Unit 17: Paper 2 — The Cold War: Superpower Tensions and Rivalries (20th Century)
Topic 17.2: Leaders and nations Questions
Practice 20 exam-style questions for IB History Topic 17.2. Review the question stems below, then unlock the full Question Bank to access markschemes, model answers, and AI grading.
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.1 - Q12
In which year did the United States help found NATO?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.4 - Q11
In which year did Senator Joseph McCarthy's power collapse after televised Senate hearings exposed his lack of evidence?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.4 - Q14
What name is given to the Vietnamese refugees who fled by sea, especially after the 1975 communist victory?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.1 - Q13
Which crisis is the clearest example of Kennedy's policy of flexible response in action?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.1 - Q11
Which United States policy aimed to stop communism from spreading without attacking it where it already ruled?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.1 - Q14
What did Reagan and Gorbachev agree in the INF Treaty of 1987?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.2 - Q15
Gorbachev's two main domestic reforms in the 1980s were perestroika and which of the following?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.3 - Q13
Who used the phrase 'Iron Curtain' in a famous 1946 speech to describe the divide across Europe?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.2 - Q13
Which policy did Khrushchev promote to signal that capitalist and communist states could avoid all-out war?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.2 - Q14
The Brezhnev Doctrine of 'limited sovereignty' was declared after the Soviet suppression of which event?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.2 - Q12
In which years did Stalin blockade the land routes into West Berlin?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.2 - Q11
Which military alliance of Eastern European communist states did the USSR form in 1955?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.3 - Q14
Which event of 1957 gave the USSR a major propaganda triumph in the Cold War?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.3 - Q11
In which year was NATO, the Western military alliance led by the USA, formed?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.3 - Q12
Which term describes a conflict where rival powers back opposing sides instead of fighting each other directly?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.3 - Q15
Soviet tanks crushed reform movements in Eastern Europe in which two years?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.1 - Q3
Compare and contrast the Cold War policies of Truman and Reagan.
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.4 - Q12
Which term describes the close, mutually reinforcing relationship between the US armed forces and arms-manufacturing companies, coined by President Eisenhower in 1961?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.4 - Q15
The shock of which January 1968 event convinced many ordinary Americans that the Vietnam War was unwinnable, deepening the anti-war counterculture?
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2026• Aimnova original vault - 17.2.1 - Q15
Which belief held that if one country fell to communism, its neighbours would topple next?
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