Post-WWII decolonization in Africa led to Cold War proxy conflicts

The US and the USSR backed opposing sides in dozens of proxy wars during the Cold War

To avoid direct confrontation, the superpowers supported rival factions in conflicts around the world—including in Korea, Vietnam, Angola, and Afghanistan.

The world rapidly decolonized after World War II

After WWII, weakened European powers faced mounting resistance from colonized peoples. Between 1945 and 1980, dozens of nations across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East gained independence.

The Cold War (1947-1991) prompted the birth of NATO and the Soviet Warsaw Pact

The geopolitical rivalry between the United States and Soviet Union was considered “cold" because the two countries never directly engaged in military combat during the time period. This page from the Kennedy Presidential Library outlines the causes and major events of the early Cold War.

The US intervened in Latin America to block communist influence during the Cold War

Fearing Soviet expansion, the US intervened across Latin America by backing coups, funding right-wing regimes, and supporting anti-communist militias—most notably in Cuba, Chile, Nicaragua and Guatemala.

Much of the Global South responded to the Russia-Ukraine war by pursuing a strategy of 'active nonalignment'

Boston University scholar Jorge Heine suggests that countries across Africa, Asia, and Latin America are avoiding taking sides between Washington and Beijing—viewing the rules-based order as increasingly unresponsive to the needs of developing nations and considering the West's framing of the war irrelevant to its own interests.

Wartime conferences exposed cracks in the US–Soviet alliance

At the Tehran, Yalta and Potsdam Conferences, Allied leaders coordinated WWII strategy—but deep disagreements over postwar Europe foreshadowed the Cold War. The USSR’s push for influence in Eastern Europe clashed with US and British calls for self-determination.

Soviet control spread across Eastern Europe after WWII

In the late 1940s, the USSR solidified control over Eastern Europe by installing pro-communist regimes in countries like Poland, Hungary and Romania—often through rigged elections and political repression.

European powers carved up nearly all of Africa in just 4 decades

This video explains the "Scramble for Africa," when seven European nations seized over 90% of the continent between 1870 and 1910. Only Liberia and Ethiopia remained sovereign as imperial competition redrew Africa’s borders and reshaped its future.

What led to the Vietnam War?

On the heels of gaining independence from colonizers, why did Vietnam fracture and begin its internal battle? Though the war took root during an independence movement against French colonial rule, it evolved into a Cold War confrontation with international support. This article explains six events that led to the conflict between North and South Vietnam.

The Monroe Doctrine helped lead to the American occupation of territory abroad

This podcast explores how the policy motivated a century of US military intervention throughout Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Pacific—covering the annexation of Hawaii, the Spanish-American War, and occupations of Cuba, Haiti, and Panama.

The 1967 war was the first use of oil as a geopolitical weapon

Following the June 1967 Arab–Israeli war, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Iraq, Libya, and Algeria embargoed oil shipments to the US, UK, and West Germany. While the move did not have a large impact, it reshaped global oil flows, and foreshadowed OAPEC's later actions.

The world is shifting from unipolarity toward a multipolar order

The post-Cold War world was briefly unipolar after 1991, with the US standing alone as a global superpower following decades of US-Soviet bipolarity. Analysts increasingly describe today's order as multipolar, with China, Russia, the US, and regional powers all competing for influence.

Relationships between countries have become more peaceful since the rules-based order was established

Our World in Data monitors bilateral relationships on a spectrum from open rivalry to "positive peace"—deep cooperation and mutual protection. In 1945, no countries had highly cooperative security relationships. Today, nearly a fifth do.

What impact did WWI have on the US civil rights movement?

One of the great hypocrisies in American history involve the expectation of African-Americans to defend liberty in several wars while being deprived of it when they returned home to, as this article puts it "disfranchisement, segregation, debt peonage and racial violence." The writer reflects on World War I and how it affected the fight for civil rights in the USA.

Davos has been home to many pivotal moments in international diplomacy

Davos provides a forum for unlikely meetings: FW de Klerk met with Nelson Mandela and Mangosuthu Buthelezi during South Africa’s transition from apartheid, North and South Korea held their first-ever ministerial talks, and East and West German leaders discussed reunification.

The Middle East's cold war, explained

The Middle East is one of the most complex regions in the world, including a complicated web of conflicts and actors. Two countries, Saudi Arabia and Iran, have torn apart the region by supporting opposing sides in other countries and indirectly...

Rock expanded to Africa, where it was used as a political artform

The Nigerian rock scene began after Bill Haley’s "Rock Around the Clock" film premiered in the country, inspiring young people to take up electric guitars. The music was also an integral part of the country’s civil war, with conscripted bands entertaining soldiers on both sides of the conflict.

Pre-revolution Cuba was prosperous—and deeply unequal

On the eve of Castro’s 1959 revolution, Cuba ranked among Latin America’s most advanced societies, with high incomes and health outcomes. Yet stark racial, rural, and political inequalities—compounded by corruption and US intervention—made the system weak and primed for revolt.

The United States has had a tumultuous relationship with Cuba since its 1959 revolution, highlighted by a nuclear crisis and a decades-long trade embargo.

HIV originated in Central and West Africa from a virus in chimpanzees

Researchers believe the virus crossed from chimpanzees to humans through bushmeat practices in the early 20th century, with genetic studies suggesting the most recent common ancestor of the HIV-1 M group, which is responsible for the global AIDS pandemic, emerged around 1910–1930 in Léopoldville (now Kinshasa) in the Belgian Congo.

Drug trafficking, violence, and politics in Northern Mali

Drug trafficking in northern Mali is fueling unparalleled regional violence and instability. In Mali, smuggling narcotics is not only a way armed groups gain funds, but also a source of conflict in itself. According to the International Crisis Group...

Congress has formally declared war 11 times across five conflicts, the last in 1942

The five declared wars were the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Spanish-American War, World War I, and World War II. Every major American military conflict since Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan has been fought without a formal declaration.

What was life like in walled-off West Berlin?

As Germany fractured along ideological lines, ruled by the Soviet Union in the East and Allied powers in the West, the capital city of Berlin, fully immersed in Soviet territory, became an island of refuge for people trying to flee Communist...

A collection of contemporary maps from World War II

Newspapers published detailed maps of the conflict in real-time. See different portrayals of the situation, ranging from propaganda maps to speculative maps about the war's outcome. The fascinating depictions reveal how maps can show us the aspirations and intentions of different players in a global conflict.

Explore how free speech and justice coexist and sometimes clash

From the abolition of slavery to South African apartheid, this podcast explores how censorship has historically been used to suppress racial justice movements—and to promote them—and asks whether free speech is a foundation for, or a threat to, equality.

10 controversial World Cup moments

If you're expecting a staid back-and-forth, then you'll be surprised by the World Cup, which is often filled with high drama and even higher tensions. This list highlights how controversy has been a constant on soccer's biggest stage, influencing outcomes, sparking debates, and sometimes leading to rule changes.

The US first hosted the World Cup in 1994, a tournament that lives in soccer infamy for its poor planning and the murder of Colombian player Andres Escobar, who'd accidentally scored on his own net.

The 2026 Ebola outbreak in the DRC is spurring new Ebola vaccine development for the Bundibugyo species.

Before humans, the Soviet Union and the United States sent animals—including apes, dogs, and cats—to space during the Space Race.

The Russia-Ukraine conflict is the largest ground war in Europe since World War II in terms of casualties, forces mobilized, and displacement of civilians.

The American cockroach is actually from Africa, an apparent hitchhiker aboard ships carrying enslaved people, with evidence suggesting the bug may have arrived in the New World as early as the 1600s.

Explore an interactive map of battles from the American Revolution, along with detailed summaries of each engagement

Watch a 1934 short film starring jazz legend Cab Calloway, a major figure in the Harlem Renaissance's music scene

The history of many kitchen appliances involves unexpected discoveries and applications, including wartime radar turned hamster defroster and replacing an 'ice king' with heat-stealing boxes.

Hookworm infection, though risky, may help fight certain autoimmune conditions by tamping down the immune system's inflammatory response.

See 33 images that became central to huge scandals, including a young Charles and Camilla, Michael Jackson's baby on a hotel balcony, and Hugh Grant's mugshot.

'Shogun,' a 1980s TV series, helped popularize sushi in the US by stimulating an American interest in Japanese culture.

While El Niño moves warm Pacific Ocean waters east along the equator, La Niña moves them west, shifting where rainfall will become more common for months.

Electrical grids worldwide must double their power delivery capacity by 2050 to meet surging demand from AI and electric vehicles.

Jimmy Carter signed a 1978 bill that legalized home brewing, a move credited with kick-starting the craft beer industry.

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

Mid-century modern graphic designers, known for their bright colors and bold lines in advertising, also found success with children's books.

In 2018, 26-year-old missionary John Allen Chau was killed by tribesmen after attempting to reach and evangelize on India's isolated North Sentinel Island

Play the role of a student in a game where you try to navigate college and remain debt-free, selecting different income levels, high school experience, race, ethnicity, and more.

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps is independent of Iran's regular army and is one of the most powerful and influential military-political organizations in the Middle East.

Sunflowers have long been a symbol of nuclear disarmament because they can extract large amounts of radioactive cesium from soil.

A small portion of The Winstons' 'Amen, Brother,' an obscure '60s gospel record, is the basis for thousands of hip-hop tracks, making it one of the most sampled records ever that's informally known as 'the Amen break.'

Coral reefs get their colors from zooxanthellae—microorganisms that line corals' digestive tracts and provide them with sugars in exchange for a home within this protective tissue.