Atomic Warfare: WWII & Cold War

Atomic warfare
• Scientists warn of potential for nuclear weapons, 1930s
• Germany and others pursue a bomb
• Germany secretly abandons program in 1942 to focus on
explosive rockets
• Manhattan Project
• Bomb test, July 1945
• Harry S. Truman
• Humble roots, briefly vice president before Roosevelt’s death
• U.S. estimates 100s of 1,000s of U.S. casualities in Japan
invasion (plus Japanese civilian casualties)
• Hiroshima chosen to show destructive potential
• 70,000 killed instantly, another 60,000 later
Dropping the bomb
• Was it right?
• U.S. knows some Japanese officials are considering
surrender before bombing
• but not unconditional surrender
• Intimidate Russia?
• U.S. desire for unconditional surrender
• Racism?
• Bomb was developed for use against Germany
• Should second bomb (Nagasaki) have been dropped?
• Japanese assume Hiroshima is one-time attack
• “V-J Day”: August 14, 1945
• End of war that claims 60 million lives
Hot War into Cold War
Yalta Conference
• “Big Three” (Roosevelt, Stalin, Churchill) meet
to discuss postwar world, 1945
• Tension, competition over plans for Europe
• Stalin promises free elections in Eastern Europe
• Instead, puppet governments
• Takes territory (e.g. Poland)
• United Nations agreement
• 5 major powers (including U.S.) have veto power over
U.N. action
Truman and the beginnings of Cold War
• Truman “get tough” policy on Soviet Union
• Stalin suspicious
• No reconstruction loans from U.S.
• Growing tension, 1949:
• Soviet Union tests nuclear weapon
• “Loss” of China to Communists
• “Containment”: U.S. support for any nonCommunist power
• Military and economic aid, 1947 onwards
• Marshall Plan (1947)
• $12 billion for non-Communist Europe
Early Cold War
Tension
• U.S. maintains large peacetime military
• Hydrogen bomb development
• U.S., Britain, France create “West
Germany”
 Stalin closes access to West Berlin (1948)
• Berlin airlift
• Constant threat of nuclear war
• North Atlantic Treaty Organization
(NATO)
• 12 non-Communist Western European
nations
• Warsaw Pact
• Communist Eastern Europe
Postwar America
Avoiding a new
Depression
• End of war spending = return of
Depression?
• 15 million servicemen discharged
• Economy shrinks in 1946-47
• GI Bill (1944)
• $20/week for 1 year after discharge
• Loan backing for home or small business
• Education expenses
• Many benefits denied to black veterans
• Decline of ethnic prejudices between
European-origin groups
Truman and the election of 1948
• Harry Truman’s “Fair Deal”: revival of New
Deal-type programs after war
• Reformist Democrats lose ground after war
• Truman backs civil rights for African-Americans
• Treatment of black veterans
• Wants laws against lynching, voter suppression,
hiring discrimination
• Southern white “Dixiecrats” break off from
Democratic party
• 1948 election: Truman beats the polls
The Long Boom
• U.S. economy strong after war
• Continued government spending (military)
• U.S. gross national product (GNP) grows 2.5
times 1945-60
• Broad benefits across social classes
• Huge middle class, including unionized workers
• Suburbanization
• “white flight”: fear of declining property values
• Baby boom
• 2 child average in 30s … up to 3.5 in 50s
• Hard to explain
• Prosperity? “Security culture”?
The new suburban and
tech economy
• Suburban construction drives economic growth
• Interstate highway system (1950s-60s) – $100 billion
• Hurts downtown businesses
• New business in suburbs: motels, drive-ins, fast food, etc.
• Tech-driven growth
• Television: millions sold in 1950s
• Transistors and integrated circuits (computers, IBM)
• Medical technology: penicillin, vaccinations
• 1950s as golden age
• Though not just “simpler times”