UNIT 8

Great britain, the usa and australia

In the post - second world war period

LIST OF WORDS

to stockpile weapons

to deploy weapons

to launch a first-strike

long / medium/ short-range missile

“iron curtain”

aftermath

weapons

offensive weapons

defensive weapons

conventional weapons

weapons of mass destruction

“brinkmanship”

détente

policy of containment

to contain arms race

Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT)

grave / serious / inevitable consequences

to gain / win independence / sovereignty

to declare / recognize independence

to strengthen peace

to have common interests

peaceful coexistence

to reduce / relax / relieve / ease international tension

disarmament conference

total disarmament

general / universal / nuclear disarmament

general and complete disarmament

multilateral / unilateral / partial disarmament

to misuse powers

to supersede

growth in prosperity

to dominate world trade

ambivalent

rapid

the G7

to boost

to outstrip

in comparative terms

to lag behind

to overtake

to strengthen the economy

living standards

loose monetary policy

public debt

mortgage crisis

instrumental

to encourage savings

advanced

to heed

to recover from a recession

TEXT 1. Read the text and explain the essence of the metaphoric notions “cold war” "iron curtain" and “warmongering”.

At the end of World War II, English author and journalist George Orwell used the term Cold War in the essay “You and the Atomic Bomb” published October 19, 1945, in the British newspaper Tribune. Contemplating a world living in the shadow of the threat of nuclear war, he warned of a “peace that is no peace”, which he called a permanent “cold war”, Orwell directly referred to that war as the ideological confrontation between the Soviet Union and the Western powers.

British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered his famous "Iron Curtain" speech in Fulton, Missouri. The speech called for an Anglo-American alliance against the Soviets, whom he accused of establishing an "iron curtain" from the Baltic to the Adriatic".

The concept of the Iron Curtain symbolized the ideological fighting and physical boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of World War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. On either side of the Iron Curtain, states developed their own international economic and military alliances:

• The Council for Mutual Economic Assistance and the military Warsaw Pact on the east side, with the Soviet Union as most important member of each

• The European Community and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization on the west and south, with the USA as the area's military powerhouse.

Physically, the Iron Curtain took the shape of border defenses between the countries of Western and Eastern Europe, most notably the Berlin Wall, which served as a longtime symbol of the Curtain as a whole.

Much of the Western public still regarded the Soviet Union as a close ally in the context of the recent defeat of Nazi Germany and of Japan. Many saw Churchill's speech as warmongering and unnecessary. Although not well received at the time, the phrase "iron curtain" gained popularity as a short-hand reference to the division of Europe as the Cold War strengthened. The Iron Curtain served to keep people in and information out, and people eventually came to accept and use the metaphor.

TEXT 2. Read the text and fulfill the task that follows it.