Hotspots

• Communist North Korea invaded free South Korea

• United Nations sent troops—mostly US

• Communist China started fighting

• War ended with a stalemate (a tie)

• But communism was contained

REVIEW: KOREAN WAR

• Fidel Castro led a communist revolution in Cuba

• Many Cubans fled Cuba and moved to Florida

• The CIA trained these exiles to invade Cuba at the Bay of Pigs

• Big FAIL

REVIEW: CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS

• 1962—Soviets put missiles in Cuba

• President Kennedy demanded that they be removed

• For six days—war on brink of nuclear war

• Soviet leader Khrushchev “Blinked” and removed the missiles

REVIEW: CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS

KENNEDY AND KHRUSHCHEV

Communist North Vietnam tried to put a communist government in South Vietnam

1950S-EARLY 1960S

Why?

PRESIDENT JOHN F.

KENNEDY SENDS TROOPS,

1961-1962

Truman Doctrine—Contain Communism

The United States would “pay any price, bear any

burden, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the

success of liberty.”“Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you

can do for your country.”

JFK’S INAUGURAL SPEECH

• Vice President, Lyndon B. Johnson became the new President

• He sent even more troops.

• Did it go well? (Hint: Look at the picture.)

IN 1963, JFK ASSASSINATED.

• US tried to fight a limited war—not too many soldiers, no nuclear weapons

• Guerrilla warfare—Remember the Revolutionary War

• American troops defeated North Vietnamese troops in the field, but they could not force the end of the war

WHY DIDN’T THE US WIN WITH MORE

TROOPS?

MANY AMERICANS PROTESTED THE

WAR

• Ran for president on promise to “bring the war to an honorable end”

• Vietnamization—give the war to the South Vietnamese troops

• Failed—1975, South Vietnam falls to Communists

NEXT PRESIDENT: RICHARD NIXON

Not treated like heroes when returning home

Not until several years after the war were they recognized for their service and

sacrifice

VIETNAM VETERANS

WAR ENDED BADLY, NIXON ENDED BADLY

Watergate Scandal