The Arms Race

• what was the start of the arms race

  the Manhattan Project 1939-45. 1st successful test of the atom bomb by the Americans. August 1945- atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki
• how did Stalin feel about this

  he already knew (espionage) but felt threatened as they were developing it in secret- feels they were hiding it from him + being deceptive
• why did people from within the project leak plans to the soviets

  if both US + USSR have atomic bombs there will be a standstill as nuclear war means annihilation for both sides whereas until the Soviet Union developed their own atomic bomb, the US could have wiped them out
• what did the soviets do in August 1949

  develop + test their own atomic bomb although the US had expected them to develop one by 1953- this shocked the US as they thought the USSR would be further behind after the devastation of WW2
• what did the US do next to regain some sort of nuclear monolopy


  1952- developed the first hydrogen bomb. Truman ordered it to the constructed and tested- if US don't, USSR will
• how powerful was the US' first H-bomb

  Operation Ivy- tested the bomb. 1000x more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. 10 mill tonnes of TNT.
• how did the new President Eisenhower change America's approach to the Cold War

  after Korean war- huge increase in military spending in US. more focus on nuclear weapons rather than conventional warfare
• what mistakes did the US make in 1954

  detonated a thermo-nuclear device called Shrimp at Bikini Atoll in the Pacific. its explosive yield was 3 times what was expected. equivalent to 15 megatons of TNT. radioactive fallout affected Japanese fishermen
• what did the USSR do in 1954 and 1955

  1954- developed a H-bomb. 1955- dropped world's first airborn H-bomb
• what was relevant about the 1955 Moscow Air Show

  they allowed the West to see their new Bison Bombers- capable of delivering nuclear bombs to the US. lead to fear of bomber gap- U2 planes built to fly over and photograph USSR military progress
• what did both nations successfully test in 1957

  [US first] ICBMs- new delivery method for nuclear weapons- program where they come down. they were stockpiled and kept in USSR and US as they could be fired from there
• how did both sides possessing the same level of nuclear weaponry and power keep the world safer

  MAD- mutually assured destruction. neither side fire missiles as neither have the upper hand- if you were to fire, the other would send theirs at you- need to find a way to hit them before they can set their missiles off
• mid-1950s US began placing B52 bombers and ICBMs in west europe- how did the USSR feel about this?


  the US now have a slight advantage as they are closer to the USSR so missiles have a shorter distance to travel whereas the USSR has no allies nearby the US so can't pose the same threat
• how much did each country spend on arms in billion dollars in 1951

  US- over 30. USSR- over 20.
• what had the US done by the end of 1959 that gave them a huge advantage in the arms race + why did it worry the USSR?

  equipped the first submarine with ICBMs. can travel right to the coast of the USSR + give them virtually no time to respond if they fire missiles
• ICBMs and SLBMs (submarine-launched ballistic missiles) owned by the US and USSR by 1961


  US- over 60 ICBMs and just under 100 SLBMs. USSR- over 50 ICBMs but no SLBMs!!!