The House Un-American Activities Committee was established in 1945 to monitor and prosecute suspected communists. Specifically, the committee believed its job was to protect the type of government specified under the Constitution—democratic, representative, capitalist, and providing equal economic opportunity—from potential subversion or sedition. The Committee was notable during the Red Scare period of American history.

In the Vietnam War, the Americans fought against the communist government of North Vietnam and on the side of the republican government of South Vietnam. The American goal in the war was to prevent the spread of communism to South Vietnam. Opposition to the Vietnam War was a major mobilizer for social change in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s.

The National Security Act of 1947 created the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Council, and the Department of Defense. The National Security Act of 1947 was a major change and growth in the powers of the Federal government to provide for the defense of the nation in the wake of World War Two. The creation of the Central Intelligence Agency can be seen as an important early moment in the budding Cold War.

Juan Peron was elected President of Argentina three times, ruling from 1946-1955, and then again from October 1973 to his death in July 1974. Peron was a military leader who espoused a "third way" form of economics and government between capitalism and communism that was referred to as "Peronismo." Typically, this is called "corporatism," as Peron and his followers sought to have the government work with corporations and labor unions to create economic balance.

In the early twentieth century, more than three quarters of the worlds coffee was grown in Brazil. The country was governed by a proto-republican oligarchy that was able to maintain power as a result of the high cost of and demand for coffee; however, during the Great Depression, the demand for coffee collapsed, causing the price to collapse and plunging Brazil into an economic crisis. This led to the overthrowing of the republican government, which was replaced by a military dictatorship.

Juan Perón is the most famous Argentinian president who served during the tumultuous years of revolution and military dictatorships that defined Argentinian politics in the middle of the twentieth century. He came to power shortly after the end of the Second World War before being overthrown and ostracized from the government by a military coup in 1955.

During the military dictatorship regimes of the mid-twentieth century, most Latin American countries were almost entirely reliant on exporting their raw resources to the industrial nations of Europe, North America, and Japan; however, as the economies of many Latin American countries began to struggle in the 1970s, their governments reacted by taking massive loans out from the banks and governments of the developed world. By 1982, Latin American debt had spiraled out of control, and many governments declared themselves unable to pay off the debt. This led to a movement towards democracy as the people of the various Latin American nations lost faith in the ability of the military dictatorships to provide safe and effective government.

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the nations of Latin America were generally either colonies or republics, with a few exceptions. When the economic crisis of the Great Depression hit in the 1930s, many states lost faith in their republican governments, and military dictatorships were able to seize power. This happened in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Guatemala, and several other countries.

For several centuries, Latin America was a series of European colonies, mostly Spanish and Portuguese. In the nineteenth century, most of these achieved independence; however, that independence was to become profoundly illusory in the twentieth century as the United States began to exert overwhelming control over Latin American economic and political life. American investors took control of mines, plantations, and financial institutions throughout Latin America, and the American government took an active role in encouraging revolutions to further political interests.

The Iran-Contra Affair was a political and diplomatic scandal that occurred during the second term of Ronald Reagan’s presidency. It involved the sale of arms, illegal under an international embargo being enforced at the time, by the American government to the Iranian government. The money was then used to fund rebel soldiers in Nicaragua (the contras) which had also been prohibited by the United States Congress. Because the President’s administration effectively acted in secret and in knowing violation of two laws it was a significant scandal for Reagan to try to deal with.