1950: Korea, A Stronghold of Cold War Struggle
It had been almost five years since the end of World War II, and the US was facing a new conflict, in Korea. This tiny Asian peninsula had been divided along the 49th parallel. Communists set up a regime in the North, and capitalists set up a regime in the South. The communist regime was led by 38-year old Kim Il-Sung. The capitalist regime was led by 75-year old Syng Man Rhee. Both of them were corrupt power-mongers who kept a tight grip and dreamt of reunifying their country under their own philosophies. On June 25th, 1950, Stalin greenlit a Northern invasion of South Korea. With Soviet aid, Northern troops advanced allong the parallel, and captured Seoul in just three days. The UN condemned the attack, and under American leadership, assembled a team of nations to protect the South. The fighting continued for 3 years until a stalemate was reached, without any real winner.
The Korean War is historical as the first of various proxy wars during the Cold War. Rather than fighting directly, the US and the Soviet Union sponsored local conflicts in other countries which represented or maintained their individual interests, while still eying each other directly. Vietnam, the Congo and North Yemen are other examples of proxy conflicts during the postwar era.
1955: Montgomery and the Civil Rights
On December 1st, 1955, an Afro-American woman, Rosa Parks, was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give her bus seat to a white passenger. In response to this act, various civil rights activists led a mass protest against the bus system and its laws. The protest was started by Jo Ann Robinson, leader of the Woman’s Political Council (WPC) and E.D. Nixon, president of the local NAACP. They printed leaflets about Parks’ arrest and called for a one-day boycott on buses. The boycott started on the evening of December 5th. The protest put Rev. Martin Luther King, a Baptist shepherd from Montgomery, in the spotlight as one of the key leaders in the civil rights movement.
The Montgomery Bus Boycott is one of the first mass protests of the civil rights movement. It inspired other Southern populations to protest for their own rights, and managed to change the laws of bus system a few months later. As such, it remains one of the most important episodes in civil rights history, American history, and postwar history.
1957: Sputnik I and the Space Race
1959: Castro and Communism in Latin
America
The Cold War didn’t only involve espionage and proxy wars, but also space exploration. On the evening of October 4th, 1957, just in time for the 40th anniversary of the October Revolution in Moscow, the Soviet Union launched a small sphere into the Earth’s low orbit. The sphere was a polished 58-in-diameter metal sphere with four external radio antennas to measure radiometric pulses. The sphere’s name was Sputnik I, and it was the first artifical satellite. Sputnik I orbitted the Earth for three weeks before its batteries died out, and then silently for two more months before falling back onto the atmosphere.
This small sphere made history as the world’s first manmade satellite, and most importantly, as the inauguration of the Space Race. The Soviet Union’s surprise success spurred panic and alarm in the US and its allies, as they feared that the Soviet Union was ahead in technological advances and space exploration. One year later, the Americans launched Explorer I. The Space Race was the competition between the two blocs to see who could get ahead on space exploration. It finished in 1969, when the American mission Apollo XI successfully put a man on the moon. The launch of the Sputnik hightened tensions between the two blocs and marked the beginning of a new era of technological advances.
The US government was already worried that the Soviet Union was ahead in missile development and space exploration. Now, as tbe 50's came to a close, they were worried because communism had arrived to their backyard. 90 miles South from the coastal state of Florida lies the tiny island of Cuba. In 1959, a young lawyer named Fidel Castro managed to overthrow US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista, who fled the island. Castro seized power and became the new president of the island. His regime set up schools, hospitals and roads, but he was a communist that seized private property and took control of the media. Like other communists, Castro was corrupt with no democratic goals, but to some people he was a Robin Hood who fought for the rights of the poor. Castro remained as dictator of the island for almost 50 years, until he resigned in 2007 due to poor health.
The Cuban Revolution is an important event in the Cold War era. Castro had managed to set up the first communist regime in the Western Hemisphere. This event then emerged into a crisis which became the closest that the world was to World War III and nuclear holocaust.