Deck 14: Power Among Nations

Question 1

In response to aggressive Soviet moves in Europe, the United States and the democracies of Western Europe created the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

Answer 1

True

Question 2

The Soviets suffered a heavy drain of human and economic resources during their nine-year war in Afghanistan, which some dubbed "Russia's Vietnam."

Answer 2

True

Question 3

The United States initially welcomed Fidel Castro's overthrow of the repressive Batista regime in Cuba in 1959.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

President Obama ordered the execution of Osama bin Laden by the U.S. Navy Seal team in May, 2011.

Question 5

An International Court (at The Hague, the Netherlands) exists to decide conflicts according to international law, and nations must submit to the authority of this court.

Question 6

The worldwide struggle for power is the definition of

A) international politics.
B) communist agenda.
C) national sovereignty.
D) international law.

Question 7

Mikhail Gorbachev believed that economic progress in the Soviet Union required a reduction in the nation's heavy military expenditures and improved relations with the United States.

Question 8

The end of the Cold War resulted in decreased prominence for the United Nations, particularly in its role as an international peacekeeper.

Question 9

Boris Yeltsin was the first elected president in the history in Russia.

Question 10

All of the following nations have a permanent seat on the Security Council of the United Nations except

A) the United States.
B) China.
C) Japan.
D) Russia.

Question 11

Communist expansion in Korea was contained at the cost of more than seventy-five thousand United States lives.

Question 12

John F. Kennedy was president during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Question 13

In 2015, there were about 200 independent nations in the world, and 193 of them were members of the United Nations.

Question 14

President Reagan announced the strategic defense initiative (SDI), a research program to develop a defense against a ballistic missile attack.

Question 15

One method of attempting to bring order to international relations is through

A) the creation of a world government.
B) the balance of power system.
C) co-dependency theory.
D) containment.

Question 16

Preventing the spread of Russian expansion was the goal of the policy of containment.

Question 17

Russia remains the only nuclear power capable of destroying the United States.

Question 18

Sovereignty means informal authority over internal affairs; freedom from external intervention; and social and humanitarian recognition by other nations.

Question 19

When General MacArthur publically protested against political limits to military operations, President Truman promoted the popular general.

Question 20

The collective security concept of the United Nations originally meant that all nations would join together to guarantee one another's territorial integrity and existing political independence against external aggression by any nation.

Question 21

The United States implemented a policy to contain communism known as the _________ through rebuilding the economies of western European nations.

A) Truman Doctrine
B) Marshall Plan
C) Cold War
D) Paris Peace Agreement

Question 22

Reagan's strategic defense initiative to develop a defense against ballistic missile attack was labeled by the media as

A) START.
B) SALT.
C) the Iron Curtain.
D) Star Wars.

Question 23

Mikhail Gorbachev won the Nobel Peace Prize for his actions as Soviet president. Which of the following is not true of Gorbachev's actions and beliefs as president?

A) He believed that economic progress in the Soviet Union required a reduction in the nation's military expenditures.
B) He announced that the Soviet Union would not use military forces to keep communist governments in power in Eastern European nations.
C) He refused to intervene to halt the destruction of the Berlin Wall.
D) All of these.

Question 24

The political, military, and ideological conflict between communist nations, led by the USSR, and the Western democracies, led by the United States, from 1945 to 1990 was called

A) World War I.
B) World War II.
C) the Cold War.
D) the Vietnam War.

Question 25

The United States did little in response to Soviet political and military expansion in the 1970s until the

A) French promised to rejoin the NATO command group.
B) U.S. military was disengaged in Vietnam.
C) hardliners in the Kremlin rejected treaty talks in 1977.
D) Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

Question 26

Joseph Stalin's actions post-WWII led to the protracted political, military, and ideological struggle known as the Cold War. Which of the following actions is not associated with Stalin's post-WWII dictatorship?

A) He installed communist governments in nations of Eastern Europe in violation of wartime agreements to allow free elections.
B) He ignored pledges to cooperate in a unified allied occupation of Germany.
C) He initiated the Berlin Blockade in an unsuccessful attempt to oust the United States, Great Britain, and France from Germany.
D) He disbanded the Red Army at the end of WWII in 1945

Question 27

All of the following are major components of the United Nations except the

A) Security Council.
B) General Assembly.
C) General Council.
D) secretariat.

Question 28

The Paris Peace Agreement ended U.S. participation in the

A) Soviet Union.
B) Cold War.
C) Vietnam War.
D) League of Nations.

Question 29

During World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union joined forces to

A) eliminate the Nazi threat to the world.
B) try to gain control of Europe.
C) begin a union of the two nations in a communist venture.
D) All of these.

Question 30

A U.S. program to rebuild the nations of Western Europe in the aftermath of World War II in order to render them less susceptible to communist influence and/or takeover was called the

A) Marshall Plan.
B) Kennan Theory.
C) Kissinger Agenda.
D) Truman Doctrine.

Question 31

John F. Kennedy's Soviet adversary in the Cuban Missile Crisis was

A) Bulganin.
B) Khrushchev.
C) Gorbachev.
D) Kosygin.

Question 32

The Soviet invasion of _________ jarred America from its neo-isolationism that had followed its defeat in Vietnam.

A) Egypt
B) Poland
C) Afghanistan
D) Korea

Question 33

The foreign policy shaped by the pledge to support free people who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures became known as

A) the balance of power system.
B) regional security.
C) the collective security system.
D) the Truman Doctrine.

Question 34

The idea that all nations would join together to guarantee each other's territory and independence against aggression by any other nation is a key tenet of the

A) balance of power system.
B) United Nations Charter.
C) collective security system.
D) Truman Doctrine.

Question 35

Which of the following was the first treaty between the superpowers that actually resulted in the destruction of nuclear arms?

A) SALT I
B) INF Treaty
C) Treaty of Marseilles
D) START I

Question 36

President Lyndon Johnson ordered troops into South Vietnam in February, 1965. Which of the following is not true of America's involvement in Vietnam?

A) Over 500,000 troops were eventually committed to Vietnam.
B) Over 47, 000 were killed in action.
C) U.S. involvement grew out of the policy of containment.
D) The Paris Peace Agreement ended the conflict in 1969.

Question 37

In response to Soviet moves in Europe, the United States and the democracies of Western Europe created the _________ in 1949.

A) League of Nations
B) Cold War
C) North Atlantic Treaty Organization
D) United Nations

Question 38

The Soviet response to the formation of NATO was the creation of

A) the Warsaw Pact.
B) the United Nations.
C) the Comintern.
D) S.E.A.T.O.

Question 39

The regional alliance of Western democracies to protect themselves against Soviet aggression was called NATO. Which of the following is not true of this organization.

A) It was created out of disappointment with the United Nations as a vehicle for collective security.
B) The underlying concept of the NATO approach is regional security.
C) The Warsaw Pact was an agreement between Eastern European satellite nations in response to NATO.
D) The United States refused to make a specific commitment to defend Western Europe in the event of Soviet attack.

Question 40

Which of the following treaties between the United States and the USSR put limits on antiballistic missiles and limited the numbers of offensive missiles?

A) SALT I
B) SALT II
C) START
D) INF Treaty

Question 41

Currently American forces must be prepared to carry out a variety of missions in addition to the conduct of conventional war. Which of the following is not one of those missions?

A) Striking at terrorist targets to deter or retaliate
B) Demonstrating U.S. resolve in crisis situations
C) Protecting U.S. citizens living abroad
D) Demonstrating U.S. support for communist governments

Question 42

Discuss how the idea of collective security resulted in the formation of the United Nations.

Question 43

How did the election of Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985 set the stage for an end to the Cold War?

Question 44

Explain the evidence with which some political analysts describe the foreign policy of President George W. Bush during post-September 11, 2001, as based in the Huntington theory of the clash of civilizations.

Question 45

Describe how the progression of international nuclear arms negotiations during the administrations of Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush eventually eliminated the threat of a massive nuclear attack.

Question 46

Terrorism's threat creates what two military requirements?

A) The ability to punish nations that support terrorism, and the ability to deter terrorists
B) The ability to punish nations that support terrorism, and the ability to capture or kill terrorists
C) The ability to capture or kill terrorists, and the ability to free their hostages
D) The ability to deter terrorists, and the ability to anticipate terrorism

Question 47

Compare the intent, scope, and outcomes of the Salt I and Salt II treaties.

Question 48

Former president George W. Bush apparently based his foreign policy on a theory proposed by Samuel P. Huntington predicting that conflict between modern, Western democracies and Islamic fundamentalist nations will characterize international relations in the future. This is called the __________.

Question 49

An agreement on long-range strategic nuclear weapons was signed in Moscow in 1991. Which of the following is not true of that treaty?

A) It was signed by President Jimmy Carter and Mikhail Gorbachev.
B) It included a 30 percent reduction in the total number of deployed nuclear systems.
C) The treaty's acronym is START I.
D) It included a 50 percent reduction in the total number of strategic nuclear warheads.

Question 50

Describe the way that history has shaped the evolution of the theories that have informed the exercise of power on an international level.

Question 51

To implement the containment policy against Russian expansive tendencies, the United States initiated the __________ to rebuild the economies of Western European nations to make them less susceptible to communist subversion and Soviet intimidation.

Question 52

Describe unilateral action as it relates to the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003.

Question 53

Describe how the balance-of-power method worked to bring order to international relations during the nineteenth century.

Question 54

How did nuclear weapons influence leaders on both sides of the Cold War to exercise extreme caution in their relations with each other?

Question 55

An important defect in the __________ system that was in effect in Europe for about a century was that a minor conflict between two nations that are members of separate alliances can draw all member nations into the conflict.

Question 56

__________ refers to formal, legal power over internal affairs; freedom from external interventions; and political and legal recognition by other nations.

Question 57

Discuss the origin and purpose of NATO.

Question 58

What spurred the formation of the Warsaw Pact? What happened to the former Eastern bloc state members when the Warsaw Pact disintegrated?

Question 59

What was "Russia's Vietnam," and what part did the United States play in that conflict?

Question 60

The __________ was created in 1945, and originally included fifty-one members as well as a Security Council with eleven members.

Question 61

Describe the ways that the newly elected President John F. Kennedy's actions during the Bay of Pigs and during the building of the Berlin Wall could have been seen as contrary to the goal of "containment of Russian expansive tendencies."

Question 62

Compare and contrast the type and extent of threats to U.S. security during the Cold War and in the post-September 11 world. What aspects have changed drastically? What has remained the same?

Question 63

Explain the way that the post-September 11 threat of terrorism created two military requirements. How have the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001 changed the foundations of American foreign policy?

Question 64

Apply the U.S. post-September 11 military reaction to terrorist activities to develop a hypothetical U.S. reaction to the 1979 incident in Iran during which 52 American U.S. embassy personnel in Tehran were held hostage for 444 days. What would the U.S. military have done differently if the current policies had been in effect in 1979? What would have been done the same way?