Transcript USH 17-2 JFK and the Cold War

USH 17-2
JFK and the Cold War
• “Flexible Response”
– Thought Eisenhower’s “Brinksmanship” too harsh
– Built up troops and conventional weapons
– Expanded Special Forces
Aid to Other Countries
• Wanted better relations with Latin America
• “Alliance for Progress”
– Provide aid to Latin American countries
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Schools
Housing
Health care
Land distribution
– Mixed results
Aid to Other Countries
• Peace Corps
– Americans sent to poverty-stricken countries to
provide aid
– Still very active today
Cold War in Space
• Soviets first to send man in space (1961)
– Yuri Gagarin
– Kennedy worried world will see communism as
superior
– Kennedy sets huge goal:
• Put a man on the moon by end of the decade (60s)
Cold War in Space
• John Glenn first American in space (1962)
• Three men sent into space in “Apollo” (1965)
• July 20, 1969
– Neil Armstrong
– Buzz Aldrin
– Michael Collins
• Humans land on the moon
• Armstrong first human to walk on moon
• U.S. ‘wins’ the space race
Crises in the Cold War
• The Bay of Pigs
– Cuba becomes communist
– C.I.A. secretly trains ex-Cubans for uprising
– Invasion a disaster
– U.S. looks disorganized
Crises in the Cold War
• The Berlin Wall
– Nikita Khrushchev, Soviet leader
– Flood of East Germans going in to West Germany
– Soviets build a massive wall to keep people form
leaving
• Became the visible symbol of the Cold War
Crises in the Cold War
• Cuban Missile Crisis
– U.S. uses satellite photos to show Cuba is home to
Russian missiles
– U.S. sends naval blockade to Cuba
– Russia agrees to leave Cuba
• U.S. takes missiles out of Turkey
– Closest world has come yet to nuclear war
Death of the President
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Dallas, Texas November 22, 1963
Lee Harvey Oswald shoots Kennedy twice
Jack Ruby kills Oswald days later
Warren Commission
– Investigated the assassination
Death of the President