of these with our navy ships.

8. North Atlantic Treaty Organization

(NATO)• In April 1949, the U.S., Canada, and 10 Western European

Nations signed a pact stating an armed attack against one of the member nations shall be considered an attack on all.

*To defend against a possible Soviet invasion of Western Europe, these countries

created a large military force.

9. Warsaw Pact• This organization was

established in 1955 (mostly in response to the formation of

NATO). The Soviet Union controlled a military force under this agreement and pledged to aid communist

nations. With the creation of this organization, Europe was

divided into two armed “camps.”

10. Berlin Wall

• Because East Germans were fleeing to

Democratic West Berlin through East Berlin, the

Soviet Union constructed The Berlin Wall.

*The wall stretched over a hundred miles. It not only ran through the center of Berlin, but also wrapped around West Berlin, entirely

cutting West Berlin off from the rest of East Germany.

11. Iron Curtain• The symbolic

metaphor given to describe the

political and military barrier that isolated

Soviet controlled countries of Eastern Europe from the rest

of the world following WWII.

11. Domino Theory

• A theory that if one state in a region came under the influence of communism, then the

surrounding countries would follow.