Deck 7: East and West in the Grip of the Cold War

Question 1

Why did the People's Republic of China enter the Korean War?

A)Out of fear that hostile American military forces would be stationed on the Chinese frontier
B)In order to distract the Chinese public from its disastrous economic condition
C)Because the United Nations urged that China intervene in order to preserve peace

Answer 1

Out of fear that hostile American military forces would be stationed on the Chinese frontier

Question 2

The policy known as "containment" was authored by whom?

A)George Kennan
B)George C. Marshall
C)Joseph McCarthy

Answer 2

George Kennan

Question 3

In 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to temporarily divide the Korean peninsula at which line?

A)17th parallel
B)25th parallel
C)38th parallel

Answer 3

38th parallel

Question 4

In the Chinese Civil War, the United States followed which policy?

A)It supported Mao Zedong because it was apparent that the Communists would win.
B)It strongly supported Chiang Kai-shek and the nationalists, even promising to use atomic weapons if necessary.
C)It gave limited military aid to the nationalists, but it refused to be drawn into the conflict.

Question 5

The unified three Western zones in Germany officially became which of the following states?

A)German Democratic Republic
B)Federal Republic of Germany
C)United German Federation

Question 6

How is the outcome of the Cuban missile crisis best described?

A)A victory for the United States
B)A victory for the Soviet Union
C)Compromise that avoided nuclear war

Question 7

How is Mao Zedong's "mass line" best described?

A)Reduced rents on land and seized land from wealthy landlords
B)Confiscated the banks and industrial facilities from the bourgeoisie elite
C)Militarily defeated the nationalists in the Chinese Civil War

Question 8

Examples of the Soviet policy of "peaceful coexistence" included all except which of the following?

A)The Soviet intervention in Hungary
B)An end to the occupation of Austria
C)The Soviet government's call for a reduction in defense expenditures

Question 9

When the United States, Great Britain, and France began to plan for the unification of their three zones in western Germany, how did the Soviets respond?

A)Building the Berlin Wall
B)Starting the Berlin blockade
C)Running the Berlin Airlift

Question 10

One of the earliest disputes in the developing cold war was which of the following?

A)The overthrow of the government of Yugoslavia
B)Whether to divide Germany into zones of occupation
C)The political makeup of the postwar Polish government

Question 11

By the early 1960s, why were the Soviet Union and Communist China were becoming estranged?

A)The Soviet Union was urging Mao Zedong to attack Taiwan, but Mao was opposed.
B)The policies of the Soviet Union were becoming more radical while those of Communist China were becoming more moderate.
C)Mao wanted Soviet support for a Chinese Communist invasion of Taiwan, but the Soviet leadership was unwilling to provide it.

Question 12

What was the Soviet response to the Marshall Plan?

A)To eagerly embrace its offer of economic assistance
B)To reject it because it was an example of American economic and political imperialism
C)Cautiously accept it but with the proviso that no aid should be given to Germany because of the latter's responsibility for causing World War II

Question 13

"Containment" entailed which of the following objectives?

A)An immediate rollback of Soviet power in eastern Europe
B)Granting the Soviets the right to expand to the Rhine River but no farther
C)The vigilant application of a counter-force in reaction to shifting Soviet policies

Question 14

In the first Indochina war, Ho Chi Minh and the Vietminh Front fought against whom?

A)The United States
B)France
C)South Vietnam

Question 15

Which eastern European country resisted Communist takeover the longest?

A)Poland
B)Czechoslovakia
C)Bulgaria

Question 16

During World War II, in China, which of the following events occurred?

A)Chiang withheld his troops from the war against Japan and Mao increased the size of the People's Liberation Army.
B)Mao Zedong reduced the size of the People's Liberation Army, devoting himself to land reform and land redistribution.
C)Chiang and Mao engaged in a bloody civil war with each other.

Question 17

The eastern European Communist states organized a formal military alliance called what?

A)Prague Pact
B)Moscow Agreement
C)Warsaw Pact

Question 18

In which year did the United States begin to commit substantial numbers of ground troops to the Vietnam conflict?

A)1954
B)1964
C)1967

Question 19

The Geneva Agreement of 1954 had what effect?

A)It united Vietnam into one nation.
B)It awarded France the southern part of Vietnam.
C)It temporarily divided Vietnam into a Communist North and a non-Communist South.

Question 20

After being defeated by the Communists, Chiang Kai-shek and the nationalists fled to where?

A)Hong Kong
B)Manchuria
C)Taiwan

Question 21

What result did the Paris peace treaty of 1973 have?

A)It ended the war in Vietnam by dividing Vietnam at the 17th parallel.
B)It stated that American troops would be withdrawn from Vietnam and that both sides would attempt to achieve a political solution.
C)It stated that American troops would remain in Vietnam in order to keep the peace.

Question 22

Why did the United States and the Soviet Union initially support the Nationalists?

Question 23

Why did the Soviets want to build up a "buffer" of states in eastern Europe?

Question 24

Which eastern European Communist leader was most successful in resisting control by the Soviet Union?

A)Joseph Stalin
B)Josip Broz Tito
C)Walter Ulbricht

Question 25

By 1968, how is the war in Vietnam best described?

A)It was becoming a stalemate.
B)It was being won by North Vietnam.
C)It was being won by the United States.

Question 26

Why did the Korean War break out?

Question 27

What was the Truman Doctrine?

Question 28

Which 1975 agreement provided for the recognition of the Soviet sphere of influence in eastern Europe and the protection of the human rights of their citizens?

A)SALT II
B)The Helsinki Accords
C)The Equivalence Accord

Question 29

Why did Nationalist and Communist forces resume fighting with each other after World War II?

Question 30

Joseph Stalin eagerly desired Communist revolutions in western Europe, but he was willing to wait because he and Lenin believed in which of the following principles?

A)The west would voluntarily embrace communism.
B)Revolutions come in waves.
C)Communism must first come to China.

Question 31

Which American president reversed the U.S. policy toward Communist China and made a diplomatic visit to China?

A)John F. Kennedy
B)Lyndon B. Johnson
C)Richard Nixon

Question 32

What was the purpose of COMECON?

Question 33

The United States' threat to use military force if necessary to safeguard Western access to the Middle East's oil reserves is known as which of the following?

A)The Carter Doctrine
B)The Kennedy Doctrine
C)The Nixon Doctrine

Question 34

How is the policy of "equivalence" best described?

A)It assumed a balance of power on both sides could prevent war.
B)It was the diplomatic attempt to trade Soviet spies for Western spies after the construction of the Berlin Wall.
C)It found that western Europe and eastern Europe were equal in their military capacity.

Question 35

In the 1972 SALT I treaty, which of the following agreements was reached?

A)The United States agreed to withdraw its troops from Vietnam and only aid South Vietnam with nonnuclear missiles.
B)The Soviet Union and the United States agreed to set limits on their antiballistic missile systems.
C)Communist China and the Soviet Union agreed to resume diplomatic relations.

Question 36

What was the purpose of NATO?

Question 37

Détente refers to which of the following?

A)The destabilization of the relationship between the Soviet Union and the People's Republic of China.
B)The lessening of tensions after the Cuban missile crisis between the United States and the Soviet Union.
C)The deactivation of the hot line between Moscow and Washington, D.C., after the Bay of Pigs fiasco.

Question 38

When Nikita Khrushchev fell from power in 1964, he was replaced by whom?

A)Josip Broz Tito
B)Leonid Brezhnev
C)Mikhail Gorbachev

Question 39

Why did Yugoslavia escape Soviet control?

Question 40

What was "containment"?

Question 41

By 1947, Yugoslavia was giving support to the Communist insurgent movement in which country?

A)Czechoslovakia
B)Greece
C)Austria

Question 42

What does "détente" refer to?

Question 43

How did Khrushchev's regime respond to uprisings in Hungary in 1956?

Question 44

How was the CCP able to achieve victory in the Chinese Civil War?

Question 45

What was the Marshall Plan, what role did it play in the early Cold War, and how important was it to the reconstruction of Europe?

Question 46

What effect did the Tet Offensive have on the military operations of the Vietnam War? What effect did it have at home in the United States? Why is the Tet Offensive considered so important to the U.S. involvement in the war?

Question 47

How and why was West Germany formed?

Question 48

Why did the Vietminh form?

Question 49

What was the outcome of the Cuban Missile Crisis?

Question 50

What was domino theory?

Question 51

Why did the United States commit ground forces to the Vietnam War?

Question 52

What was the intent of Gorbachev's reforms?

Question 53

To what extent did Khrushchev reform the Soviet system, and to what extent did he carry on with his predecessors' policies?

Question 54

How successful were Khrushchev's foreign policies? Discuss at least two in your response.

Question 55

What was the result of US intervention in South Vietnamese politics?

Question 56

In 1946 in Fulton, Missouri, Winston Churchill described the onset of the Cold War in what terms?

A)As an iron curtain that had descended across Europe
B)As a corruption of socialism would lead to communism
C)As a sign that Britain would soon have to withdraw support from Greece

Question 57

What was the Brezhnev Doctrine?

Question 58

How did the Korean War and the first Vietnam War lead to a rupture between the United States and China? What were the implications of this rupture?

Question 59

What was the outcome of the Soviet-Afghan War?

Question 60

Why did the Soviet-Chinese relationship sour by 1961?

Question 61

How had the events of the late 1970s threatened the "détente"? What new policies and conflicts increased tensions the most?

Question 62

The European Recovery Program of 1947 is better known as which of the following?

A)The Truman Doctrine
B)The Marshall Plan
C)The Eisenhower Assistance Act

Question 63

Why do historians refer to the early Brezhnev period as a time of "détente" between the United States and the Soviet Union? To what extent is this justified?

Question 64

How is the Truman doctrine best described?

A)The United States would only aid the governments of western Europe against Communist insurgencies.
B)The Soviet Union must abandon control of the governments of eastern Europe.
C)The United States would support free peoples resisting Communist aggression.

Question 65

By 1948, the fate of which of the following European nations had become a source of bitter contention between the Soviet Union and the West?

A)Yugoslavia
B)Greece
C)Germany

Question 66

What consequences did Gorbachev's reforms have for the Soviet Union? Did they achieve their intended goals? Why or why not?

Question 67

The Truman doctrine in the first instance was to provide aid to which countries?

A)Yugoslavia and Austria
B)Greece and Turkey
C)Greece and Italy