Then and Now: Civil Rights.

This picture is of people who were not afraid of showing how they really felt and had the courage to do something about it. They held up signs and walked for hours just to have the same rights as everybody else and have the rights they rightfully deserved.

Civil Rights has been a big issue amungst the people these days. Whether it's from Women's Rights or Animal Rights. This May, the people are celebrating the 50 year anniversary of the court case Brown vs. the Board of Education ruling. The ruling of this case said that all schools would not be segregated and that people would be treated equal.

Civil Rights today is like even today women don't fully have every right as of the men, but they still have most of their rights. Children don't have as many rights as do, let's say the women. Animals don't have really any rights. etc. People still have movements concerning our rights, but not huge movements like back in the 50's. There are alot more examples of how Civil Rights is still present today, but just so it's known, the Civil Rights today are not as bad as they were back in the day. The men had many rights but not all, women had barely any rights(not as equal as the men), the children didn't really have the rights they should have had, etc.

I think that the effects of the Cold War came as a relief to us because atleast the "Cold War Today" is not as bad as it was. Right? Well, that is not all about the Civil Rights today, but it is just some of the examples. See you soon! (:

Sputnik 1 & The Explorer!

Sputnik 1 was the worlds first artificial satellite, which represented a milestone for all man kind. It was launched on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union successfully launched it. The world's first artificial satellite was about the size of a beach ball, weighed only 83.6 kg. or 183.9 pounds, and took about 98 minutes to orbit the Earth on its elliptical path. They wanted to launch Sputnik because they wanted to do something that would put them at the top, take the United States off guard, and ultimately to look evidentually superior to the United States, technologically. The Sputnik launch ushered in new political, military, technological, and scientific developments. While the launch was a single event, it marked the start of the space age and the U.S.-U.S.S.R space race. The Soviets' launch of Sputnik came as a surprise to the United States. The Space Race had dawned on us that our Cold War rival, the Soviet Union, was appearing as technologically superior to us. So immediately after the Sputnik I launch in October, the U.S. Defense Department responded to the political furor by approving funding for another U.S. satellite project because we the United States needed to "one up" them and make our own interpretation of their Sputnik. The United States first attempt at launching their own satellite was unsuccessful when its Vanguard rocket exploded during lift-off. But they did not give up hope and decided to try again and so, finally on January 31, 1958, a Jupiter-C rocket sent Explorer 1 into orbit. This let everyone know, including our rivals the Soviet Union, that the Space Race was underway.

Differences between the two satellites were that Sputnik was more than twice the size of a basketball, which made it much larger and heavier than Explorer. Only the "striped section" of Explorer contained the payload, while the rear half was a solid-fuel rocket motor. Another difference was that Sputnik's sphere was polished to aid in tracking by telescope and the Explorer's light and dark stripes helped control its temperature. Also, despite Sputnik's streamlined appearance, it trembled and tumbled while in orbit when the Explorer spun about its long axis, which extended its four flexible antennas. And last but not least, Sputnik contained two radio transmitters, which sent back the "beep-beep-beep"heard all around the world. While the Explorer contained a cosmic ray detector, radio transmitter, and temperature and micrometeroid sensors. Well, that's it for the launch of Sputnik and the Explorer 1! (:

The United States during the Cold War!

During the Cold War, both countries(the United States and the Soviet Union) at the time were strong and powerful superpower nations that influenced the world in a way, but also both governments thought that their political ideologies were the way 'forward' and that all nations should adopt their way of government. During the Cold War and even today the United States believes in a democratic way of government allowing the civilians to vote for their political party to govern the country in a democratic election system and a sense of Capitalism. Capitalism is the term used to describe the rights we give our citizens, like the right to own a private buisness(s), own private property and the right to earn a profit and so on. We did not want to fight directly, but when the Communist way started spreading across the nation, we had to do something. Anything. We thought that if communism continued to spread nation wide we would be lost, because we thought of communism as a threat to us personally. All the United States knew of and holds dear is the thought of Capitalism and that it is the way of life. We still have capitalism today and we ultimatly hope to keep it that way, if we can. Let's just hope nothing like the Cold War happens again and we have a World War 3. Well, there you have it.. The ideologies of the United States and what we were and still are about. (:

The "quarantine" of Cuba!

Another example of tension during the Cold War was the Cuban Missile Crisis. This crisis involved both Western superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, and ofcourse Cuba. The Cuban Missile Crisis was a crisis were the Soviet Union were trying to influence Cuba to the communist lifestyle. So the Cubans and Soviets decided to make and launch missiles in Cuba. And also, this confrontation between them was the closest we had ever come as a nation to a nuclear war. The Soviets goal was to luer the United States in. This all started in late April of 1962 when the Soviet leader, Khruschev, conceived a plan to place and launch missiles in Cuba. In the summer of 1962, the Soviets put this plan into action and quickly but as secretly as they could to build their missiles in Cuba. But not secretly enough because on October 15, 1962, the United States found out about the missiles by reconnaissance photos taken by U-2 planes that flew over Cuba. These photos confirmed our suspicions and also confirmed that there was infact something going on, on the "down low." During this time, everyone was tense because no one had no idea what was going to happen next with the Soviets. But when they found out about what the Soviets were up to, they were a little suprised but mostly afraid of what might happen and they also were wondering.. why? Well, little did any of us know that during this time, the Soviets were very far behind the United States in the Arms Race and that the Soviets were ultimatly weaker than that of the United States. This is because the Soviets were only powerful enough to be launched at Europe when the United States missiles were capable of wiping out all the Soviets with their missiles. So with all these facts we knew that something bad was going to be coming our way. All we really wanted was for someone to tell us what was going on and that if everything was under control.

When our president of the United States at the time, Mr. John F. Kennedy, first heard of what was going on and that we were all scared, he realized that he had to let the public know about what was going on. But first, he had to create a game plan which was to, immediately, put together a group of twelve of his best and most important advisors to handle the crisis, which was what Kennedy called the EX-COMM. After seven days of a heated, political debate within the up most highest level of government, Kennedy finally came up with a solution. At 7 p.m. on Monday, October 22, 1962, President John F. Kennedy appeared on television, which at this time was the newly found love of americans all over the nation. He did this to inform American citizens of the newly discovered Soviet military build-up in Cuba, including the installations of Russian missiles. One of the solutions that he imposed was that the island of Cuba should be in fact "quarantined." By doing this he wished to prevent the arrival of more Soviet offensive weapons on the island. He also proclaimed that if any guns were fired upon us or missiles were launched towards us that we would take it as a sign of war. He lastly, demanded for the Soviets to remove all their offensive weapons from Cuba. Two days later, the President talked with the Soviet Minister of Foreign Affairs, Andrei Gromyko, who claimed that the nuclear weapons in Cuba were strictly for defensive purposes. So during this time of a very public crisis, tensions were, very rapidly were building among both sides. Anyone and everyone could feel it building. But on the 25th, Kennedy pulled the quarantine back and raised military readiness on DEFCON 2. After all of this, the Soviet's decided to write the president a letter that we had been waiting for. Khruschev's letter to the president said that he would remove the missiles from Cuba and have his people leave if and only if the United States would promise them that they would not invade Cuba under any circumstances. We later found out that that letter was in fact not written by Khruschev and that why would they give up that easily. So on October 27th we sent a U-2 plane over Cuba to take pictures, to see what the Soviets were up to. But the worst was yet to come.. On that day, the Soviet's disregarded all of what we had said earlier and shot down the U-2 plane we had sent. After this, the president received a second letter from Khruschev demanding that the U.S. remove their missiles from Turkey in exchange for the removal of Soviet missiles in Cuba. Attorney General Robert Kennedy, John F. Kennedy's brother, thought to ignore the second letter and comply with the first. So he himself went to confer with the Soviet Ambassator, Anatoly Dobrynin, letting him know of their decision. With this in place and when tensions finally began to ease, on October 28 we had heard what we have been waiting for. Khruschev announced that he would have his men dismantle the installations and leave Cuba. This gave us a sense of security because they finally trusted us NOT to invade Cuba. All that need to be done was that light bombers be removed from Cuba. After the United States, the Soviet Union and Cuba had reached an agreement, we knew something else was bound to happen, but wee just wanted to get through the task at hand and we did. There you have it for the Cuban Missile Crisis. See you soon.(:

The Hydrogen Bomb!

The Hydrogen Bomb or otherwise known as the H-Bomb internally was a weapon deriving a large portion of it's energy from the nuclear fusion of hydrogen isotopes. Many countries made their own interpretation of the thermonuclear bomb include the United States(1952 at Enewetak), Russia(1953), Great Britain, France and China. The structure of a hydrogen/thermonuclear bomb is not a simple thing. From the interior to the exterior. They had the H-bomb because they needed something that would put other nations in their place and that they would know that something bad would happen if this did not stop. There have been many thermonuclear bombs in these nations(U.S., Russia, etc). The H-bomb symbolized that the war was turning nuclear and that something was to fear if this didn't stop. Well, that's not all about the H-bomb trust me, but this is just a brief summary. See you soon! (:

The "forgotten" war!

The image on the right shows us just how bad the Korean War got. It also shows one of the results of a fued between Nation's, or the Western Superpowers. Whom of which is the United States and the Soviet Union.

The Korean War erupted on June 25, 1950 and was one of five major tensions during the Cold War. Before the Korean War even started, we believed that something was going to happen but never knew when. So when the Soviet Union, who did not want to get directly involved in the fighting, was trying to start something and spread the communist way of life throughout the world, we couldn't just stand there and watch. The Soviet's would start out and supply weapons and supplies to North Korea. When the North Korean's finally realized that communism was the way to go they joined forces with the Soviets. More plans were being developed to try and achieve their goal of a nation under communism which involved invading and converting the lower, anti-communism half of Korea(South) to communism. Before the Cold War even began and during the second world war, Korea was split in half by an imaginary line which is called the the 38^th parallel. They did this to represent the communist half, which is the North and the anti-communist half of Korea, which is the South. On June 25, in order to convert South Korea to communism, North Korea (under the rule of Kim Il Sung at this time) decided to go through with their plan and took over South Korea which is known as the beginnings of the Korean War. The United States only got involved because they did not want to seem soft on communism, not because Korea was vital to the United States interests. To the United States all of the things that were happening were somewhat surprising, because just a few years after letting China turn communist and go under the Soviet Union's wing without getting too involved that we start getting tangled within an Asian land war over the fate of strategically challenged Korea. So due to all these issues adding up, this war went about being an important shift to the U.S. Cold War foreign policy.

An important event within the Korean War is whenever the US, UN and South Korean(ROK) forces were pinned against the sea at Pusan and General MacArthur thought to orchastrate a sneaky amphibious or water attack on Inchon, which is a port on the Western Coast of Korea. By making this landing, the United States came out very successful-they hypothetically crushed the North Korean troops and took back the capital of South Korea, Seoul. People would think that this victory would satisfy MacArthur, but not exactly. Him and his troops crossed the 38th parallel and pursued the North Korean army all the way to the northmost parts of North Korea. When China heard this they reacted very cleverly and decided to plan a "sneak attack" on the U.S. troops. Only after the appointment of Lt. General Matthew Ridgeway as commander of ground forces did the Americans improve and the initiative began to swing against the Chinese Communists. When this all started to settle down and Truman ultimately wanted to end the war, MacArthur being the brilliant strategist that he was decided to ignore the presidents request/orders and went about formulating ideas/plans to hopefully reunite Korea. When Truman caught wind of this and after he consulted and got permission from the Joint Chiefs of Staff(JCS) he was ultimately pushed to the point to where he had to relieve General MacArthur of his duties. This is when Lt. General Matthew Ridgeway took his place to lead the U.S. troops. American citizens who agreed with and liked MacArthur did not agree that this decision was not the greatest choice, but once they knew of what he had done and thought it was truly the wiser decision did they finally see eye-to-eye.

There were many results of the Korean War, one of them being a truly significant result which was that it gave the United States a reason to increase its military expenditure. The Korean War also strengthened the United States' relationship with Britain, which sent troops for the UN "peace-keeping" force. Another important result of the Korean War was that the Chinese had appeared less and less. And also, the Korean War proved the tenacity and skill of the Communist Asian military. We also revisited this topic during the Vietnam War(1962), which is another tension of the Cold War. The Korean War also showed the impact a single individual can have on history. General MacArthur's brilliant strategies, willfulness, and refusal to obey orders dramatically influenced the outcome of the war, in both positive and negative ways. And lastly, the Korean War demonstrated the new terms of the new post-WWII era, and showed how difficult it would be to fight a limited war under those terms. Although the United States attempted to keep the war on a very small scale, it quickly snowballed out of proportion, involving China, at times seeming as if it might become a World War III. Looked at another way, though, the Korean War can be considered a success: although the war did at times get out of hand, the US and the USSR were able to avoid direct confrontation, especially since the USSR fought mainly by proxy. And lastly, the Korean War showed us and made us realize how difficult it would have been to fight in a limited war under the terms of the post-war era. The only real bad outcome of the Korean War was that it "snowballed" out of proportion and almost became World War 3 because we mistakeingly got involved with China. But if we look at this war in a different way, the Korean War was actually a success, because even though it got out of hand, at times, the United States and the Soviet Union managed to keep it under raps and suprisingly managed to not fight directly to avoid military confrontation. But most important of all is that the Korean War was not an atomic battle, thankfully! Well, that's about if for the Korean War! See you soon,(:

The first major, international crisis of the Cold War!

This picture represents or shows some of the people in Berlin watching as some United States pilots flew into Berlin carrying food and supplies for the people. The sight of the U.S. planes gave them a sense of security and hope.

The Berlin Airlift was the first major event in the Cold War. This was whenever the Communist Soviet Union government closed all traffic going in and out of West Berlin and basically held them hostage. Their ultimate goal was to gain practical control on the entire city. So they decided to force the Western powers(Britain and the United States) into the Soviet zone to bring food and supplies to Berlin to luer them in to their trap. Just as the planned, When the Western powers caught wind of what the Soviets were doing they came to rescue Berlin. Between June 1948 and September 1949 alone, pilots made over 277,000 flights into West Berlin, carrying more than two million tons of products including coal for fuel. What the Soviets didn't think of was that it would actually work and ultimatly drive themselves to lifting the blockade on West Berlin. By the spring of 1949, the effort was clearly succeeding, and by April the airlift was delivering more cargo than had previously flowed into the city by rail. Due to the Soviets appearant loss, they were ultimatly driven to the point of lifting the blockade. Everything started to settle down after this major tension, but the fight against the Soviets and communism is still upon us.