Global Conflict and Civil Rights

Unit Review Sheet

Facts and Definitions

Lesson 1: The Post-War World

• Historians estimate that approximately 50-80 million people died as a result of World War II.
• Military needs created new technologies during the war that could be repurposed and developed for peacetime applications after the war's end.
• Wartime production of aircraft, uniforms, weapons, and other military necessities increased the industrial capacity of many countries and led to post-war economic booms.
• After soldiers returned home from the war and families settled into home lives amid the prosperity of the postwar economy, many couples started or increased the size of their families, resulting in a baby boom in the late 1940s and 1950s.

Lesson 2: The Cold War and Communism

• The Cold War refers to the post-World War II tensions and military arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union.
• Communism is a social and political system in which, in theory, the means of production and resources of the nation are owned jointly and shared equitably. Ideally, there would be no socioeconomic classes in a communist system because all workers would contribute to and share the benefits of economic activities.
• The Truman Doctrine was a 1947 policy in which President Truman committed to providing military and economic aid to any nation facing threats from communist or authoritarian forces either internally or externally.
• The Marshall Plan, set in action in 1948, devoted millions of American dollars for the rebuilding of western Europe after World War II. The idea behind the plan was that if Europe remained economically devastated, communism would seem appealing to everyday workers and more countries might become communist nations.

Lesson 3: The Cold War

• The Bay of Pigs Invasion was an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro's government in Cuba in which the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency trained and funded counter-revolutionary forces in Cuba and planned an invasion.
• The Cuban Missile Crisis was a 13-day diplomatic crisis between the U.S. and the Soviet Union in which the nations came closer to nuclear war than at any other point in history.
• The Red Scare refers to a time in the late 1940s and early 1950s when many were afraid of communist activities in the U.S.
• The House Unamerican Activities Committee (HUAC) investigated Americans who were suspected of having communist sympathies.

Lesson 4: Civil Rights

• Rosa Parks became famous when she refused to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama, but teenager Claudette Colvin had done the same thing several months earlier.
• The Montgomery Bus Boycott was an example of non-violent protest in support of equality. Citizens, led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., refused to ride the city buses. Eventually, the segregation was ruled unconstitutional and Montgomery was forced to integrate its bus system.

Lesson 5: Sit-Ins and Freedom Rides

• Sit ins were non-violent protests of segregation.
• SNCC was the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee
• The March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in 1963 brought a quarter of a million people to Washington D.C. in support of civil rights.
• The Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
• The 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama was bombed in September of 1963. Four young girls were killed.

Lesson 6: The Ballot

• Freedom Summer brought hundreds of college students to the South to register voters and teach in Freedom Schools.
• The backlash against the Civil Rights Movement was intense and often violent. Activists were beaten, severely injured, and sometimes murdered by those who opposed their work.
• The Voting Rights Act of 1965 outlawed unfair voting practices and gave the federal government the power to enforce equitable voting standards throughout the United States.

Lesson 7: New Directions and Other Social Movements

• By the mid-1960s, there were some tensions in the Civil Rights Movement as some people branched out into other forms of social justice organizing and as some young activists questioned the strategies of those in power and looked to more militant leadership.
• The Community Service Organization, led by Cesar Chavez and Fred Ross, helped farm laborers improve their quality of life and organize for better working conditions and political action.

Lesson 8: Korea

• Korea was ruled by Japan from 1910 until the end of World War II. Agreements at the end of the war took away all of Japan's colonies including Korea.
• Korea was temporarily divided to facilitate the surrender of Japanese troops, but the line along which it was divided became a line between communist and non-communist powers in Korea.
• When communist forces pushed into South Korea, the United Nations sent in troops from 15 countries to defend the non-communist South. The U.S. devoted the most troops to this effort.
• The Korean War failed to unify Korea, and it set the stage, in many ways, for the conflict in Vietnam that would follow.

Lesson 9: Vietnam

• The "Domino Effect" was the idea that if South Vietnam fell under communist control, it would lead to other places falling to communism and increase the communist threat in Asia.
• Agent Orange was a chemical spray that destroyed foliage, removing the jungle cover that Vietnamese troops used to hide.
• The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution authorized the president to take the steps that brought the U.S. into the war in Vietnam.
• The Tet Offensive demonstrated to the American people that the Vietnam War would not be over quickly, eroding support for the war at home.

Lesson 10: The Culture of the 1960s

• The communities of young people who experimented with communal living, peaceful protest, rebellion against cultural standards, and sometimes mind-altering drugs became known as the counter-culture or "hippies."
• By the 1960s, televisions were present in most American homes.

Final Project: A Time Capsule

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