3. Empire, Cold War, and Decolonization, 1945–53

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
Formed Part ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This chapter examines decolonization and the changes that took place within the European empires during the early years of the Cold War. Decolonization constituted a crucial element of the new international order after the Second World War and formed part of the broader shift in the global balance of power. The war marked the end of the European-dominated system of nation states and was followed by the decline of the major European powers, with international dominance lying for a quarter of a century with the United States, challenged only by the Soviet Union. The chapter considers the challenges to colonial rule that were evident in both Africa and Asia during the inter-war years. It also discusses the imperialism and the struggles against it that have formed part of a post-war landscape in the Middle East.

3. Empire, Cold War, and Decolonization, 1945–53

2020 ◽  
pp. 70-102
Author(s):  
John W. Young ◽  
John Kent
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Nation States ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
Formed Part ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This chapter examines decolonization and the changes that took place within the European empires during the early years of the Cold War. Decolonization constituted a crucial element of the new international order after the Second World War and formed part of the broader shift in the global balance of power. The war marked the end of the European-dominated system of nation states and was followed by the decline of the major European powers, with international dominance lying for a quarter of a century with the United States, challenged only by the Soviet Union. The chapter considers the challenges to colonial rule that were evident in both Africa and Asia during the inter-war years. It also discusses the imperialism and the struggles against it that have formed part of a post-war landscape in the Middle East.

FROM WORLD WAR TO COLD WAR: THE WARTIME ALLIANCE AND POST-WAR TRANSITIONS, 1941–1947

2002 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 211-227 ◽  
Author(s):  
DAVID REYNOLDS
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
World War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Social ◽  
Post War ◽  
The One ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This review examines some of the recent British, American, and Russian scholarship on a series of important international transitions that occurred in the years around 1945. One is the shift of global leadership from Great Britain to the United States, in which, it is argued, the decisive moment was the fall of France in 1940. Another transition is the emergence of a wartime alliance between Britain and America, on the one hand, and the Soviet Union, on the other, followed by its disintegration into the Cold War. Here the opening of Soviet sources during the 1990s has provided new evidence, though not clear answers. To understand both of these transitions, however, it is necessary to move beyond diplomacy and strategy to look at the social, cultural, and economic dimensions of the Second World War. In particular, recent studies of American and Soviet soldiers during and after the conflict re-open the debate about Cold War ideology from the bottom up.

In a Changing America

Arthur Szyk ◽  
2004 ◽  
pp. 217-232
Author(s):  
Joseph P. Ansell
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Early Years ◽  
The Political ◽  
World War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Freedom Struggles ◽  
Second World

This chapter encompasses Arthur Szyk's final years. It shows his continued dedication to freedom struggles around the world even as it contemplates on the dwindling number of exhibitions he held during this period. During this time, the United States was also turning inward after the Second World War. This attitude was one which Szyk did not share and which his work, with its liberal and international themes, did not support. Moreover, the chapter reveals his growing sympathy towards the Soviet Union, which was so evident in the political cartoons and related works from the years of alliance during the Second World War. It also shows that, by the early years of the Cold War, his health was somewhat precarious, forcing him to choose his activities carefully.

“It Is a Day of Judgment”: The Peacemakers, Religion, and Radicalism in Cold War America

2008 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 215-248 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leilah Danielson
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Leadership Roles ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Politics Of Resistance ◽  
The Cold War

AbstractThis article argues that Christian beliefs and concerns shaped the political culture of anti-nuclear activism in the early years of the Cold War. It focuses in particular on the origins of the Peacemakers, a group founded in 1948 by a mostly Protestant group of radical pacifists to oppose conscription and nuclear proliferation. Like others who came of age in the interwar years, the Peacemakers questioned the Enlightenment tradition, with its emphasis on reason and optimism about human progress, and believed that liberal Protestantism had accommodated itself too easily to the values of modern, secular society. But rather than adopt the “realist” framework of their contemporaries, who gave the United States critical support in its Cold War with the Soviet Union, radicals developed a politics of resistance rooted in a Christian framework in which repentance for dropping atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the first step toward personal and national redemption. Although they had scant influence on American policymakers or the public in the early years of the Cold War, widespread opposition to nuclear testing and U.S. foreign policy in the late 1950s and 1960s launched them into leadership roles in campaigns for nuclear disarmament and peace.

Growing Up Communist in the Netherlands and Britain

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elke Weesjes
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Political Movements ◽  
Growing Up ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This book documents communists' attempts, successful and otherwise, to overcome their isolation and to connect with the major social and political movements of the twentieth century. Communist parties in Britain and the Netherlands emerged from the Second World War expecting to play a significant role in post-war society, due to their domestic anti-fascist activities and to the part played by the Soviet Union in defeating fascism. The Cold War shattered these hopes, and isolated communist parties and their members. By analysing the accounts of communist children, Weesjes highlights their struggle to establish communities and define their identities within the specific cultural, social, and political frameworks of the Cold War period and beyond.

Growing Up Communist in the Netherlands and Britain

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elke Weesjes
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Political Movements ◽  
Growing Up ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This book documents communists’ attempts, successful and otherwise, to overcome their isolation and to connect with the major social and political movements of the twentieth century. Communist parties in Britain and the Netherlands emerged from the Second World War expecting to play a significant role in post-war society, due to their domestic anti-fascist activities and to the part played by the Soviet Union in defeating fascism. The Cold War shattered these hopes, and isolated communist parties and their members. By analysing the accounts of communist children, Weesjes highlights their struggle to establish communities and define their identities within the specific cultural, social, and political frameworks of the Cold War period and beyond.

The Accidental Political Advantages of a Nonpolitical Book Program

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victoria M. Grieve
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Cultural Diplomacy ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Us ◽  
Us Government ◽  
Written Word ◽  
The Cold War

In the early years of the Cold War, the US government devoted substantial energy and funds to using books as weapons against the Soviet Union. Books and the principles they represented were to counter Soviet accusations of American materialism and spread American ideals around the globe. Founded in 1952, Franklin Books Program, Inc. was a gray propaganda program that operated at the nexus of US public–private cultural diplomacy efforts. USIA bureaucrats believed Franklin successfully carried out diplomatic objectives by highlighting the positive aspects of American culture and those who ran Franklin emphasized the “nonpolitical” aspects of cultural diplomacy, many of which directly targeted children. Franklin’s textbooks and juvenile science books cultivated a literate population friendly to the United States, reaching out to foreign young people through books, which like art, seemed to transcend the written word and represent abstract ideals of freedom and democracy.

scholarly journals SIS, Grigori Tokaev, and the London Controlling Section: New Perspectives on a Cold War Defector and Cold War Deception

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (4) ◽  
pp. 517-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Huw Dylan
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Early Years ◽  
World War ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

This article examines British deception during the early years of the Cold War, and how a Soviet defector named Grigori Tokaev contributed to British plans and operations. Tokaev provided valuable insights into the Soviet Union, allowing British intelligence to craft more intricate deception operations, political and military. The manner in which he was used, and the extent to which his idiosyncrasies were tolerated, underline the difficulties the British authorities faced as they attempted to apply the lessons of the Second World War deception to the Cold War environment. The case offers new perspectives on both the relatively under-examined subject of British deception operations against the USSR, and the history of one of the most prominent Cold War defectors.

ABC’s Wide World of Sports

ABC Sports ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 33-62
Author(s):  
Travis Vogan
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
The United States ◽  
Early Years ◽  
Ski Jumping ◽  
Testing Ground ◽  
Saturday Afternoon ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
The Cold War

Chapter 2 turns to Wide World of Sports, ABC Sports’ signature show and the primary testing ground for its creative approach. The Saturday afternoon anthology possessed a meager budget that permitted it to secure rights to televise only the most marginal sports. Ski jumping and demolition derbies, for instance, were commonplace during its early years. The Cold War provided a way to dramatize many of the show’s prerecorded and otherwise unpopular events. The program established its popularity and gained much-needed acclaim when it carried a series of track meets between the United States and the Soviet Union that at once emphasized sports television’s capacity to cultivate international harmony and advertised ABC Sports as innovative and edifying.

Dutch Communism in Transition: The Unfolding of a National Cold War during Political Reconstruction, 1944–8

2017 ◽  
Vol 52 (4) ◽  
pp. 1042-1062
Author(s):  
Tijn Sinke
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Second World War ◽  
World War ◽  
Dutch Politics ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Natural Outcome ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Cold War ◽  
Second World

Within three years after the Second World War, the wartime alliance between the Western Allies and the Soviet Union, and between communist and bourgeois resistance forces, had collapsed. By 1948, Dutch communists found themselves in total isolation. Historians have generally treated this phenomenon in light of the ‘restoration’ of pre-war structures – including anticommunist attitudes – or by interpreting the Cold War as an international phenomenon ‘imposed’ on Dutch society. Neither view pays sufficient attention to the contingency of transition politics and the power struggle that was fought between 1944 and 1948. My project focuses on the Dutch Communist Party’s (CPN) attempt to forge a political breakthrough by forming a front of progressive forces against the ‘reaction’, and on the responses of non-communist political and intellectual actors. Instead of interpreting the 1948 stalemate as a ‘natural’ outcome, this article highlights the combination of historical anticommunism, dynamics of transition politics and strategic solidification that accounts for the emergence of the Dutch Cold War. The reinvention of the rules of Dutch politics during political reconstruction ultimately led to the ruination of the post-war communist breakthrough. This resembles the process going on in other European countries, but with important unique features.

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