Aspirant Academy

History

Key Points at a Glance

World Wars Impact, Cold War

Paper I · Unit 1 Section 1 of 13 0 PYQs 44 min
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Key Points at a Glance

  1. World War I 1914–1918

    • Killed approximately 17 million people (military + civilian); wounded 20 million more
    • Toppled four empires — Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian, Russian, and German
    • Triggered by the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo on 28 June 1914

  2. Treaty of Versailles 1919

    • Signed 28 June 1919; ended WWI but planted seeds of WWII
    • Imposed "war guilt" clause (Article 231) and reparations of 132 billion gold marks
    • Germany lost 13% territory; army reduced to 100,000; all overseas colonies stripped
    • Germans called it the Diktat (dictated peace)

  3. World War II 1939–1945

    • Deadliest conflict in human history — estimated 70–85 million deaths (~3% of 1940 world population)
    • 6 million Jews killed in the Holocaust
    • Ended with atomic bombing of Hiroshima (6 Aug 1945) and Nagasaki (9 Aug 1945)
    • Japan surrendered on 15 August 1945

  4. United Nations Founded 1945

    • Established on 24 October 1945 with 51 founding member states (UN Day is 24 October)
    • Predecessor League of Nations (formed 1920 under Treaty of Versailles) failed to prevent WWII
    • League failed because the US never joined and it lacked enforcement powers

  5. Cold War c. 1947–1991

    • Geopolitical, ideological, and military rivalry between USA-led Western bloc (capitalism/NATO, 1949) and USSR-led Eastern bloc (communism/Warsaw Pact, 1955)
    • Term "Cold War" coined by journalist Walter Lippmann (popularised by Bernard Baruch) in 1947
    • Never escalated into direct military clash between superpowers

  6. Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan 1947

    • Truman Doctrine (March 1947): US pledged support to countries threatened by communist takeover; first applied to Greece and Turkey
    • Marshall Plan (June 1947): Provided $13 billion in economic aid to rebuild Western European economies devastated by WWII

  7. Cuban Missile Crisis October 1962

    • Cold War's most dangerous moment — world came closest to nuclear war
    • USSR installed nuclear missiles in Cuba; President Kennedy ordered a naval blockade
    • Soviet ships turned back; Khrushchev agreed to remove missiles in exchange for a US pledge not to invade Cuba
    • Secret removal of US missiles from Turkey also agreed

  8. Non-Aligned Movement NAM

    • Co-founded by Jawaharlal Nehru (India), Josip Broz Tito (Yugoslavia), and Gamal Abdel Nasser (Egypt) at the Bandung Conference (April 1955)
    • Represented newly independent nations' refusal to align with either Cold War bloc
    • First formal NAM Summit held in Belgrade in 1961 with 25 member states

  9. Cold War Proxy Wars

    • Korean War (1950–53): Peninsula divided at 38th Parallel
    • Vietnam War (1955–75): US eventually withdrew; communist North Vietnam reunified the country
    • Afghanistan (1979–89): USSR invasion; US-backed Mujahideen bled Soviet forces
    • Angola Civil War and other African/Latin American conflicts where USSR and US backed rival factions

  10. Space Race 1957–1969

    • USSR launched Sputnik-1 (first artificial satellite) on 4 October 1957
    • USSR sent Yuri Gagarin (first human in space) on 12 April 1961
    • USA responded with Apollo 11 landing Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the Moon on 20 July 1969
    • Declared US technological supremacy

  11. Détente — Easing of Cold War Tensions 1970s

    • SALT I Treaty (1972) limited strategic nuclear arms
    • Nixon's visit to China (1972) opened Sino-US rapprochement
    • Helsinki Accords (1975) recognised post-WWII European borders
    • Détente collapsed after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan (1979)

  12. End of the Cold War 1989–1991

    • Berlin Wall fell on 9 November 1989 — most iconic symbol of Cold War division
    • USSR formally dissolved on 25 December 1991 when Mikhail Gorbachev resigned
    • Soviet flag replaced by Russian flag; 15 new independent states emerged from the former Soviet Union

  13. Women's Role in WWI and WWII (PYQ 2023)

    • WWI: Women replaced men in factories and farms; UK had 800,000 women in war industries by 1918
    • WWII: "Rosie the Riveter" in the US symbolised women in defence manufacturing
    • War contributions accelerated suffrage — UK gave women 30+ the vote in 1918, equal voting in 1928; France in 1944

  14. Gorbachev's Reforms — Glasnost and Perestroika

    • Glasnost (openness): Press freedom, release of political prisoners, announced from 1985–87
    • Perestroika (restructuring): Market-oriented economic reforms
    • Reforms unintentionally triggered centrifugal forces leading to USSR's dissolution
    • Gorbachev also withdrew Soviet forces from Afghanistan in 1989

  15. Cold War's Global Legacy

    • Nuclear arms race produced over 70,000 warheads at its 1986 peak
    • SEATO (1954), CENTO (1955) formed as US-led alliance networks
    • Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT, 1968) created global nuclear framework
    • Decolonisation accelerated by Cold War dynamics; UN Security Council P5 veto reflects post-WWII power balance