Hi I’m John Green; this is Crash Course U.S. history and today we’re gonna talk
about the Cold War. The Cold War is called “Cold” because
it supposedly never heated up into actual armed conflict, which means, you know, that
it wasn’t a war. Mr. Green, Mr. Green, but if the War on Christmas
is a war and the War on Drugs is a war… You’re not going to hear me say this often
in your life, Me from the Past, but that was a good point. At least the Cold War was not
an attempt to make war on a noun, which almost never works, because nouns are so resilient.
And to be fair, the Cold War did involve quite a lot of actual war, from Korea to Afghanistan,
as the world’s two superpowers, the United States and the U.S.S.R., sought ideological
and strategic influence throughout the world. So perhaps it’s best to think of the Cold
War as an era, lasting roughly from 1945 to 1990.
Discussions of the Cold War tend to center on international and political history and
those are very important, which is why we’ve talked about them in the past. This, however,
is United States history, so let us heroically gaze--as Americans so often do--at our own
navel. (Libertage.)
Stan, why did you turn the globe to the Green Parts of Not-America? I mean, I guess to be
fair, we were a little bit obsessed with this guy.
So, the Cold War gave us great spy novels, independence movements, an arms race, cool
movies like Dr. Strangelove and War Games, one of the most evil mustaches in history.
But it also gave us a growing awareness that the greatest existential threat to human beings
is ourselves. It changed the way we imagine the world and humanity’s role in it.
In his Nobel Prize Acceptance Speech, William Faulkner famously said, “Our tragedy today
is a general and universal physical fear so long sustained by now that we can even bear
it. There are no longer problems of the spirit. There is only the question: When will I be
blown up?” So, today we’re gonna look at how that came
to be the dominant question of human existence, and whether we can ever get past it.
intro So after WWII the U.S. and the USSR were the
only two nations with any power left. The United States was a lot stronger – we had
atomic weapons, for starters, and also the Soviets had lost 20 million people in the
war and they were led by a sociopathic mustachioed Joseph Stalin.
But the U.S. still had worries: we needed a strong, free-market-oriented Europe (and
to a lesser extent Asia) so that all the goods we were making could find happy homes.
The Soviets, meanwhile, were concerned with something more immediate, a powerful Germany
invading them. Again. Germany--and please do not take this personally, Germans--was
very, very slow to learn the central lesson of world history: Do not invade Russia. Unless
you’re the Mongols. (Mongoltage.)
So at the end of World War II, the USSR “encouraged” the creation of pro-communist governments
in Bulgaria, Romania, and Poland--which was a relatively easy thing to encourage, because
those nations were occupied by Soviet troops. The idea for the Soviets was to create a communist
buffer between them and Germany, but to the U.S. it looked like communism might just keep
expanding, and that would be really bad for us, because who would buy all of our sweet,
sweet industrial goods? So America responded with the policy of containment,
as introduced in diplomat George F. Kennan’s famous Long Telegram. Communism could stay
where it was, but it would not be allowed to spread.
And ultimately this is why we fought very real wars in both Korea and Vietnam.
As a government report from 1950 put it the goals of containment were:
1. Block further expansion of Soviet power 2. Expose the falsities of soviet pretensions
3. Induce a retraction of the Kremlin’s control and influence, and
4. In general, foster the seeds of destruction within the Soviet system.
Harry Truman, who as you’ll recall, became President in 1945 after Franklin Delano Prez
4 Life Roosevelt died, was a big fan of containment, and the first real test of it came in Greece
and Turkey in 1947. This was a very strategically valuable region
because it was near the Middle East, and I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, but
the United States has been just, like, a smidge interested in the Middle East the last several
decades because of oil glorious oil. Right, so Truman announced the so-called Truman
Doctrine, because you know why not name a doctrine after yourself, in which he pledged
to support “freedom-loving peoples” against communist threats, which is all fine and good.
But who will protect us against “peoples,” the pluralization of an already plural noun?
Anyway, we eventually sent $400 million in aid to Greece and Turkey, and we were off
to the Cold War races. The Truman Doctrine created the language through
which Americans would view the world with America as free and communists as tyrannical.
According to our old friend Eric Foner, “The speech set a precedent for American assistance
to anticommunist regimes throughout the world, no matter how undemocratic, and for the creation
of a set of global military alliances directed against the Soviet Union.”[1]
It also led to the creation of a new security apparatus – the National Security Council,
the Central Intelligence Agency, the Atomic Energy Commission, all of which were somewhat
immune from government oversight and definitely not democratically elected.
And the containment policy and the Truman Doctrine also laid the foundations for a military
build-up – an arms race – which would become a key feature of the Cold War.
But it wasn’t all about the military, at least at first. Like, the Marshall Plan was
first introduced at Harvard’s Commencement address in June 1947 by, get this, George
Marshall, in what turned out to be, like, the second most important commencement address
in all of American history. Yes, yes, Stan, okay. It was a great speech, thank you for
noticing. Alright, let’s go to the Thought Bubble.
The Marshall Plan was a response to economic chaos in Europe brought on by a particularly
harsh winter that strengthened support for communism in France and Italy.
The plan sought to use US Aid to combat the economic instability that provided fertile
fields for communism. As Marshall said “ our policy is not directed against any country
or doctrine, but against hunger, poverty, desperation and chaos.” [2] Basically it
was a New Deal for Europe, and it worked; Western Europe was rebuilt so that by 1950
production levels in industry had eclipsed pre-war levels and Europe was on its way to
becoming a U.S. style-capitalist-mass-consumer society. Which it still is, kind of.
Japan, although not technically part of the Marshall Plan, was also rebuilt. General Douglas
MacArthur was basically the dictator there, forcing Japan to adopt a new constitution,
giving women the vote, and pledging that Japan would foreswear war, in exchange for which
the United States effectively became Japan’s defense force. This allowed Japan to spend
its money on other things, like industry, which worked out really well for them.
Meanwhile Germany was experiencing the first Berlin crisis. At the end of the war, Germany
was divided into East and West, and even though the capital, Berlin, was entirely in the east,
it was also divided into east and west. This meant that West Berlin was dependent on shipments
of goods from West Germany through East Germany. And then, in 1948, Stalin cut off the roads
to West Berlin. So, the Americans responded with an 11-month-long airlift of supplies
that eventually led to Stalin lifting the blockade in 1948 and building the Berlin Wall,
which stood until 1991, when Kool Aid Guy--no, wait, wait, wait, wait, that wasn’t when
the Berlin Wall was built. That was in 1961. I just wanted to give Thought Bubble the opportunity
to make that joke. Thanks, Thought Bubble. So right, the Wall
wasn’t built until 1961, but 1949 did see Germany officially split into two nations,
and also the Soviets detonated their first atomic bomb, and NATO was established, AND
the Chinese Revolution ended in communist victory.
So, by the end of 1950, the contours of the Cold War had been established, West versus
East, Capitalist Freedom versus Communist totalitarianism.
At least from where I’m sitting. Although now apparently I’m going to change where
I’m sitting because it’s time for the Mystery Document. The rules here are simple.
I guess the author of the Mystery Document and about 55% of the time I get shocked by
the shock pen. “We must organize and enlist the energies
and resources of the free world in a positive program for peace which will frustrate the
Kremlin design for world domination by creating a situation in the free world to which the
Kremlin will be compelled to adjust. Without such a cooperative effort, led by the United
States, we will have to make gradual withdrawals under pressure until we discover one day that
we have sacrificed positions of vital interest. It is imperative that this trend be reversed
by a much more rapid and concerted build-up of the actual strength of both the United
States and the other nations of the free world.” I mean all I can say about it is that it sounds
American and, like, it was written in, like, 1951 and it seems kind of like a policy paper
or something really boring so I...I mean... Yeah, I’m just going to have to take the
shock. AH! National Security Council report NSC-68? Are
you kidding me, Stan? Not-not 64? Or 81? 68? This is ridiculous! I call injustice.
Anyway, as the apparently wildly famous NSC-68 shows, the U.S. government cast the Cold War
as a rather epic struggle between freedom and tyranny, and that led to remarkable political
consensus--both democrats and republicans supported most aspects of cold war policy,
especially the military build-up part. Now, of course, there were some critics, like
Walter Lippmann who worried that casting foreign policy in such stark ideological terms would
result in the U.S. getting on the wrong side of many conflicts, especially as former colonies
sought to remove the bonds of empire and become independent nations. But yeah, no, nothing
like that ever happened. Yeah, I mean, it’s not like that happened
in Iran or Nicaragua or Argentina or Brazil or Guatemala or Stan are you really going
to make me list all of them? Fine. Or Haiti or Paraguay or the Philippines or Chile or
Iraq or Indonesia or Zaire or, I’m sorry, THERE WERE A LOT OF THEM, OKAY?
But these interventions were viewed as necessary to prevent the spread of communism, which
was genuinely terrifying to people and it’s important to understand that.
Like, national security agencies pushed Hollywood to produce anticommunist movies like “The
Red Menace,” which scared people. And the CIA funded magazines, news broadcasts, concerts,
art exhibitions, that gave examples of American freedom. It even supported painters like Jackson
Pollack and the Museum of Modern Art in New York because American expressionism was the
vanguard of artistic freedom and the exact opposite of Soviet socialist realism.
I mean, have you seen Soviet paintings? Look at the hearty ankles on these socialist comrade
peasants. Also because the Soviets were atheists, at
least in theory, Congress in 1954 added the words “under God” to the pledge of allegiance
as a sign of America’s resistance to communism. The Cold War also shaped domestic policy--anti-communist
sentiment, for instance, prevented Truman from extending the social policies of the
New Deal. The program that he dubbed the Fair Deal would
have increased the minimum wage, extended national health insurance and increased public
housing, Social Security and aid to education. But the American Medical Association lobbied
against Truman’s plan for national health insurance by calling it “socialized” medicine,
and Congress was in no mood to pay money for socialized anything.
That problem goes away. But the government did make some domestic
investments as a result of the Cold War--in the name of national security the government
spent money on education, research in science, technology like computers, and transportation
infrastructure. In fact we largely have the Cold War to thank for our marvelous interstate
highway system, although part of the reason Congress approved it was to set up speedy
evacuation routes in the event of nuclear war.
And, speaking of nuclear war, it’s worth noting that a big part of the reason the Soviets
were able to develop nuclear weapons so quickly was thanks to espionage, like for instance
by physicist and spy Klaus Fuchs. I think I’m pronouncing that right.
Fuchs worked on the Manhattan Project and leaked information to the Soviets and then
later helped the Chinese to build their first bomb. Julius Rosenberg also gave atomic secrets
to the Soviets, and was eventually executed--as was his less-clearly-guilty wife, Ethel.
And it’s important to remember all that when thinking about the United States’s
obsessive fear that there were communists in our midst. This began in 1947 with Truman’s
Loyalty Review System, which required government employees to prove their patriotism when accused
of disloyalty. How do you prove your loyalty? Rat out your
co-workers as communists. No seriously though, that program never found any communists.
This all culminated of course with the Red Scare and the rise of Wisconsin senator Joseph
McCarthy, an inveterate liar who became enormously powerful after announcing in February 1950
that he had a list of 205 communists who worked in the state department
In fact, he had no such thing, and McCarthy never identified a single disloyal American,
but the fear of communism continued. In 1951’s Dennis v. United States, the Supreme Court
upheld the notion that being a communist leader itself was a crime.
In this climate of fear, any criticism of the government and its policies or the U.S.
in general was seen as disloyalty. There was only one question--when will I be blown up--and
it encouraged loyalty, because only the government could prevent the spread of communism and
keep us from being blown up. We’ve talked a lot about different ways
that Americans have imagined freedom this year, but this was a new definition of freedom--the
government exists in part to keep us free from massive destruction.
So, the Cold War changed America profoundly: The U.S. has remained a leader on the world
stage and continued to build a large, powerful, and expensive national state. But it also
changed the way we imagine what it means to be free, and what it means to be safe. Thanks
for watching. I’ll see you next week. Crash Course is created by all of these nice
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forget to be awesome...Wait, wait, wait, Stan, is that music copyrighted?
All right! It's not! Woo! That saved us a thousand dollars.