Cold War

The North Atlantic Treaty, signed in Washington, D.C. on April 4, 1949, established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a political and military alliance aimed at collective defense and the preservation of peace in the North Atlantic area. The treaty binds its member states to mutual…

The Warsaw Pact was an agreement formed shortly after West Germany joined NATO and was aimed for mutual defense against outside threats and established a unified military command under Soviet control. While it promoted ideals of peaceful coexistence, the pact ultimately served to reinforce Soviet…

The Tonkin Gulf Incident significantly escalated U.S. involvement in Vietnam. After reported attacks on U.S. naval vessels by North Vietnamese forces, President Lyndon B. Johnson addressed Congress on August 5, 1964, citing a grave threat to peace in Southeast Asia. He reaffirmed America's…

The Truman Doctrine, announced by President Harry S. Truman on March 12, 1947, marked a significant change in U.S. foreign policy by committing to support free nations resisting communist influence. In response to political instability in Greece and Turkey, Truman requested $400 million in aid,…

The Agreement on the Prevention of Incidents On and Over the High Seas, signed on May 25, 1972, in Moscow, was a Cold War-era arms control accord between the United States and the Soviet Union, designed to reduce the risk of accidental military confrontations at sea. It established formal…

The Cuban Missile Crisis was a dangerous confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union. This intense standoff was triggered by the discovery of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba. Such a direct menace to American interests propelled the Cold War adversaries to the precipice of nuclear…

Foreign Relations of the United States, 1958–1960, Cuba, Volume VI is a collection of U.S. government documents detailing the shift in U.S.-Cuban relations from 1958 to 1960. It focuses on the Cuban Revolution, the fall of Fulgencio Batista's government, and the early years of Fidel Castro…

The Alliance for Progress was a major foreign aid initiative by President John F. Kennedy. It aimed to promote economic development, social reform, and democratic stability in Latin America. Driven by Cold War anxieties and the desire to stop the spread of communism, the ten-year program sought to…

The Rio Treaty is a security pact among nations in the Americas. Born out of World War II and the early Cold War, it aimed to establish a common defense mechanism to maintain regional peace. However, its practical application and relevance have faced scrutiny and challenges.

In 1966, Congress enacted the Cuban Adjustment Act (CAA). This granted Cuban citizens permanent resident status when entering the United States. It exempted them from immigrant quotas and certain inadmissibility grounds.

This agreement was signed by the French government and the anti-colonialist, socialist Viet Minh guerilla force. It divided Vietnam into two halves at the 17th parallel, with the northern half administered by the Viet Minh and the southern half under the French, although the two sections were meant…

This 1971 agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union established a shared understandings for nuclear weapons and missile use. The agreement was signed during the Nixon Administration's push for détente, in which they sought to reduce tensions with the Soviet Union through…

<p><span class="deck"><span class="typestyle">The “conversion” of Arthur Vandenberg, told by a former Secretary of State, his sometime adversary but also his friend</span> </span></p>

<p>During World War II, Tunner led the effort to fly supplies from India “over the Hump” of the Himalayas to supply nineteen Chinese divisions, and later commanded the Berlin Airlift operation.</p>
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<p><span class="deck"> “Almost every time a serious disarmament effort got under way, it barely managed to move forward an inch or two before a great world cataclysm intervened”</span> </p>

<p><span class="deck"> <span class="typestyle"> The job ran in the family; both his uncle and grandfather were Secretaries of State. Home life in a parsonage taught him piety, and the law precision. The rigid views of a world divided between good and evil he worked out, apparently, himself. Private letters and new taped recollections help explain the shaping of the man who set our Cold War foreign policy</span> </span></p>

<p><span class="deck"> President Nixon’s visit to Peking starts one more surprising turn in an American-Chinese “affair” nearly two centuries old</span> </p>

<p><span class="deck"> When and how it got the green light to conduct “subversive operations abroad”</span> </p>

<p><span class="deck"> <span class="typestyle"> The U-2, Cuba, and the CIA</span> </span></p>

<p><span class="deck"> <span class="typestyle"> The fallout-shelter craze of 1961</span> </span></p>

<p><span class="deck"><span class="typestyle">His newly discovered diary reveals how the President saw the conference that ushered in the Cold War</span> </span></p>

<p><span class="deck"> Was the murdered President one of our best, a man of “vigor, rationality, and noble vision” or was he “an optical illusion,” “an expensively programmed waxwork”? A noted historian examines the mottled evolution of his reputation.</span> </p>

<p><span class="deck"> THE BIRTH OF THE RAND CORPORATION <span class="typestyle"> During World War II, America discovered that scientists were needed to win it—and to win any future war. That’s why RAND came into being, the first think tank and the model for all the rest.</span> </span></p>

<p><span class="deck">30 years after judging Eisenhower to be among our worst presidents, historians have now come around to the opinion most of their fellow Americans held right along.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">For 40 years, George Kennan and Paul Nitze, architects of our foreign policy under nine presidents, have squared off over Russia, the atom bomb, arms control, and everything except for their respect and affection for each other.</span></p>

<p>As I watched the lunar landing on television, my part in the whole scenario took on a new meaning.</p>

<p><span class="deck">In the twilight of Castro’s regime, one of the soldiers who put him in power recalls what it was like to be a<em> <span class="typestyle"> fidelista</span></em> up in the hills four decades ago when a whole new, just, democratic world was there for the building.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">The Cold War was an anomaly. More often than not, the world’s two greatest states have lived together in uneasy amity. And what now?</span></p>

<p>The first Soviet conductor to tour in the United States had been accused <span class="body">with “anti-democratic tendencies.”</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">After every war in the nation’s history, the military has faced not only calls for demobilization, but new challenges and new opportunities. It is happening again.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">The half-remembered Korean conflict was full of surprises, and nearly all of them were unpleasant</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">The first American to leave the Earth's atmosphere recalls the momentous flight that put us on a course for the Moon.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">How the Bureau got those restrictions that so many people today want to see abolished</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">Though it appears to have sprung up overnight, the inspiration of free-spirited hackers, it in fact was born in Defense Department Cold War projects of the 1950s.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">Seen in its proper historical context, amid the height of the Cold War, the investigation into Kennedy’s assassination looks much more impressive and its shortcomings much more understandable.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">In an exchange of letters, a man who had an immeasurable impact on how the great struggle of our times was waged looks back on how it began.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">Sixty years ago this month, the Soviet Union orbited a “man-made moon” whose derisive chirp persuaded Americans that they’d already lost a race that had barely begun.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">It was born of a slew of compromises, which may be the secret of its survival in a vastly changed world.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">Growing up on a Cold War air base in the shadow of the big one</span></p>

<p>My would-be pen pal asked for photos of my home and school, and of the local <span class="body">Strategic Air Command base.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">Nikita Khrushchev’s son recalls a world in which the United States was the Evil Empire, and the Soviet superpower was a carefully maintained illusion.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">From Berlin to Washington to Area 51, landmarks of the era are opening up to tourists.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck">The strangest of all Cold War relics also offers a clue to why we won it.</span></p>

<p><span class="deck"><span class="typestyle">Nikita Khrushchev’s son remembers a great turning point of the Cold War, as seen from behind the Iron Curtain</span> </span></p>

<p>In his last speech as president, he inaugurated the spirit of the 1960s.</p>

<p><span class="deck">The Cuban Missile Crisis as seen from the Kremlin</span></p>