GRC - During the Truman Administration, 1945-1953 (Lesson)

During the Truman Administration, 1945-1953

Truth never damages a cause that is just. -Mohandas Gandhi, from Nonviolence in Peace and War, 1948

In the United States, President Truman rose to power following the death of his predecessor during World War II. His administration spanned the beginning of the Cold War, most of the Korean War, the formation and earliest activities of the United Nations and the start of decolonization. As you read through the timeline of world events that occurred during his presidency, keep in mind the background information that you read in the previous lesson to help stay focused as we jump around the world.

 

March 22, 1945—International

  • Flag of the Arab LeagueThe Arab League, or League of Arab States, formed in March 1945 with six original members—Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan (later named Jordan,) Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Syria—to promote cooperation among members regarding economic, social and foreign policies and to promote their common interests. Most of the Arab nations of the Middle East and North Africa won their independence in stages after World War II. Over the years, the League has grown to include 22 member nations and four observer nations.

August 6-9, 1945—Japan

  • On August 6th and 9th of 1945, the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan. The resulting destruction led to two things—the end of World War II and the beginning of an arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union (USSR.)

July 1945—International

  • With the stated goal of the reduction of poverty, the World Bank formed in 1945 as an international financial organization that gave loans to countries in need. Most of the money from the loans they granted went to the building up of a nation's infrastructure—seaports, highway systems, power plants—in order to allow the nation to generate more income. As of the 21st Century, the organization still remains a subset of the United Nations but grants loans in other areas—education, environmental protection, health, development, gender equality and extreme poverty—and to other entities besides national governments.

Flag of the United NationsOctober 24, 1945—International

  • In October 1945, the United Nations opened its doors for business. As an intergovernmental organization, its goals included the promotion of international cooperation and to create and maintain international order. To this end, the United Nations differed in the structure of its predecessor—the League of Nations—in many areas, including the creation of a UN peacekeeping forces.

December 27, 1945—International

  • Formed during the same meeting as the World Bank and the United Nations, the International Monetary Fund actually opened its doors in December 1945. Its main purpose was to promote stability of the world's currencies. To that end, it provides a pool of money for nations to use to balance their deficits.

February 24, 1946—Argentina

  • Juan and Eva PeronThree years earlier, Colonel Juan Perón helped lead a military coup against the government of Argentina. He then spent the next three years as the nation's labor minister, ushering in a number of reforms supported by the organized labor movements in his country. Riding on their support, Perón won a presidential election in 1946. Stressing Argentine nationalism, Perón (and his popular wife Evita) gained wide support by the Argentinian masses until his regime started resembling an ever-increasingly harsh dictatorship. In 1955, Perón was on the receiving end of a military coup that threw him out of power. The following decades saw a period of political chaos in Argentina—a nation that had been among the wealthiest in the world at the turn of the 20th century. [Side Note: During Perón's first term in office, Argentina became a haven for fleeing Nazi war criminals—among the most noted were Josef Mengele (a former doctor at Auschwitz known for his "experiments" on prisoners) and Adolf Eichmann (the Nazi officer responsible for implementing the Final Solution during the Holocaust.)]

July 4, 1946—The Philippines

  • In July 1946, the United States signed the Treaty of Manilla granting full independence to the Republic of the Philippines. The Philippines originally came under the American umbrella following the Spanish-American War of 1898. While the Philippines received its independence, other nations—Guam and Puerto Rico—acquired during the same war remained as American territories.

October 24, 1946—Science & Technology

  • Taken from an altitude of 65 miles, a camera strapped to a missile launched from New Mexico captured the first grainy images of the earth from space. Within minutes, the rocket climbed straight up through the atmosphere and then crashed back to earth—but not before taking multiple pictures of the earth from space—and also launching a race to space between the Cold War nations.

FIrst Photo from Space

 

December 19, 1946—Vietnam

  • The Indochina War began in 1946 and lasted until 1954. This was the war fought by the Vietminh to end French colonial rule in Vietnam following World War II. From the onset, both sides of the war were supported by Cold War nations—Ho Chi Minh (the leader of the Viet Minh) received assistance from China and the Soviet Union while France received aid from the United States.   Culminating in the Battle of Dien Bien Phu, the Indochina war ended when the city fell to the Vietminh. After the treaty was signed to end the war, the north became a communist state under Ho Chi Minh known as the Democratic Republic of Vietnam while the south became a non-communist state eventually led by Ngo Dinh Diem known as the Republic of Vietnam.

March 12, 1947—United States

  • In March 1947, United States President Harry S. Truman announced the Truman Doctrine—a policy that declared the United States would provide political, military, and economic assistance to any democratic nation under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces. This new policy was a change for the United States away from its isolationist past and announced to the world that it was embracing a more international and powerful role and, ultimately, led to the creation of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO.) The Truman Doctrine was the basis for the United States' policy of containment—the policy to keep communism contained to those nations in which it already existed—that led to the Domino Theory and American involvement in a lot of "hotspots" during the Cold War.

August 15, 1947—India & Pakistan

  • Map of the partition of IndiaThe Partition of British India in 1947 marked the independence of two nations out of the former British Raj—India and Pakistan. But it also marked a period of violence between the two new neighbors. The Radcliffe Line, as the division was called, displaced roughly ten to twelve million people along religious lines that created an overwhelming refugee crisis for both of the new nations. And the violence that accompanied the partition—including the 1948 assassination of Mohandas Gandhi by a Hindu Indian that blamed him for the partition—created an animosity between India and Pakistan that still exists. Since 1947, India and Pakistan have fought a series of wars—Indo-Pakistani Wars—over their border.

September 18, 1947—United States

  • In September, 1947, the United States opened the doors of a new agency—the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA.) The purpose of the CIA was to collect, evaluate and distribute information on the military, political, economic, scientific, technological, and social conditions of other nations—primarily those that the United States distrusted—and has always been a somewhat controversial agency within and without the borders of the United States. This is especially true regarding its role in weakening or discrediting certain foreign governments and its meddling in foreign elections over its history which began in the 1948 Italian election and continued on throughout its existence all over the world (sometimes in the form of coups to topple "unfriendly" governments. You'll read more about that later.)

October 14, 1947—Science & Technology

  • This is the official date given for the first time the sound barrier was broken by a pilot in level flight (meaning he wasn't diving) by American pilot, Chuck Yeager.

April 7, 1948—International

  • In 1948, the United Nations founded the special agency of the World Health Organization (WHO) to address concerns involving international public health. Through vaccinations, educational programs, provision of resources and other steps, the WHO worked to control the spread of diseases while improving the health of everyone on the planet. One of its largest projects was the eradication of smallpox (a disease that through the centuries struck peasants and kings alike and had been used in the past for biological warfare.) In 1979, WHO scientists confirmed that smallpox had been wiped out from the planet.

May 14, 1948—Israel & Palestine

  • Founded in May 1948 by the United Nations, the nation of Israel became a national homeland for Jews around the world. However, the choice for its location—within Palestine—immediately caused conflict for the region. Immediately after its founding, Israel faced a war against a coalition of five of its Arab neighbors. The result of the first Arab-Israeli War was a gain of territory for Israel, an Egyptian claim to the Gaza Strip, and a Jordanian claim on the West Bank—but nothing for the Palestinian population. The lines drawn following this war held until the next Arab-Israeli War in 1967.

Raising the Israeli flag

 

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