First female prime minister of Sri Lanka; economic struggles caused her defeat for reelection, but she was elected again in 1970
Sirimavo Bandaranaike
Iranian leader who's power was reinstalled after the US and England engineered a military overthrow of Muhammad Mosaddegh; he instituted the White Revolution in Iran
Shah Muhammad Reza Pahlavi
First female elected leader of Pakistan; she struggled to improve Pakistan's economy and and reduce poverty, but was no successful; she was assassinated in 1999
Benazir Bhutto
U.S. President who presided over the two main crises in Cuba, the Bay of Pigs Crisis and the Cuban Missile Crisis
John F. Kennedy
Second leader of independent Egypt; proponent of Pan-Arabism who blended Islam and socialism to form his domestic policies; eventually sparked the Suez Crisis when he nationalized the Suez Canal
Gamal Abdel Nasser
Leader of communist China who instituted reforms like the Five Year Plan, the Great Leap Forward, and the Cultural Revolution
Mao Zedong
The U.S. President who greatly increased troops and action in Vietnam; he deeply believed in the domino theory, which led to the escalation of fighting in Vietnam
Lyndon B. Johnson
First president of newly independent Ghana; essentially created Ghana nationalism with anthems, a flag, museums, etc; eventually became a dictator
Kwame Nkrumah
Communist leader of North Vietnam who led the resistance against both the French and the U.S. in Vietnam's struggle for independence and unification
Ho Chi Minh
Soviet Premier who came to power after Joseph Stalin's death; after the Cuban Missile Crisis he realized how precarious relations were between the US and the USSR and worked to ease tensions
Nikita Khrushchev
Big Three leader through most of the World War II cooperation between the US, Britain, and the Soviet Union; he was succeeded by Harry Truman upon his death in April 1945
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Big Three leader of the USSR at the end of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War
Joseph Stalin
Leader of the Cambodian revolutionary group, the Khmer Rouge; imposed ruthless forms of communism and was eventually overthrown with the help of the Vietnamese military
Pol Pot
Independence leader in India; used nonviolent civil disobedience as his main method of resistance against the British government
Mohandas Gandhi
First female prime minister of India; under her leadership, India won the war against Pakistan but suffered economically; she was assassinated in 1984
Indira Gandhi
First president of independent Tanzania; instituted ujamaa (Swahili for "familyhood"); remained a popular social leader until his death in 1999
Julius Nyerere
Big Three leader of Britain at the end of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War; talked about an Iron Curtain between the West (capitalism) and the East (communism)
Winston Churchill
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