COLD WAR IN ASIA

CHINA’S COMMUNIST REVOLUTION Mao Zedong led Communist forces against Nationalists Emerged victorious How? Won over the peasants (majority of population) Nationalist policies hurt economy Conquered city after city

CHANGING CHINESE SOCIETY Collectivization-forced pooling of peasant land and labor in an attempt to increase productivity Great Leap Forward (1958-1960) Establish communes (commonly owned & operated farms/communities) Goal-increase farm/industry output FAILURE

THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION Goal (1966)-purge China of bourgeois tendencies Red Guard-young Chinese revolutionaries who led purge Any bourgeois beaten or killed Skilled workers/managers sent to manual labor camps Schools & factories closed Another MASSIVE FAILURE

CHINA-COLD WAR WILD CARD China goes Communist in 1949 Huge gain for Soviets, huge loss for U.S. Not for long! Split from Soviet Union (1960) Distrust & conflict over territory dating back hundreds of years

KOREAN CONFLICT Conquered by Japan during WWII U.S. & Soviet Union decided to split the country at the 38th Parallel North Korea-ruled by Kim Il Sung (Communist), backed by Soviet Union South Korea-ruled by a dictator North invades, China assists & U.S. gets involved---STALEMATE 1953-Armistice signed, troops remained dug in at the demilitarized zone (DMZ)

COMMUNISM IN EAST ASIA Ho Chi Minh- leader of Communist forces in Indochina Led guerrilla fighters in overthrow of the French (1954) Vietnam divided by U.S. & Soviet Union into North & South North-Communist South-Democratic

COMMUNISM IN EAST ASIA Ho Chi Minh aided the Viet Cong Communist rebels attempting to overthrow South Vietnamese government U.S. declares war against Vietnam (1954-1975)….why? Domino Theory-one Southeast Asian country falls to Communism, others will follow

VIETNAM WAR (1955-1975) Guerrilla War- War fought in jungles, Viet Cong had the upper hand Traditional army can’t cope with guerrilla tactics (parallel to American Rev/Modern Wars) Local villagers sympathized w/Viet Cong, helped them Made civilians military targets----atrocities committed Tet Offensive-North Vietnamese forces launched massive raids during Vietnamese New Year Militarily not a success, but turned public opinion against the war in the U.S.

VIETNAM WAR-PUBLIC OPINION No more body bags Television footage of burned villages Young People leading mass demonstrations in the streets “I want to get out, but I don’t want to give up” Military didn’t lose, the public did American forces withdraw, and within months South Vietnam is crushed by North Vietnamese forces Some dominoes fell, but not as bad as we thought

COLLAPSE OF THE SOVIET UNION Command Economy stagnated while the West blossomed Massive military budgets, space race, building nuclear weapons bankrupted the Soviets They could no longer keep up with the United States http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/fall-of- soviet-union/videos/the-fall-of-the-soviet-union

SOVIET UNION’S VIETNAM--AFGHANISTAN 1979-Soviets became involved in lengthy war in Afghanistan Soviet-supported Afghan gov’t tried to change, but regional landlords revolted Mujahedin-Muslim religious warriors fought the Soviet forces American government smuggled modern weaponry to mujahedin Russian left, defeated & U.S. abandoned the mujahedin

MIKHAIL GORBACHEV Came to power in 1985 Economy in the tank, Army stuck in Afghanistan Reform! Glasnost-”openness”; ended censorship, encouraged people to discuss gov’t problems openly Perestroika- restructuring of the government & economy

REFORMS FAIL Too much, too fast Shortages, higher prices, higher unemployment 1989-1991-Eastern European countries split from the U.S.S.R., claiming their independence & then the remaining republics declared independence Berlin Wall falls, November 9, 1989 http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/berlin-wall Soviet hard-liners attempted to overthrow Gorbachev, but they failed and Gorbachev resigned By the end of 1991, the Soviet Union ceased to exist