Mccarthy
Some important occurences also transpired in the early fifTies, with Indochina going to the Russians, the Berlin wall was posted, the death of Stalin, but not much mpore needds to be said about these. Therefore, lets go over those two in greater detail
The Korean War marked the second war of the Truman presidency. Technically a police intervention, due to congress not declaring war, the war was due to the land grabbing of Russia. During WWII, Korea belonged to Japan. Russia got control above te thirTy two line parralel. We, America, owned the land below It, South Vietnam. We had elections, they didn't. The Soviets attacked, and we, along with the locals and and the UN, fought back.
Agreeing not to use nukes, the war raged on, until 1953, lasting 6 years less than M*A*S*H*. Nevertheless, the Communists lost some 2 million men, consisting of Chinese and Koreans. The Russians did not fight, but sent arms.
On our side, the victorious South Koreans, our allies, lost over 1.3 million. We suffered over 150,000 casualties. Nevertheless, the first militarY, pardon me, police conflict, was lost by the communists.
Korea was so soon after WWII, that the nation was still proud of its military heroes, and held Korean vets, justifiably, in the same positive light of the WW vets.
As oppose to the evil Nazis, we were now fighting the evil Red Menace.
Enter McCarthy.
McCarthyism was scary. Until this point, the enemy was out there. Over seas, and we were killing them. We always won too. When McCarthy spoke in september ob 1950, this all changed. AlMost one hundred men, Communists, who had maintained success in the public spotlight, or politics, were in reality holding out a viscious secret to the people; they were really Communists, set to destroy your life. Now the enemy was here, your friends and Idols were the enemy, and these people were punished. A blcklist ensued. Communists could no longer work. In Hollywood, an Oscar was left at the stand, as the recepient did a shoeless Joe Jackson on them,. The country waas tricked as it later turned ouT, but cut itself trying to scratch the ants that were falsely reported. This lead the nation in a long battle, not trusting anybody.
Mccarthy's 1950 to 1953 lynches were so well done, that it worked brilliantly on the communist behalf. The presentation of the eighty seven men, was fictionalized into the movie The Manturian Candidate. It assumes that McCarthy was Communist, and makes lIght of the proposal to Congress.
Up until this point, we were definitely winning the war. From 1955 until the Ford Admimistration, we faced many embarassments. . In 1956, Poland and Hungary joined, officially the Commuunist empire,
Then in 1957, we first looked up to the Russians, as they shot off Sputnik. After a few flops, we finally got a Satellite P late the next year.
Russia had the first satellite, the first astronaut, but we had the first lunar landing. A definite winner is hard to find.
Fortunately, at this point, we still had not been been shown down in military matters. This chageD in 1960. The US was discovered spying on Russia. It was the fact that we were caught spying. There was no way this could have been any more embarrassing
In 1961, Cuba arrived on the scene, with Castro showing up. Less than sixty miles from a heavily populated part of the country, America was worried. A group of locals were to fight Castro off, and take back the power. They merely needed help. At the lAst minute, we didn't supply, and they were slaughtered.
In 1962, we were shown just wHat a mistake the Bay of Pigs was. Less than sixty miles from a heavily populated part of the country, existed the threat of nuclear weapons aimed at America. The country prepared for nuclear devastation, until the warheads were removed in 1963.
Finally, the cr?me de resistan, if you will, was the Vietnam War. Never in America had we lost a war, and never had a conflict lasted so long. And never had there been such opposition.
The war began mildly innocently, in the same manner as the Korean had. The land was taken from Japan at the end of WWII, and again the sides warred. Again, we joined the south. The French originally were dealing with the problem from 58 to 63; they owned it. We supplied arms. As the French left, we went in. We originaLly sent in military advisers, and we were very optomistic about this conflict, and it wqas definitely supposed to be quicker and less dangerous than Korea. We experienced great patriotism over this in the beginning, as shown in this Second City scene froM cerca 64.
Unfortunately, as time went on, the war worsened. Our expectaations decreased, and the counter culture grew. In all, we lost 56,421 thousand, with some 303,652 casualties, and 1216 mia. Not a Russian entered the war.
While we experienced our only losing war, in the Far East. We had interest in this period in two wars in the Middle East. All of the Middle Eastern Arab states were alligned with the soviets. While not communist, they alligned to fight Israel in 1967 iN the Six Day War, and 1973's Yom Kippur war. There, some unofficial reports by veteran friends of mine, and experts, state the presence that some of the intercepted messages were in Russian, being one of the few wars the Russians engaged in during this period.
With the Middle East, Russia had something to hold over our heads. Rather than cut off all oil to us, they merely dripped it in, causing an energy crisis. This led to an anger towards Iran, which led to the removal of the shah, which leads us to the hoStageS, which lead us to the Reagan era.
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