1. Investigating proxy wars: Jigsaw activity

Crossing the 38th parallel. United Nations forces withdraw from Pyongyang, the North Korean capital 1950. Author unknown. Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)

Activity

For this activity you will need to break up into four different home groups. Each group member will be assigned a different proxy war from the following:

1. The Korean War
2. The Vietnam War
3. The Cuban Missile Crisis
4. The Civil War in Angola

Group members will then move into their expert groups to investigate their topic and become ‘mini-experts’ in order to create a presentation they will then use to teach their peers in their home group about their topic. Presentations should be backed up by evidence and each group needs to carefully select their sources and reference appropriately. The presentations must be able to be displayed or stored digitally for everyone to access after the activity has ended.

The presentation should cover these essential aspects:

• What historical, political, and social factors led to this war?
• Why is this event called a proxy war?
• Who were the main powers involved in each war?
• How do the ideological differences between the US and USSR effect these events?
• What impact did media coverage have on these conflicts?
• What were the perspectives of the people in those areas?
• How were these conflicts resolved?
• How do perspectives differ now in the future?

Sources to start with:

The Korean War

The Cuban Missile Crisis

Domino Theory

Vietnam War

US Involvement in the Korean War

Angolan Civil War

The Korean War

The Vietnam War

The Cuban Missile Crisis

Angola Independence and Civil War

2. Tweeting perspectives

President MPLA (Angola), heer Neto door Den Uyl ontvangen; premier Den Uyl en A. Neto by Rob Mieremet / Anefo ( CC0 1.0)

Activity

Based on the previous research on proxy wars you should select one event to focus on with this activity. This can be the event you researched or one from another group. Using your event, you will create a series of ‘Tweets’ that make up the feed of a historical figure during this time . This can be a well-known historically significant figure, a soldier, a journalist or a normal person. Be creative! But no matter whose perspective you choose to write from their perspective must be grounded in historical research.

Identify 5-10 key moments that represent a perspective on the Cold War or event. These moments can be both historically significant and significant to your historical actor, this could include:

• when the US entered the Vietnam War,
• the Geneva accords
• the 13-day period in the Cuban missile crisis
• president Truman finding out about the war in Korea
• the death of a loved one
• enlisting in the army
• being affected by one of the wars

No matter what moment you choose to represent with your figure you must adhere to the conventions of a normal tweet and get your point across in 280 characters or less. Your tweets and feed must be presented in the manner typical to the platform and can utilise other features from the platform such as a unique username and retweets. Capture the character’s thinking in their feed and maybe even reflect a shift in perspective as each event goes on. You can be as creative as you like however you should use language that is appropriate to the time and the context.

You can use the template provided below to plan your tweets and then create Tweets in a Tweet generator like Zeoob. Please note these tools are for educational  purposes only and should be used responsibly.

Resources on differing perspectives to start your thinking:

• PSB Learning Media Joseph Rank Fightin’ For video
• Korean War Legacy Foundation Multiple Perspectives
• National Archives One Step from Nuclear War
• American Archive of Public Broadcasting Hot Wars in the Cold War

These sources are just a jumping off point, and you should read widely to evidence your characters perspective but remember to always be conscious of the reliability of your source!