Outline of US History by U.S. Department of State - HTML preview

CHAPTER 13: DECADES OF CHANGE: 1960-1980

KENNEDY AND THE

that Kennedy had risked nuclear di-

COLD WAR

saster when quiet diplomacy might

P

have been effective . But most Ameri-

resident Kennedy came into of- cans and much of the non-Commu-

fice pledging to carry on the Cold nist world applauded his decisiveness .

War vigorously, but he also hoped The missile crisis made him for the

for accommodation and was reluc- first time the acknowledged leader of

tant to commit American power . the democratic West .

During his first year-and-a-half

In retrospect, the Cuban mis-

in office, he rejected American in- sile crisis marked a turning point

tervention after the CIA-guided

in U .S .-Soviet relations . Both sides

Cuban exile invasion at the Bay of saw the need to defuse tensions that

Pigs failed, effectively ceded the could lead to direct military con-

landlocked Southeast Asian nation flict . The following year, the United

of Laos to Communist control, and States, the Soviet Union, and Great

acquiesced in the building of the Britain signed a landmark Limited

Berlin Wall . Kennedy’s decisions Test Ban Treaty prohibiting nuclear

reinforced impressions of weakness weapons tests in the atmosphere .

that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrush-

Indochina (Vietnam, Laos, Cam-

chev had formed in their only per- bodia), a French possession before

sonal meeting, a summit meeting at World War II, was still another Cold

Vienna in June 1961 .

War battlefield . The French effort to

It was against this backdrop that reassert colonial control there was

Kennedy faced the most serious opposed by Ho Chi Minh, a Viet-

event of the Cold War, the Cuban namese Communist, whose Viet

missile crisis .

Minh movement engaged in a guer-

In the fall of 1962, the adminis- rilla war with the French army .

tration learned that the Soviet Union

Both Truman and Eisenhower,

was secretly instal ing offensive nu- eager to maintain French support for

clear missiles in Cuba . After con- the policy of containment in Europe,

sidering different options, Kennedy provided France with economic aid

decided on a quarantine to prevent that freed resources for the struggle

Soviet ships from bringing addition- in Vietnam . But the French suffered

al supplies to Cuba . He demanded a decisive defeat in Dien Bien Phu in

publicly that the Soviets remove the May 1954 . At an international confer-

weapons and warned that an attack ence in Geneva, Laos and Cambodia

from that island would bring retali- were given their independence . Viet-

ation against the USSR . After sever- nam was divided, with Ho in power

al days of tension, during which the in the North and Ngo Dinh Diem, a

world was closer than ever before to Roman Catholic anti-Communist in

nuclear war, the Soviets agreed to a largely Buddhist population, head-

remove the missiles . Critics charged ing the government in the South .

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OUTLINE OF U.S. HISTORY

Elections were to be held two years

After Kennedy’s death, President

later to unify the country . Persuaded Lyndon Johnson enthusiastically

that the fall of Vietnam could lead to supported the space program . In

the fall of Burma, Thailand, and In- the mid-1960s, U .S . scientists devel-

donesia, Eisenhower backed Diem’s oped the two-person Gemini space-

refusal to hold elections in 1956 and craft . Gemini achieved several firsts, effectively established South Viet- including an eight-day mission in

nam as an American client state .

August 1965 — the longest space

Kennedy increased assistance, flight at that time — and in No-

and sent small numbers of military vember 1966, the first automatically

advisers, but a new guerrilla strug- controlled reentry into the Earth’s

gle between North and South con- atmosphere . Gemini also accom-

tinued . Diem’s unpopularity grew plished the first manned linkup of

and the military situation wors- two spacecraft in flight as well as the

ened . In late 1963, Kennedy secretly first U .S . walks in space .

assented to a coup d’etat . To the

The three-person Apol o space-

president’s surprise, Diem and his craft achieved Kennedy’s goal and

powerful brother-in-law, Ngo Dien demonstrated to the world that the

Nu, were killed . It was at this uncer- United States had surpassed Soviet

tain juncture that Kennedy’s presi- capabilities in space . On July 20,

dency ended three weeks later .

1969, with hundreds of millions of

television viewers watching around

THE SPACE PROGRAM

the world, Neil Armstrong became

D

the first human to walk on the sur-

uring Eisenhower’s second face of the moon .

term, outer space had become an

Other Apol o flights followed, but

arena for U .S .-Soviet competition . many Americans began to question

In 1957, the Soviet Union launched the value of manned space flight . In

Sputnik — an artificial satellite — the early 1970s, as other priorities thereby demonstrating it could became more pressing, the United

build more powerful rockets than States scaled down the space pro-

the United States . The United States gram . Some Apol o missions were launched its first satellite, Explorer I, scrapped; only one of two proposed in 1958 . But three months after Ken- Skylab space stations was built .

nedy became president, the USSR

put the first man in orbit . Kennedy

DEATH OF A PRESIDENT

responded by committing the Unit-

ed States to land a man on the moon John Kennedy had gained world

and bring him back “before this de- prestige by his management of the

cade is out .” With Project Mercury Cuban missile crisis and had won

in 1962, John Glenn became the first great popularity at home . Many be-

U .S . astronaut to orbit the Earth .

lieved he would win re-election eas-

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