First World: Capitalist Democracies; “developed” nations
Second World: Communist/Socialist/Soviet states; industrializing but non-capitalist
Third World: non-Communist “developing” or “undeveloped” economies
1945 | Yalta Conference divides Europe into spheres of influence. WWII ends. |
UN Founded | |
1946 | Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech in Fulton, MO |
1947 | Truman Doctrine (for Greece and Turkey) affirms US support against Communist-sponsored subversion, “Containment” |
Marshall Plan announced; USSR, fearing loss of control, keeps Czech, Fin, Polish and Hungarian governments from participating. | |
1948 | Communist takeover in Czechoslovakia |
Berlin blockade begins, reaction to Western revival of German currency and industry. | |
US House Un-American Activities Committee opens hearings. | |
1949 | USSR explodes a-bomb |
Communist forces unite Mainland China, establish People’s Republic of China; Guomindang Nationalists establish Republic of China on Taiwan. | |
COMECON begins coordination of Communist economies. | |
April | NATO founded. Members: Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxemborg, France, UK, Italy, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Iceland, Canada, US. |
May | Berlin blockade ends after months of airlifted supplies |
Sept | West German state (German Federal Republic, FRG) declared |
Oct | East German state (German Democratic Republic, GDR) declared |
1950 | North Korea invades South Korea, prompting US/UN intervention |
1953 | USSR develops thermonuclear weapons |
Korean War ends with 38th parallel armistice. | |
Joseph McCarthy chairs US Senate committee hearings targeting Soviet agents in Departments of State and Army | |
Stalin dies | |
1954 | Eisenhower accepts “domino theory”: intervention to prevent new communist regimes. |
France withdraws from Vietnam; US begins support of non-Communist South Vietnam | |
1955 | NATO admits West Germany as member. |
Warsaw Pact defense bloc founded. Members: USSR, Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania | |
Austria established, after USSR withdrawal, as independent, neutral state | |
Geneva Summit (US, USSR, France, UK) produces good feelings, but no agreements | |
1956 | Khrushchev’s Secret Speech denouncing Stalin, signals slight opening of intellectual and political rigidity; removal of Stalin’s supporters. |
Polish Crisis: disagreement between Polish and Soviet CP over PM; compromise inspires Hungary. | |
Suez Crisis: After Nasser’s nationalization in July, war breaks out between Egypt and Israel; UK, France intervene to protect Canal and access to Persian Gulf; US and USSR fail to support action and Egypt regains control. | |
Hungarian Uprising: Hungarian CP selects Nagy, who favors USSR withdrawal; USSR invades Hungary, executes Nagy, installs Janos Kadar. | |
1957 | Sputnik I launched by USSR, Earth’s first artificial satellite. |
1958 | Dr. Zhivago author Boris Pasternak wins Literature Nobel; not permitted to accept |
1959 | Nixon visits USSR (Kitchen talks); Krushchev visits US |
1959 | Cuban Revolution installs Fidel Castro |
U-2 spy plane shot down over Russia | |
1960 | Paris Summit cancelled in retaliation for U-2. |
1961 | Berlin Wall rises to stop flow of Eastern refugees. Failure of US to force removal raises concerns about committment and influence. |
Bay of Pigs invasion fails to topple Castro’s Cuban regime. | |
1962 | Cuban Missle Crisis ends “in a triumph of common sense” (Khruschev) |
1963 | US-USSR Nuclear Test Ban Treaty |
1963 | Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn permitted to publish One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich |
1964 | Krushchev falls from power; replaced by Leonid Brezhnev |
Sino-Soviet rift | |
Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove released. | |
1965 | US ground troops sent to Vietnam, and US begins bombing raids. |
1968 | Prague Spring led by Alexander Dubcek; USSR invades Czechoslovakia. |
Brezhnev’s “Doctrine of Limited Sovereignty” claims Soviet right to interfere in the affairs of other Communist countries | |
Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty signed | |
1969 | Apollo XI spacecraft successfully visits Earth’s moon, returns. |
1972 | Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty |
Nixon visits Beijing | |
1973 | US withdraws from Vietnam |
CIA aids overthrow of Chilean socialist Salvadore Allende | |
1974 | Solzhenitsyn expelled from USSR; harassment of Soviet Jewry begins in earnest |
1975 | Helsinki accords “recognize the Soviet sphere of influence in eastern Europe and the obligation of both nations to safeguard human rights. |
Vietnam united by North Vietnamese (Communist) forces | |
Jiang Jieshi dies, succeeded by his son. | |
1976 | Mao Zedong dies, succeeded eventually by Deng Xiaoping |
1979 | Soviet invasion of Afghanistan |
1980 | Moscow Olympics boycott by US; US grain shipments to Russia suspended |
1981 | Poland suppresses Solidarity movement with Martial Law |
1982 | Brezhnev dies. Reagan deploys new missiles in Europe, proposes missile defense system. |
1985 | Mikhail Gorbachev takes control in USSR; initiates perestroika (“restructuring”) and glasnost (“openness”) reforms |
1989 | Gorbachev repudiates Brezhnev Doctrine, initiating collapse of Second World, withdraws from Afghanistan |
Romanian demonstrations remove Ceauşescu from power; | |
Bulgarian communist leadership falls. | |
Berlin Wall falls | |
China’s Tiananmen Square protests result in crackdown, massacre. | |
1990 | Germany reunites |
Free elections in Poland, Hungary; Czechoslovakian “Velvet Revolution” | |
Gorbachev wins Nobel Peace Prize | |
1991 | Soviet Union dissolves; Boris Yeltsin president of Russian Republic |
1993 | Czech Republic and Slovakia separate. |
“Nations, organizations, institutions, bodies, or single human beings are never as powerful, intelligent, far-seeing, efficient, and dangerous as they seem to their enemies.” — “Barzini’s Law” / Luigi Barzini
This is a very interesting way to look at these events. (I love a timeline.)
Thanks for sharing the link.