VCE Modern History Cold War essay structures quiz

The American Revolution

Causes of WW1

The Changing World Order 1945-2010, including the Cold War

Ancient civilisations

The United States for provoking Soviet defensive responses

The Soviet Union for expansionist behaviour after 1945

Britain and France

Decolonisation

Continued wartime cooperation

A commitment to support free peoples resisting subjugation, formally inaugurating containment

A declaration of neutrality

A disarmament treaty

Direct US-Soviet military conflict

SALT I, the Helsinki Accords, Nixon's visits to Moscow and Beijing

Withdrawal from the United Nations

Nuclear escalation

Stalinist purges

Glasnost (openness), perestroika (restructuring), and 'New Thinking' in foreign policy

Reconquest of Eastern Europe

Outlawing the Communist Party

Define the Cold War only

State a clear thesis, signpost the body argument, and reference at least one historiographical position the essay will engage with

List every event chronologically

Quote a song lyric

Quote without attribution

Identify the source, situate it (date, author, type), use it to support a claim, then evaluate its perspective/limitations

Use sources only at the end

Avoid sources

Renewed cooperation

Reagan's 'Evil Empire' framing, SDI, Soviet expansion in Afghanistan, Able Archer 83

The fall of the Berlin Wall

Detente

US invasion of Cuba

Soviet withdrawal of missiles in exchange for a US pledge not to invade and (secretly) US withdrawal of missiles from Turkey

Direct nuclear exchange

Cuba joining NATO

Many causes contributed to the Cold War.

Ideology was the primary cause of the Cold War only when fused with security interests; the orthodox emphasis on Soviet expansionism captures part of the story, but post-revisionist accounts demonstrate that the bipolar power vacuum after 1945 was equally decisive.

I will discuss the causes of the Cold War.

The Cold War lasted from 1945 to 1991.