Communism Dbq

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Communism has been a threat to the United States long before the Cold War. People have been worrying about communism ever since Karl Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto, but the panic didn’t start until Stalin came to power and started spreading communism throughout Europe. The American people lived in fear during the Cold War, also known as the Red Scare, because they thought communist spies were everywhere and at any moment Stalin could drop an atomic bomb and wipe out the US. The administration of Dwight D Eisenhower addressing the fears of the people, but he didn’t do anything to ease the fears. Instead of calming the people he fed the hysteria and had them prepare for the possible war and nuclear fallout. He let the people panic until his …show more content…
Thus “the possibility of mutually assured destruction influenced international diplomacy and daily life” (Fraser 733). This caused the government and the people to prepare for a possible nuclear war. The photo in Document C shows how worried the people were during the 1950s. Families would build bomb shelters in their basements and backyards and stalk them full of supplies incase there was a fallout. Document E shows a news report from the Cold War, it showed how far away the US is from Russia and how with one “push of a button in Russia, and 35 minutes later much of the US could be laid to waste…” Daily reports like that were just a constant reminder to the people that they could face the same fate as the people in Hiroshima or Nagasaki. President Eisenhower addressed these issues by encouraging the people to prepare for war because he himself was scared. He stated in a press conference “We fear the men in the Kremlin, We fear what they will do to our friends around them…” (Document A). He was just as worried as the people (which is not good for a man with so much power) so he encouraged the people to do their part for the country. In his message to Congress on education, Eisenhower said “If we are to maintain our position of leadership, we must see to it that today’s young people are prepared to contribute the maximum to our future progress” (Document …show more content…
“The 40,000-mile- network of existing roads… connects 209 of the 237 cities having a population of 50,000 or more…” (Document D). The highway system was intended to not only connect the country’s major defense areas, but also decongest the highways, and make travel easier. While the government funded 90% of the cost, not many people criticized because there was less traffic.
While Eisenhower was smart to prepare the US for a nuclear war, he failed to keep the people control the hysteria. Instead of easing the suspicions of spies he allowed the FBI and the CIA to interrogate teachers, political members, actors, and anyone else they thought were potential communist spies. People like Joseph McCarthy went around lying to people and telling them there were spies in the government, the people didn’t know who they could trust. Eisenhower just kept the hysteria going long enough to pass it on to JFK in 1960, JFK then addressed the Cold War in his inaugural address, saying that “both sides overburdened by the cost of modern weapons… yet both racing to alter that uncertain balance of terror that stays the hand of mankind’s final war” (Document I).
Looking over his time in office, President Eisenhower did a great job preparing the country for the war but failed to keep everyone calm in the
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