These notes provide a comprehensive overview of United States history from the end of World War II to the end of the Cold War, focusing on key political, social, and cultural developments. Topics include the transformation of American liberalism, the Cold War and its global repercussions, the Civil...
The Great Depression & World War II
– events that fundamentally reshape America
– dramatically altered size and nature of federal government and US role in the world
– changed people’s expectations of what governments should and could provide
1. Start of long road of Liberalism – reaching heights in mid 1960s
a. Central Goals:
i. Expansion of the welfare state: government’s obligation to provide for the
needs of its citizens
ii. US defender of freedom and democracy for world
iii. Racial equality and justice
2. Crises shapes lives of a generation
a. Commitment to security/stability/middle class comfort
b. Belief in American “can-doism” and “Victory Culture”
The Great Depression
A. Impacts
a. Shocking; transformation from seeming prosperity of the 1920s
b. Psychologically devastating
c. Inability of Hoover to deal with crisis
B. Election of FDR (1932-1945) and New Deal
a. Dominant personality of his age
b. Greatly expands role of government in ensuring social welfare:
i. Programs like the CCC, TVA
ii. Social Security
iii. Wagner Act and growth of Unions like AFL and CIO
C. Development of New Deal Coalition
a. Industrial workers
b. Northern black people
c. Southern white people
d. Women/youth
e. Intellectuals
f. Midwestern progressives
i. Results: Democrat political control for 30+ years
,The Good War? World War II & The Rise of American Hegemony
– time when US really does change the world for the better
– but motivated more by fear, racism, and the “American way of life” than by idealism of spreading
democracy
A. US Enters the War
a. Enormity of scale of conflict
b. Very slow move to war – only certain after Pearl Harbor attack
c. Allows US to view itself as a Reluctant Warrior (forced to fight / defend the innocent)
B. The Home Front
a. Period in many ways of incredible, unmatched unity
b. Sense of willing sacrifice for a greater good
C. World War II as Race War
a. Racism at home – “Race Riots”
b. Holocaust
c. Pearl Harbor and Japanese Internment
d. US attitudes vs. Germans and vs. Japanese
e. “The good German” vs. “apes and lice”
D. Total War, the Bomb, and the Seeds of the Cold War
a. Triumph of scientific military connection
b. Atomic bomb as new weapon of the Cold War
c. New possibility of human extermination
i. Was the atomic bomb necessary to end the war? If yes, think about covid
The End of WWII and the Dawn of the Cold War
– US entered war through South Africa
– Russia suffers most casualties with 18 million total, most are soldiers
– Poland has highest number of civilian casualties, due to holocaust
A. The War’s End and the Roots of the Cold War, 1945-1946
a. WWII and “Total War”
b. A decision to drop the bomb
i. Potential cost of invading Japan
ii. Alternatives not tried
iii. Atomic Diplomacy vs. Soviet Union? Might not have simply been a message to
the Japanese, but to the SU as a warning about their expansion
, B. Defining the Cold War
a. Militarily
i. There are no battles between two nation-states (US and Russia) but rather
proxy battles which they still fight against the idea of the other
b. Ideologically
i. Democracy vs. Communism (US vs. Russia)
c. Culturally
i. Consumption/Consumerism framed as the best way of life
C. The Alliance Breaks Down
a. US and USSR – radically different visions of postwar Europe and world
i. US advocates for less colonization in the world from European powers
ii. US desires free, global trade for power, resources, manufacturing at home, and
a need to sell our goods to keep our economy up from the Depression
iii. USSR wants to maintain the gains they had during the war (land, people) so
they can prevent revolution and invasions (dismember Germany, create buffer
states between the two)
b. Ambiguous wartime agreements of Allies
i. Yalta Conference (Feb. 1945): Allies meet to agree on the body of the United
Nations (do better than the League of Nations), Soviets will join the war in
Japan once the Europe theater was closed, allow for free elections in Poland
after the war was over at some point in time
1. Veto Powers in the UN Today: Russia, America, Great Britain, France,
China
ii. Potsdam Conference (May 1945): US now has atomic bomb and new
President
D. Issues Dividing US and USSR
a. Poland’s future and Eastern Europe
b. Germany’s future (dividing Germany & Berlin among US, British, French, and Soviet)
c. Economic reconstruction of Europe, needed for numerous reasons for US gain
d. Atomic Bomb and how knowledge is shared
e. “Cold War” Speeches, 1946
i. Churchill “Iron Curtain Speech”
ii. Stalin response
E. Containing the Soviet Threat, 1946-1949
a. US and Allies perspective
i. View of worldwide Communist threat
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