1.
Soviet Union
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The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was a socialist state in Eurasia that existed from 1922 to 1991. It was nominally a union of national republics, but its government. The Soviet Union had its roots in the October Revolution of 1917 and this established the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and started the Russian Civil War between the revolutionary Reds and the counter-revolutionary Whites. In 1922, the communists were victorious, forming the Soviet Union with the unification of the Russian, Transcaucasian, Ukrainian, following Lenins death in 1924, a collective leadership and a brief power struggle, Joseph Stalin came to power in the mid-1920s. Stalin suppressed all opposition to his rule, committed the state ideology to Marxism–Leninism. As a result, the country underwent a period of rapid industrialization and collectivization which laid the foundation for its victory in World War II and postwar dominance of Eastern Europe. Shortly before World War II, Stalin signed the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact agreeing to non-aggression with Nazi Germany, in June 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union, opening the largest and bloodiest theater of war in history. Soviet war casualties accounted for the highest proportion of the conflict in the effort of acquiring the upper hand over Axis forces at battles such as Stalingrad. Soviet forces eventually captured Berlin in 1945, the territory overtaken by the Red Army became satellite states of the Eastern Bloc. The Cold War emerged by 1947 as the Soviet bloc confronted the Western states that united in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization in 1949. Following Stalins death in 1953, a period of political and economic liberalization, known as de-Stalinization and Khrushchevs Thaw, the country developed rapidly, as millions of peasants were moved into industrialized cities. The USSR took a lead in the Space Race with Sputnik 1, the first ever satellite, and Vostok 1. In the 1970s, there was a brief détente of relations with the United States, the war drained economic resources and was matched by an escalation of American military aid to Mujahideen fighters. In the mid-1980s, the last Soviet leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, sought to reform and liberalize the economy through his policies of glasnost. The goal was to preserve the Communist Party while reversing the economic stagnation, the Cold War ended during his tenure, and in 1989 Soviet satellite countries in Eastern Europe overthrew their respective communist regimes. This led to the rise of strong nationalist and separatist movements inside the USSR as well, in August 1991, a coup détat was attempted by Communist Party hardliners. It failed, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin playing a role in facing down the coup. On 25 December 1991, Gorbachev resigned and the twelve constituent republics emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union as independent post-Soviet states
2.
United States
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Forty-eight of the fifty states and the federal district are contiguous and located in North America between Canada and Mexico. The state of Alaska is in the northwest corner of North America, bordered by Canada to the east, the state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific Ocean. The U. S. territories are scattered about the Pacific Ocean, the geography, climate and wildlife of the country are extremely diverse. At 3.8 million square miles and with over 324 million people, the United States is the worlds third- or fourth-largest country by area, third-largest by land area. It is one of the worlds most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, paleo-Indians migrated from Asia to the North American mainland at least 15,000 years ago. European colonization began in the 16th century, the United States emerged from 13 British colonies along the East Coast. Numerous disputes between Great Britain and the following the Seven Years War led to the American Revolution. On July 4,1776, during the course of the American Revolutionary War, the war ended in 1783 with recognition of the independence of the United States by Great Britain, representing the first successful war of independence against a European power. The current constitution was adopted in 1788, after the Articles of Confederation, the first ten amendments, collectively named the Bill of Rights, were ratified in 1791 and designed to guarantee many fundamental civil liberties. During the second half of the 19th century, the American Civil War led to the end of slavery in the country. By the end of century, the United States extended into the Pacific Ocean. The Spanish–American War and World War I confirmed the status as a global military power. The end of the Cold War and the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 left the United States as the sole superpower. The U. S. is a member of the United Nations, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, Organization of American States. The United States is a developed country, with the worlds largest economy by nominal GDP. It ranks highly in several measures of performance, including average wage, human development, per capita GDP. While the U. S. economy is considered post-industrial, characterized by the dominance of services and knowledge economy, the United States is a prominent political and cultural force internationally, and a leader in scientific research and technological innovations. In 1507, the German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller produced a map on which he named the lands of the Western Hemisphere America after the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci
3.
Nuclear weapons testing
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Nuclear weapons tests are experiments carried out to determine the effectiveness, yield, and explosive capability of nuclear weapons. Throughout the twentieth century, most nations that developed nuclear weapons tested them, the first nuclear device was detonated as a test by the United States at the Trinity site on July 16,1945, with a yield approximately equivalent to 20 kilotons of TNT. The first thermonuclear weapon technology test of engineer device, codenamed Mike, was tested at the Enewetak atoll in the Marshall Islands on November 1,1952, also by the United States. The largest nuclear weapon ever tested was the Tsar Bomba of the Soviet Union at Novaya Zemlya on October 30,1961, with the largest yield ever seen, the treaty permitted underground nuclear testing. France continued atmospheric testing until 1974, and China continued until 1980, underground tests in the United States continued until 1991, the Soviet Union until 1990, the United Kingdom until 1991, and both China and France until 1996. Non-signatories India and Pakistan last tested nuclear weapons in 1998, North Korea conducted nuclear tests in 2006,2009,2013, and 2016. The most recent confirmed nuclear test occurred in September 2016 in North Korea, Nuclear weapons tests have historically been divided into four categories reflecting the medium or location of the test. Atmospheric testing designates explosions that take place in the atmosphere, Nuclear explosions close enough to the ground to draw dirt and debris into their mushroom cloud can generate large amounts of nuclear fallout due to irradiation of the debris. This definition of atmospheric is used in the Limited Test Ban Treaty, underground testing refers to nuclear tests conducted under the surface of the earth, at varying depths. True underground tests are intended to be contained and emit a negligible amount of fallout. Unfortunately these nuclear tests do occasionally vent to the surface, producing from nearly none to considerable amounts of debris as a consequence. In 1976, the United States and the USSR agreed to limit the maximum yield of underground tests to 150 kt with the Threshold Test Ban Treaty. Underground testing also falls into two categories, tunnel tests in generally horizontal tunnel drifts, and shaft tests in vertically drilled holes. Exoatmospheric testing refers to tests conducted above the atmosphere. The test devices are lifted on rockets, underwater testing results from nuclear devices being detonated underwater, usually moored to a ship or a barge. Tests of this nature have usually been conducted to evaluate the effects of weapons against naval vessels. Another way to nuclear tests are by the number of explosions that constitute the test.1 second. The USSR has exploded up to eight devices in a single salvo test, Pakistans second, almost all lists in the literature are lists of tests, in the lists in Wikipedia, the lists are of explosions
4.
Nuclear weapon
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A nuclear weapon is an explosive device that derives its destructive force from nuclear reactions, either fission or a combination of fission and fusion. Both reactions release vast quantities of energy from small amounts of matter. The first test of a bomb released the same amount of energy as approximately 20,000 tons of TNT. The first thermonuclear bomb test released the same amount of energy as approximately 10 million tons of TNT, a thermonuclear weapon weighing little more than 2,400 pounds can produce an explosive force comparable to the detonation of more than 1.2 million tons of TNT. A nuclear device no larger than traditional bombs can devastate a city by blast, fire. Nuclear weapons are considered weapons of destruction, and their use. Nuclear weapons have been used twice in nuclear warfare, both times by the United States against Japan near the end of World War II, the bombings resulted in the deaths of approximately 200,000 civilians and military personnel from acute injuries sustained from the explosions. The ethics of the bombings and their role in Japans surrender remain the subject of scholarly, since the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, nuclear weapons have been detonated on over two thousand occasions for the purposes of testing and demonstration. Only a few nations possess such weapons or are suspected of seeking them, israel is also believed to possess nuclear weapons, though in a policy of deliberate ambiguity, it does not acknowledge having them. Germany, Italy, Turkey, Belgium and the Netherlands are nuclear weapons sharing states, south Africa is the only country to have independently developed and then renounced and dismantled its nuclear weapons. Modernisation of weapons continues to occur, all existing nuclear weapons derive some of their explosive energy from nuclear fission reactions. Weapons whose explosive output is exclusively from fission reactions are commonly referred to as bombs or atom bombs. This has long noted as something of a misnomer, as their energy comes from the nucleus of the atom. The latter approach is considered more sophisticated than the former and only the approach can be used if the fissile material is plutonium. A major challenge in all nuclear weapon designs is to ensure that a significant fraction of the fuel is consumed before the weapon destroys itself. The amount of energy released by fission bombs can range from the equivalent of just under a ton to upwards of 500,000 tons of TNT, all fission reactions necessarily generate fission products, the radioactive remains of the atomic nuclei split by the fission reactions. Many fission products are highly radioactive or moderately radioactive. Fission products are the radioactive component of nuclear fallout
5.
Geology
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Geology is an earth science concerned with the solid Earth, the rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Geology can also refer generally to the study of the features of any terrestrial planet. Geology gives insight into the history of the Earth by providing the evidence for plate tectonics, the evolutionary history of life. Geology also plays a role in engineering and is a major academic discipline. The majority of data comes from research on solid Earth materials. These typically fall into one of two categories, rock and unconsolidated material, the majority of research in geology is associated with the study of rock, as rock provides the primary record of the majority of the geologic history of the Earth. There are three types of rock, igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic. The rock cycle is an important concept in geology which illustrates the relationships between three types of rock, and magma. When a rock crystallizes from melt, it is an igneous rock, the sedimentary rock can then be subsequently turned into a metamorphic rock due to heat and pressure and is then weathered, eroded, deposited, and lithified, ultimately becoming a sedimentary rock. Sedimentary rock may also be re-eroded and redeposited, and metamorphic rock may also undergo additional metamorphism, all three types of rocks may be re-melted, when this happens, a new magma is formed, from which an igneous rock may once again crystallize. Geologists also study unlithified material which typically comes from more recent deposits and these materials are superficial deposits which lie above the bedrock. Because of this, the study of material is often known as Quaternary geology. This includes the study of sediment and soils, including studies in geomorphology, sedimentology and this theory is supported by several types of observations, including seafloor spreading, and the global distribution of mountain terrain and seismicity. This coupling between rigid plates moving on the surface of the Earth and the mantle is called plate tectonics. The development of plate tectonics provided a basis for many observations of the solid Earth. Long linear regions of geologic features could be explained as plate boundaries, mid-ocean ridges, high regions on the seafloor where hydrothermal vents and volcanoes exist, were explained as divergent boundaries, where two plates move apart. Arcs of volcanoes and earthquakes were explained as convergent boundaries, where one plate subducts under another, transform boundaries, such as the San Andreas Fault system, resulted in widespread powerful earthquakes. Plate tectonics also provided a mechanism for Alfred Wegeners theory of continental drift and they also provided a driving force for crustal deformation, and a new setting for the observations of structural geology
6.
Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty
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The impetus for the test ban was provided by rising public anxiety over the magnitude of nuclear tests, particularly tests of new thermonuclear weapons, and the resulting nuclear fallout. A test ban was also seen as a means of slowing nuclear proliferation, though the PTBT did not halt proliferation or the arms race, its enactment did coincide with a substantial decline in the concentration of radioactive particles in the atmosphere. The PTBT was signed by the governments of the Soviet Union, United Kingdom, the treaty formally went into effect on 10 October 1963. Since then,123 other states have become party to the treaty, ten states have signed but not ratified the treaty. In 1952–53, the US and Soviet Union detonated their first thermonuclear weapons, in 1954, the US Castle Bravo test at Bikini Atoll had a yield of 15 megatons of TNT, more than doubling the expected yield. In the same year, a Soviet test sent radioactive particles over Japan, around the same time, victims of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima visited the US for medical care, which attracted significant public attention. Between 1951 and 1958, the US conducted 166 atmospheric tests, the Soviet Union conducted 82, in 1945, Britain and Canada made an early call for an international discussion on controlling atomic power. At the time, the US had yet to formulate a policy or strategy on nuclear weapons. Taking advantage of this was Vannevar Bush, who had initiated and administered the Manhattan Project, as a first step in this direction, Bush proposed an international agency dedicated to nuclear control. Truman to help construct US nuclear weapons policy, a version of the Acheson-Lilienthal plan was presented to the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission as the Baruch Plan in June 1946. The Baruch Plan proposed that an International Atomic Development Authority would control all research on and material, the Soviet Union dismissed the Baruch Plan as a US attempt to secure its nuclear dominance, and called for the US to halt weapons production and release technical information on its program. The Acheson–Lilienthal paper and Baruch Plan would serve as the basis for US policy into the 1950s, between 1947 and 1954, the US and Soviet Union discussed their demands within the United Nations Commission for Conventional Disarmament. A series of events in 1954, including the Castle Bravo test and spread of fallout from a Soviet test over Japan, additionally, by 1954, both US and Soviet Union had assembled large nuclear stockpiles, reducing hopes of complete disarmament. Interest in nuclear control and efforts to stall proliferation of weapons to other states grew as the Soviet Unions nuclear capabilities increased, in the same year, the British Labour Party, then led by Clement Attlee, called on the UN to ban testing of thermonuclear weapons. 1955 marks the beginning of negotiations, as Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev first proposed talks on the subject in February 1955. On 10 May 1955, the Soviet Union proposed a test ban before the UN Disarmament Commissions Committee of Five, the May 1955 proposal is now seen evidence of Khrushchevs new approach to foreign policy, as Khrushchev sought to mend relations with the West. The proposal would serve as the basis of the Soviet negotiating position through 1957, Eisenhower had supported nuclear testing after World War II. In 1947, he rejected arguments by Stafford L. Warrens arguments were lent credence in the scientific community, everybody seems to think that were skunks, saber-rattlers and warmongers
7.
Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty
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The INF Treaty eliminated all nuclear and conventional missiles, as well as their launchers, with ranges of 500–1,000 kilometers and 1, 000–5,500 km. The treaty did not cover sea-launched missiles, by May 1991,2,692 missiles were eliminated, followed by 10 years of on-site verification inspections. Whereas the SS-4 and SS-5 were seen as weapons, the SS-20 was seen as a potential offensive system. Leslie H. Gelb, the US Assistant Secretary of State, on 12 December 1979, following European pressure for a response to the SS-20, Western foreign and defense ministers meeting in Brussels made the NATO Double-Track Decision. The ministers argued that the Warsaw Pact had developed a large and growing capability in nuclear systems that directly threaten Western Europe, theater nuclear systems. The ministers also attributed the situation to the deployment of the Soviet Tupolev Tu-22M strategic bomber. To address these developments, the ministers adopted two policy tracks, formal talks began on 30 November 1981, with the US then led by President Ronald Reagan and the Soviet Union by Leonid Brezhnev. Additionally, the US insisted that a sufficient verification regime be in place, paul Nitze, a longtime hand at defense policy who had participated in the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, led the US delegation after being recruited by Secretary of State Alexander Haig. Though Nitze had backed the first SALT treaty, he opposed SALT II and had resigned from the US delegation during its negotiation, Nitze was also then a member of the Committee on the Present Danger, a firmly anti-Soviet group composed of neoconservatives and conservative Republicans. Yuli Kvitsinsky, the well-respected second-ranking official at the Soviet embassy in West Germany, on 18 November 1981, shortly before the beginning of formal talks, Reagan made the Zero Option proposal. The plan called for a hold on US deployment of GLCM and Pershing II systems, reciprocated by Soviet elimination of its SS-4, SS-5, there appeared to be little chance of the Zero Option being adopted, but the gesture was well received in the European public. Opinion within the Reagan administration on the Zero Option was mixed, Richard Perle, then the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Global Strategic Affairs, was the architect of the plan. Reagan later recounted that the zero option sprang out of the realities of nuclear politics in Western Europe. The Soviet Union rejected the plan shortly after the US tabled it in February 1982, specifically, Soviet negotiators proposed that the number of INF missiles and aircraft deployed in Europe by one side be capped at 600 by 1985 and 300 by 1990. Between 1981 and 1983, US and Soviet negotiators gathered for six rounds of talks, the US delegation was composed of Nitze, General William F. Colonel Norman Clyne, a SALT participant, served as Nitzes chief of staff, there was little convergence between the two sides over these two years. Nitze later said that his and Kvitsinskys goal was to agree to certain concessions that would allow for a summit meeting meeting Brezhnev, Nitzes offer to Kvitsinsky was that the US would forego deployment of the Pershing II and continue deployment of GLCMs, but limited to 75 missile launchers. The Soviet Union, in return, would also have to limit itself to 75 intermediate-range missile launchers in Europe and 90 in Asia, while Kvitsinsky was skeptical that the plan would be well received in Moscow, Nitze was optimistic about its chances in Washington
8.
Richard Nixon
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Richard Milhous Nixon was an American politician who served as the 37th President of the United States from 1969 until 1974, when he became the only U. S. president to resign from office. He had previously served as a U. S, Representative and Senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under the presidency of Dwight D. Eisenhower. Nixon was born in Yorba Linda, California, after completing his undergraduate studies at Whittier College, he graduated from Duke University School of Law in 1937 and returned to California to practice law. He and his wife Pat moved to Washington in 1942 to work for the federal government and he subsequently served on active duty in the U. S. Navy Reserve during World War II. Nixon was elected to the House of Representatives in 1946 and to the Senate in 1950 and his pursuit of the Hiss Case established his reputation as a leading anti-communist, and elevated him to national prominence. He was the mate of Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Republican Party presidential nominee in the 1952 election. Nixon served for eight years as vice president and he waged an unsuccessful presidential campaign in 1960, narrowly losing to John F. Kennedy, and lost a race for Governor of California to Pat Brown in 1962. In 1968, he ran for the presidency again and was elected by defeating incumbent Vice President Hubert Humphrey, Nixon ended American involvement in the war in Vietnam in 1973 and brought the American POWs home, and ended the military draft. His administration generally transferred power from Washington D. C. to the states and he imposed wage and price controls for a period of ninety days, enforced desegregation of Southern schools and established the Environmental Protection Agency. Nixon also presided over the Apollo 11 moon landing, which signaled the end of the moon race and he was reelected in one of the largest electoral landslides in U. S. history in 1972, when he defeated George McGovern. The year 1973 saw an Arab oil embargo, gasoline rationing, the scandal escalated, costing Nixon much of his political support, and on August 9,1974, he resigned in the face of almost certain impeachment and removal from office. After his resignation, he was issued a pardon by his successor, in retirement, Nixons work writing several books and undertaking of many foreign trips helped to rehabilitate his image. He suffered a stroke on April 18,1994. Richard Milhous Nixon was born on January 9,1913 in Yorba Linda, California and his parents were Hannah Nixon and Francis A. Nixon. His mother was a Quaker and his father converted from Methodism to the Quaker faith, Nixons upbringing was marked by evangelical Quaker observances of the time, such as refraining from alcohol, dancing, and swearing. Nixon had four brothers, Harold, Donald, Arthur, four of the five Nixon boys were named after kings who had ruled in historical or legendary England, Richard, for example, was named after Richard the Lionheart. Nixons early life was marked by hardship, and he quoted a saying of Eisenhower to describe his boyhood, We were poor. The Nixon family ranch failed in 1922, and the moved to Whittier
9.
President of the United States
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The President of the United States is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the executive branch of the government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed Forces. The president is considered to be one of the worlds most powerful political figures, the role includes being the commander-in-chief of the worlds most expensive military with the second largest nuclear arsenal and leading the nation with the largest economy by nominal GDP. The office of President holds significant hard and soft power both in the United States and abroad, Constitution vests the executive power of the United States in the president. The president is empowered to grant federal pardons and reprieves. The president is responsible for dictating the legislative agenda of the party to which the president is a member. The president also directs the foreign and domestic policy of the United States, since the office of President was established in 1789, its power has grown substantially, as has the power of the federal government as a whole. However, nine vice presidents have assumed the presidency without having elected to the office. The Twenty-second Amendment prohibits anyone from being elected president for a third term, in all,44 individuals have served 45 presidencies spanning 57 full four-year terms. On January 20,2017, Donald Trump was sworn in as the 45th, in 1776, the Thirteen Colonies, acting through the Second Continental Congress, declared political independence from Great Britain during the American Revolution. The new states, though independent of each other as nation states, desiring to avoid anything that remotely resembled a monarchy, Congress negotiated the Articles of Confederation to establish a weak alliance between the states. Out from under any monarchy, the states assigned some formerly royal prerogatives to Congress, only after all the states agreed to a resolution settling competing western land claims did the Articles take effect on March 1,1781, when Maryland became the final state to ratify them. In 1783, the Treaty of Paris secured independence for each of the former colonies, with peace at hand, the states each turned toward their own internal affairs. Prospects for the convention appeared bleak until James Madison and Edmund Randolph succeeded in securing George Washingtons attendance to Philadelphia as a delegate for Virginia. It was through the negotiations at Philadelphia that the presidency framed in the U. S. The first power the Constitution confers upon the president is the veto, the Presentment Clause requires any bill passed by Congress to be presented to the president before it can become law. Once the legislation has been presented, the president has three options, Sign the legislation, the bill becomes law. Veto the legislation and return it to Congress, expressing any objections, in this instance, the president neither signs nor vetoes the legislation
