Assignment Guide Unit 5

A Generation in Vietnam: 1950s – 1970s

Readings:

Griffith, Robert and Baker, Paula. Major Problems in American History. 3rd edition. Houghton Mifflin Company: Boston, 2007. Chapters 2-3, 6-7, and 9.

Keylor, William R. The Twentieth-Century World and Beyond: An International History Since 1900. 6th Edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011. Chapters 9, 10, and 11.

LaFeber, Walter. America, Russia, and the Cold War 1945-2002. 9th edition. McGraw-Hill: New York, 2004. Chapters6-10.

Leffler, Melvyn P., “The Cold War: What Do ‘We Now Know”?” The American Historical Review 104:2 (April, 1999), pp. 501-524.

Wednesday, 1/11 Keylor, Chapter 9 [Daniel Sandoval on Juan Peron]

  1. Discuss the theory and practical consequences of Eisenhower’s “New Look” strategy.
  2. Account for France’s decision to withdraw from the European Defense community in August, 1954.
  3. Examine the circumstances in which the Warsaw Pact emerged.
  4. Consider the evidence indicating that Soviet policy was becoming more conciliatory after the death of Stalin.
  5. Identify the consequences of the Polish October (1956).
  6. “The Soviet crackdown on Imre Nagy’s Hungary came strictly as a result of his announcement of withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact in 1955.” To what extent do you agree with this statement?
  7. Identify the member states of SEATO and CENTO.
  8. Analyze the agreements Colonel Nasser had made with both the Soviet Union and United States prior to the Suez Crisis.
  9. Examine the three foreign policy goals of Nasser in his quest to become the undisputed leader of the Arab world.
  10. Explain the ruse that underlay the joint French, British, and Israeli attack on Egypt in the Suez Crisis.
  11. Assess the consequences of the Suez crisis.

Thursday, 1/12 Keylor, chapter 9 (cont’d). [Hana on Eisenhower Domestic and Lola on NAACP]

  1. Discuss Walter Ulbricht’s role in Khrushchev’s Berlin ultimatum.
  2. Examine the pressures Khrushchev faced in the context leading up to the Paris summit of 1960.
  3. Analyze the complex geo-political situation that had emerged in the Congo during the 1960s.
  4. Evaluate the building of the Berlin Wall as a solution to a major Soviet diplomatic problem.
  5. Identify the components of the Inter-American Treaty of Reciprocal Assistance, signed in Rio de Janeiro in September 1947.
  6. Examine the conditions of “backwardness” that characterized many Latin American governments.
  7. Consider the circumstances of the 1954 CIA-backed Guatemala coup.
  8. Discuss the purpose of the Inter-American Development Bank.
  9. Outline the goals and methods of the Alliance for Progress program.
  10. Examine Khrushchev’s strategic goals for placing MRBMs and IRBMs in Cuba.

Friday, 1/13 DQs for Keylor, chapter 10. [Yvonne and Tyler on Mao]

  1. Account for Keylor’s claim that only the US qualified as a “global power” at the time of the Cuban missile crisis of 1962.
  2. Discuss the terms of the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
  3. Outline the program of military expansion undertaken by the Brezhnev administration after the downfall of Khrushchev in October, 1964.
  4. Assess the SALT I agreement of 1972.
  5. How was Nixon able to convince Congress to ratify the SALT I agreement despite the advantages it gave to the Soviets for ICBMs and SLBMS?
  6. Discuss the three major factors that contributed to the disintegration of the two power blocs in the late 1960s.
  7. Assess the doctrine of “flexible response” that emerged in the context of the Kennedy administration.
  8. Why did de Gaulle’s withdrawal from NATO fail to initiate a more independent Western European posture in the Cold War?

Tuesday, 1/17 DQs for Keylor, Chapter 10 (cont’d) [Eli and Sonia on the Korean War]

  1. Consider the Hallstein Doctrine (12/1955).
  2. Examine the program of Willy Brandt’s Ostpolitik.
  3. Explain the failure of COMECON as an economic counterpart to the Marshall Plan and OEEC (predecessor to the European Union).
  4. Outline the provisions of the Helsinki Agreement signed on August 1, 1975.
  5. Discuss the configuration of Cold War alliances in the Middle East on the eve of the Six-Day war.
  6. Identify the territorial gains of Israel in the Six-Day War.

Wednesday, 1/18 DQs for Leffler, “What Do ‘We Now Know’?” [Wes on Taiwan Straits Crises and Dharaa on Guatemala]

  1. Identify the three major new sources of information that have opened the study of the Cold War to reinterpretation.
  2. Identify and explain Leffler’s thesis.
  3. Examine the major themes that emerge from Gaddis’ study of the Cold War.
  4. What evidence does Gaddis provide to support his claim that the newly released documents show that Stalin and the USSR were motivated by revolutionary romanticism?
  5. Explain the meaning of the two questions with which Leffler challenges Gaddis’ master narrative.
  6. Discuss the significance of Stalin’s early letters to V.M. Molotov.
  7. To what extent do the recent interpretations of Zubok, Pleshakov, and Mastny verify Gaddis’ thesis?
  8. What appears to have been China’s main motive for intervening in the Korean War?
  9. Explain the context which Westad, Zubok, and Pleshakov claim must be taken into account for a proper understanding of the role of ideology in Soviet behavior.
  10. Compare and contrast Gaddis’ treatment of the role of security concerns as motive factors for both the USSR and the USA.
  11. What does Kathryn Weathersby identify as the main Soviet concern in the Korean conflict?
  12. In what sense does the research of Carolyn Eisenberg revive the revisionist historiography of the 1960s and 1970s?
  13. Outline Stalin’s responses to the Marshall Plan in 1947.
  14. To what extent do Stalin’s moves in 1947 reflect revolutionary romanticism?
  15. Explain the predominant themes that emerged in the revisionist historiography of the 1960 and 1970s.
  16. Assess Gaddis’ thesis that “the cold war in Asia developed largely out of inadvertence.” (p. 522)

Thursday, 1/19 Keylor, chapter 11 [Alexandra and James on Eisenhower Foreign Policy]

  1. In what sense was the viewpoint of American Foreign Service officers on the Chinese Civil War different from that of official Washington and US public opinion?
  2. Explain the ideological differences between Maoist and Soviet Communism.
  3. Discuss the treaty terms that Stalin established with the Chinese Nationalist Government at the end of World War II.
  4. Account for Stalin’s refusal to provide unqualified support to Mao at the point at which it became obvious that the Chinese Communists would prevail.
  5. Analyze the terms of the 1950 Friendship Treaty between the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China (PRC).
  6. Account for the US refusal to exploit the inherent tensions between the Soviet Union and Mao’s China.
  7. In what ways was the post-war settlement of Korea similar to Germany?
  8. Examine the motives for the Soviet Union to support the North Korean attack on Syngman Rhee’s Republic of Korea.
  9. “The Soviet encouragement of Kim’s invasion was a major blunder in Soviet foreign policy.” [Paraphrase of Keylor, p. 358] To what extent do you agree with this statement?
  10. Explain why the presence of the Seventh Fleet in the Formosa strait in June 1950 became such a crucial moment for Mao’s China.
  11. Consider the circumstances that led President Truman to fire General MacArthur in April, 1951.
  12. Discuss the consequences of the Korean War for US policy in Asia.

Friday, 1/20 Keylor, Chapter 11 (cont’d) [Nathan on Hungarian Crisis]

  1. Discuss the consequences of the Korean War on Sino-Soviet relations.
  2. Examine the factors that contributed to growing hostility between China and the Soviet Union.
  3. Analyze the three crises that brought Sino-Soviet relations to the breaking point.
  4. Discuss the global effects of the Sino-Soviet split.
  5. Consider the Brezhnev Doctrine.
  6. Examine the motives for French colonization of Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia).
  7. Discuss the US role in the postwar configuration of Vietnam.
  8. Explain the significance of the battle of Dien Bien Phu.
  9. Why did the US not use B-29 bombers to support the French at Dien Bien Phu?
  10. Analyze the terms of the 1954 Geneva Accords that ended the eight-year war between France and the Vietminh.
  11. Evaluate the US response to the Geneva Accords.
  12. Discuss the origins of the “Viet Cong”.
  13. Assess the evidence that JFK was escalating US involvement in Vietnam at the time of his assassination in 1963.

Monday, 1/23 DQs for Keylor, ch. 11 (cont’d) [Nicole and Kyler on Berlin, 1961-1989]

  1. Evaluate the “strategic hamlet” program of Kennedy.
  2. Explain the context and significance of the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution of August, 1964.
  3. Outline the expansion of US involvement in Vietnam during the Johnson administration.
  4. Discuss the significance of the 1968 Tet Offensive.
  5. Discuss the concept of “Vietnamization”.
  6. Examine the terms on which the Vietnam War came to an end.
  7. To what extent was the US intervention in Vietnam motivated by concern with China?
  8. Describe the outcome of Nixon’s February 1972 trip to China.
  9. Discuss the consequences of the Sino-American rapprochement for US-Soviet relations.
  10. Examine the economic consequences of Nixon’s opening to China.

Tuesday, 1/24 DQs for Griffith, chapter 2 [Ariel on Post-war Japan]

  1. Explain Truman’s decision to fire Secretary of Commerce Henry A. Wallace.
  2. To what extent does Truman’s attitude toward Stalin appear to have changed between July 18 and July 25?
  3. Summarize the four policy consequences that Kennan proposed in the 2/2/46 “Long Telegram.”
  4. To what extent did Ambassador Novikov see conflict and mistrust with the US as inevitable?
  5. Discuss the venues that Novikov identifies as examples of the imperial reach of the US.
  6. Compare and contrast Truman’s proposals for Greece and Turkey in his famous Truman Doctrine speech to Congress in March, 1947.
  7. To what extent can Joseph McCarthy’s allegations about the communist threat be regarded as demagogy?
  8. To what extent are the eleven policy guidelines of NSC 68 consistent with traditional understandings of containment?
  9. Analyze Offner’s critique of post-revisionist historiography.
  10. Analyze Gaddis’ critique of revisionist historiography.

Thursday, 1/26 DQs for Griffith, chapter 3 [Emilee on Ho Chi Minh]

  1. Discuss the problems that lurked below the surface of prosperous and ideologically uniform culture of the United States in the 1950s.
  2. Analyze the composition of the Ad Council.
  3. Explain the role of factory workers in creating the “Miracle of America” according to the Ad Council.
  4. Why might the number of babies born to families of male college graduates be greater than the number born to female college grads?
  5. Compare and contrast the role of 1950s street gangs with those of today.
  6. To what extent does the Life magazine article perceive teen spending as a threat to core values?
  7. Discuss the effects of TV that are presented in the three perspectives presented in the US News and World Report article.
  8. Examine the major findings of social science as applied to advertising in Vance Packard’s analysis.
  9. Identify the arenas of popular culture in which Roland Marchand perceives homogenization and evidence of an emerging classless society appeared.
  10. Discuss the changing role of the woman that emerged in the popular culture of the 1950s.
  11. Assess the contributions of Norman Vincent Peale in shaping the popular culture of the 1950s.
  12. Discuss Marchand’s viewpoint on the role of rock music in shaping the youth culture of the 1950s.
  13. Discuss the effects of post-war prosperity on the emergence of a female teen culture, according to Kelly Schrum.
  14. Explain the particular success of Seventeen magazine as the first publication with broad appeal to teenage girls.
  15. Analyze Seventeen’s perspective on marriage in relation to trends of the day.

Monday, 1/30

Stone, Oliver, Matt Graham, and Peter Kuznick. Chapter 5: “The ‘50s: Eisenhower, the Bomb, & the Third World.” Disc 2. Oliver Stone’s Untold History of the United States. Directed by Oliver Stone. Burbank, CA: Warner Brothers Entertainment, Inc., 2012.

Tuesday, 1/31 DQs for LaFeber, chapter 6

  1. Compare and contrast the positions of Hans Morgenthau and Senator Robert A. Taft on the “roles of morality, the place of power, and the nature of the Soviet threat.”
  2. Discuss the role of Japan and the Philippines in Niebuhr’s Asia policy.
  3. Examine the meaning of the following from Niebuhr (p. 141): “This ‘illusion of American omnipotence,’ . . . is a natural mistake of a commercial community which knows that American hegemony is based upon our technical-economic power but does not understand the vast complexities of ethnic loyalties, of social forces in a decaying agrarian world, of the resentments which a mere display of military power creates among those who are not committed to us.”
  4. Why did Truman and Eisenhower become bitter enemies?
  5. Identify the New Deal constituencies that drifted toward the Republican Party during the course of the 1950s.
  6. Assess the validity of the following claim: “The 1960s generation paid in blood and treasure for the ignorance of the early 1950s.” (p. 144)
  7. Outline the ways in which LaFeber claims that Eisenhower was a precursor to Reagan.
  8. Identify the immediate changes in Soviet foreign policy upon the death of Stalin.

Wednesday, 2/1 DQs for LaFeber, chapter 7

120.In what sense was Eisenhower’s foreign policy platform not consistent with the issues that emerged during his presidency?

121.Explain the internal power struggle that emerged in the USSR after Stalin’s death.

122.Analyze Eisenhower’s motives for withdrawing the US from Korea.

123.Explain the various tactics that Eisenhower used to deal with unwanted revolutions.

124.Discuss the intervention of the US into Iranian affairs (August 1953) after the coming to power of Mohammed Mossadegh.

125.Account for the demise of Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán’s Guatamelan government in May, 1954.

126.Discuss the reasons that LaFeber claims that the coup in Guatemala marks a turning point in U.S. foreign policy.

127.Explain Congressional refusal to support Eisenhower’s request for military intervention after Dien Bien Phu.

128.Outline the terms of the two Geneva agreements of July 20-21, 1954.

129.Why did the US not allow the elections negotiated in the Geneva accords?

130.In what ways did the SEATO treaty mark a unique precedent in US diplomatic history?

131.Explain LaFeber’s assertion that the 1955 Congressional authorization to secure Formosa and vicinity a “major step in creating an imperial presidency.” (p. 173)

Thursday, 2/2 DQs for LaFeber, chapter 8

132.Analyze the circumstances in which Khrushchev was able to seize more direct control of the USSR.

133.To what extent did Khrushchev abandon the harsh regime of Stalin in Europe?

134.Identify the focus of Soviet economic investment outside of Europe.

135.Explain the preconditions for the effective use of foreign aid in undeveloped countries as seen by the Eisenhower administration.

136.What appears to have been the consequences of the revised Bricker amendment?

137.Outline the terms of Dulles’ negotiating position in the 1955 summit with the Soviet Union.

138.Discuss the factors that inhibited the US from closing the negotiations to help Nasser build the Aswan dam.

139.Identify the demands of the Hungarians during the uprising in October 1956.

140.Analyze and assess the strategy used by Eisenhower to resolve the Suez crisis.

141.Explain Eisenhower’s victory in the 1956 presidential election despite significant Democratic gains in both the House and Senate.

142.Explain the terms and significance of the Eisenhower Doctrine.

143.Analyze and assess the work of the USIA and Voice of America.

144.Discuss the threats to Khrushchev that emerged inside the Soviet Union in 1956 and 1957.

Friday, 2/3 DQs for LaFeber, chapter 9.

145.Outline the consequences of the launching of Sputnik on 10/4/57 for US policies and attitudes.

146.Explain the ways in which Khrushchev’s exaggerations of ICBM strength proved costly to Soviet policy.

147.Account for the growing division between the USSR and China after 1957.

148.Identify China’s objectives in bombing the Taiwan straits in 1958.

149.Discuss the significance of the European Economic Community (Also known as the Common Market which included France, West Germany, Italy, and Benelux) agreement of 1/1/59 for relations between Western Europe and the US.

150.Explain the importance of Berlin for both the USSR and the US.

151.Outline US influence in the Cuban economy in 1956.

152.Analyze the social problems that began to emerge in Latin America in the late 1950s.

153.Examine the map on page 218 and identify the places and dates of US interventions in Latin America.

154.Identify the countries that benefited from JFK’s decision to address US trade deficits by allowing the sale of high technology weaponry.

Monday 2/6 General Discussion

Tuesday 2/7 Exam

  1. In what ways, and with what results, was Germany the key focus of the early stages of the Cold War? [P2/07/Q22]
  2. Examine the effects of McCarthyism on society and culture in the United States from the late 1940s to the late 1950s. [P3/13/Q20]
  3. Examine the features of Eisenhower’s “New Look” foreign policy and evaluate its impact on the region of the Americas. [P3/12/Q19]
  4. Examine the factors that influenced US military intervention in Korea. [P3/15/20]
  5. Evaluate the successes and failures of the US policies of containment and brinkmanship up to 1962. [P2/16/26]
  6. To what extent were social and economic challenges effectively confronted in either Japan (1945-1952) or the United States (1953-1973)? [P2/15/8]
  7. To what extent did the economic policies of either Mao or Castro contribute to the maintenance of his power? [P2/15/16]
  8. Examine the internal and external factors that led to the establishment of the Warsaw Pact. [P2/15/29]

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