Contemporary History - Post-1945 History

Post-1945 History

See also: 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s (decade), Modernity, Postmodernity, Modernism, and Postmodernism

At the turn of the 19th to 20th century, the world saw a series of great conflagrations, World War I and World War II. Near the end of the first great war, there were a series of Russian Revolutions and a Russian Civil War. In between the great wars, the 1920s saw a great rise in prosperity where progress and new technology took hold of the world, but this was soon ended by the Great Depression. During this time, the League of Nations was formed to deal with global issues, but failed to garner enough support by the leading powers and a series of crises once again lead the world into another epoch of violence.

Notable events of this modern period of universal history include two World wars and the Cold War, characterized by the dispute for world influence between the United States and the Soviet Union.

The Cold War began in 1945 and lasted into 1989. The Space Age was concurrent with this time, encompassing the activities related to the Space Race, space exploration, space technology, and the cultural developments influenced by these events. Pax Americana is an appellation applied to the historical concept of relative liberal peace in the Western world, resulting from the preponderance of power enjoyed by the United States of America and, in its contemporaneousness connotations, the peace established after the end of World War II in 1945.

The post-1945 world experienced the establishment and defense of democratic states. Throughout post-1945 period, the Cold War was expressed through military coalitions, espionage, weapons development, invasions, propaganda, and competitive technological development. The Soviet Union created the Eastern Bloc of countries that it occupied, annexing some as Soviet Socialist Republics and maintaining others as satellite states that would later form the Warsaw Pact. The United States and various western European countries began a containment policy of communism and forged alliances to this end, including NATO. The conflict included defense spending, a conventional and nuclear arms race, and various proxy wars; the two superpowers never fought one another directly.

The post-1989 World saw the abolishment of totalitarian regimes of the Cold War and the abolishment of Cold War superpower client states. By the Democratizing Revolutions of Eastern Europe in 1989 and the Cold War effectively ended by the Malta Summit on December 3, 1989. The Soviet Union was dissolved on the last day of 1991. The "post-Cold War regimes" established were democratic republics, not the oligarchic republics.

In South America, military regimes supported by the CIA, such as seen in the United States intervention in Chile, give way.. In Southeast Asia, developmental dictatorships were overthrown by uprising of people.