What is the orthodox interpretation of who caused the Cold War?

That Stalin caused it, because a suspicious dictatorship pledged to spread communism could never be a peaceful partner.

What was the standard Soviet explanation of the Cold War?

That the capitalist powers had encircled and threatened the USSR ever since 1917, and used their atomic monopoly and their dollars to dominate Europe.

What is the revisionist interpretation of the Cold War?

That the USA was chiefly to blame, using its wealth and its forces to open the world to American trade and to install governments it approved of.

Why did the fighting in Vietnam produce that interpretation?

A war that looked brutal and dishonestly justified led a generation of American writers to doubt whether their country’s foreign policy had ever been purely defensive.

OCR GCSE History A J410

Castles: Form and Function c.1000–1750Historic environment

Topic overview The location of Kenilworth Castle The appearance and layout of Kenilworth Castle at different times in its history The day-to-day functions of Kenilworth Castle The evidence historians use for a castle’s changing function Life in Kenilworth Castle at different times in its history Key events associated with Kenilworth Castle at different times in its history

China 1950–1981: The People and the StateDepth study

Topic overview Early purges, the Hundred Flowers and social policy in the 1950s Land reform, collectivisation, the First Five Year Plan and the Great Leap Forward Causes and impact of the Cultural Revolution, the Red Guards and Tibet The nature of Communist propaganda and its impact Communism in China after the death of Mao 1976–1981 The Communist state and the Chinese people

Germany 1925–1955: The People and the StateDepth study

Topic overview The Weimar Republic 1925–1928 and the impact of the Depression Rising support for Nazis 1929–1933 The Nazi consolidation of power 1933–1934 The Nazi terror state, propaganda and the people's community Nazi economic and social policy, and the lack of effective opposition Reaction to war, changing fortunes and the home front 1939–1945 Racial persecution, the Holocaust and opposition during the war Defeat, occupation and the two Germanys 1945–1955 The state and the German people, 1925–1955

International Relations: The Changing International Order 1918–1975

Topic overview The Versailles settlement, the League and the agreements of the 1920s The Depression, the failure of the League and the road to war Soviet actions in Eastern Europe and the Western response, 1945–48 NATO, the Warsaw Pact, the Berlin Wall and the Cuban Missile Crisis Origins of US involvement in Vietnam and the tactics of the war US withdrawal from Vietnam, opposition at home and the end of the war Changing interpretations of Appeasement Changing interpretations of the responsibility for the Cold War The big ideas behind the twentieth-century international order

Migration to Britain c.1000 to c.2010Thematic study

Topic overview Diversity before 1066, and the impact of the Norman Conquest Jews in medieval England: treatment, integration and expulsion Resident aliens in later medieval England Africans in sixteenth-century England, the East India Company and Britain’s black communities The readmission of Jews in 1656, and Protestant refugees Industrial-age migration: the Irish, Eastern European Jews, abolition and Chartism Naturalisation, port communities and immigration law 1870–1948 Attitudes towards Jews in the 1930s and migrants in the two world wars The impact of post-war migration on Britain Immigration as a political issue c.1990–c.2010 The big questions about migration to Britain

Personal Rule to Restoration 1629–1660British depth

Topic overview Relationship between Parliament and Charles I 1629–1642 Attempts at settlement, the radical groups and the Army 1646–1649 The execution of Charles I 1649 The Rump, Cromwell and the Protectorate 1649–1658 Attempts to reach a settlement September 1658 – April 1660 The tensions that led to war, and the changes that followed

Power: Monarchy and Democracy in Britain c.1000 to 2014Thematic study

Topic overview Anglo-Saxon kingship, 1066 and the Norman monarchy Magna Carta and the emergence of Parliament Richard II’s deposition and the Wars of the Roses Tudor government, personal rule and the Civil Wars The Restoration, 1688 and the Bill of Rights The rise of political parties and a parliamentary monarchy Parliament and the people, c.1800–c.1918: reform and the unions Votes for women, and the state in war and peace Challenges to Parliament since 1980 Claiming, keeping and losing power

South Africa 1960–1994: The People and the StateDepth study

Topic overview Consolidating apartheid in the 1960s: the Bantustans, state control and Sharpeville Reasons for, methods of and impact of different types of resistance The further development of resistance The Anti-Apartheid Movement and the regime's response in the 1970s Growing pressure on the regime The State of Emergency and the failure of total strategy 1985–1990 Negotiations between the government and the ANC The state and the South African people, 1960–1994

The English Reformation c.1520–c.1550British depth

Topic overview The church in England c.1520 and its critics Popular attitudes to reform, the annulment and the Reformation Parliament Cromwell, the Valor Ecclesiasticus and the dissolution of the monasteries Immediate reactions to Dissolution including support Resistance and protest Development and changes in religious policy under Henry VIII and Edward VI Enforcing the new religious policies and the Prayer Book Rebellion 1549 The English Church before and after the Reformation

The Impact of Empire on Britain 1688–c.1730British depth

Topic overview The Glorious Revolution, the Hanoverian succession and the British Isles Darien, the Act of Union, the 1715 rising and emigration to the Americas Economic impact of war and imperial expansion The Treaty of Utrecht, the South Sea Bubble and the slave-based colonial economy Consumerism, the slave-trading ports and the coffee houses Ideas of racial hierarchy, and opposition and resistance to slavery What empire did to Britain and the British Isles

The USA 1919–1948: The People and the StateDepth study

Topic overview The US economy and women in the ‘Roaring Twenties’Prohibition, the Red Scare and immigration restrictions Jim Crow, the Ku Klux Klan and attempts to combat prejudice Economic and social effects of the Great Depression and government response The Second New Deal The mobilisation of the US people for the war effort Social impact of the war The Detroit Race Riots 1943 and segregation in the armed forces The state and the American people, 1919–1948

The USA 1945–1974: The People and the StateDepth study

Topic overview Fears of Communism at home, the Red Scare and McCarthyism Jim Crow and the development and achievements of the civil rights movement Opposition to civil rights and the role of the Supreme Court and Eisenhower The roles of Kennedy and Johnson in civil rights campaigns Black Power, radical leaders, and Native American and Chicano campaigns The impact of feminism Stonewall, anti-war protest and the Great Society The state and the American people, 1945–1974

Urban Environments: Patterns of MigrationHistoric environment

Topic overview When immigrant groups arrived, why and from where Spitalfields: who came, when and why Where immigrants settled and how they were received Settling in Spitalfields, and how newcomers were received The experiences of immigrants Work, housing and faith in Spitalfields Key events in local migration history Altab Ali, Brick Lane 1978 and other key events in Spitalfields The impact of migration on the area Spitalfields today: impact and the multicultural community Reading an urban site for its migration history Reading the buildings, maps and records of Spitalfields

War and British Society c.790 to c.2010Thematic study

Topic overview Viking raids and the Norman Conquest The feudal system and feudal military service War in medieval society, c.1290–c.1450 Elizabeth I’s wars with Spain, and English privateers Border warfare, the Civil Wars and the Jacobite risings Imperial wars of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries The Crimean War and the Boer Wars The two world wars and the Cold War The IRA campaigns and conflict since 1945 What war did to British people and their rulers

International Relations: The Changing International Order 1918–1975

Changing interpretations of the responsibility for the Cold War

3 things to know
Paper 1

Overview

The orthodox view that Stalin was to blame, the Soviet explanation, how censorship and McCarthyism shaped history writing, the revisionist interpretation and the Vietnam War, its weakness, the post-revisionist view and what the Soviet archives revealed after 1991.

What you need to know

Answer each one before you reveal it.

Your recallNot started

Key term

How did censorship in the USSR shape the history written there?

Key term

How did McCarthyism affect American writing about the origins of the Cold War?

Key term

What became available to historians when the USSR broke up in 1991?

Questions from this subtopic

Each one with the model answer underneath.

1
What is the orthodox interpretation of who caused the Cold War?
Model answer
That Stalin caused it, because a suspicious dictatorship pledged to spread communism could never be a peaceful partner.
2
What was the standard Soviet explanation of the Cold War?
Model answer
That the capitalist powers had encircled and threatened the USSR ever since 1917, and used their atomic monopoly and their dollars to dominate Europe.
3
How did censorship in the USSR shape the history written there?
Model answer
Publication was controlled and the party line was the only permitted account, so Soviet historians blamed the west and could not print anything else.
4
How did McCarthyism affect American writing about the origins of the Cold War?
Model answer
Anyone suggesting that the USA shared the blame risked being branded disloyal, so critical views were driven out of public debate in the early 1950s.
5
What is the revisionist interpretation of the Cold War?
Model answer
That the USA was chiefly to blame, using its wealth and its forces to open the world to American trade and to install governments it approved of.
6
Why did the fighting in Vietnam produce that interpretation?
Model answer
A war that looked brutal and dishonestly justified led a generation of American writers to doubt whether their country’s foreign policy had ever been purely defensive.

See the rest and revise

Other ways to work this

The same content, four other ways.

What is inside Levo

Six ways to work the same material.

1Closed book

2Open book

3Closed book

The 3-step method, run for you

Answer cold, learn it, then prove it stuck. Levo tracks the jump between your first attempt and your last.

Castles: Form and Function c.1000–1750

China 1950–1981: The People and the State

Germany 1925–1955: The People and the State

International Relations: The Changing International Order 1918–1975

Cram a whole paper in one sitting

Sort every topic into what you know and what you do not, then drill only the weak ones.

John presided.

BradshawLambertPym

Blank Blitz makes facts automatic

Rapid timed gap-fills on the terms and numbers you need to recall without thinking.

AFactories switched from consumer goods to weapons.

BCar plants turned out tanks, aircraft and jeeps.

CProduction outstripped that of every enemy.

Build It gets the exam shape right

Assemble a full-mark answer from its marking points, in the order an examiner wants them.

Whigs means party given almost every office by George I after 1714.

TrueFalse

Test It catches misconceptions

Spot the fault in a statement. The traps are the mistakes students actually make.

721941163128510

Brain Breaks between sessions

Short focus games to reset attention, so the next set lands better than the last.

Every question in International Relations: The Changing International Order 1918–1975, on a schedule.

Attempt a question from memory, write the correct version, then attempt it again. Levo records the jump between your first attempt and your last, and brings each question back on the day you are due to forget it.

Start revising, £5 a month See how the method works

Or £46 a year, about £3.83 a month. Cancel anytime.