13. what part of europe did the first wave of immigrants come from? 14. what are some pull factors that attracted many immigrants to the u. s.? 15. what are two reasons immigrants faced discrimination?

The first wave of immigrants hailed from Western and Northern Europe. Many felt pulled to come to the United States because they were fleeing political or religious factors, or looking to make a better life with a stronger economic future. Some were even fleeing areas that were war torn and home to corrupt political powers. At the time, many Irish arrived in the United States to find that work was hard to come by, many businesses posted signs stating no Irish need apply. The Chinese were banned in the US due to the Chinese Exclusion Act. There were already many Chinese people in the US but they were barred from becoming US citizens.

Of course it could have been avoided. a great many scholars argue it happened because of truman's use of fear to gain support. his predecessor fdr was the most popular and charismatic president ever. truman was a machine politician chosen as the least offensive choice around for vp. had henry wallace remained vp and then president, the cold war might not have happened. or had dewey been defeated in the primaries by robert taft, and then taft defeated truman in 48, the cold war also might not have happened. taft was somewhat isolationist, opposing nato and the korean war. wallace believed truman to be unnecessarily provocative in his dealings with the soviets.of course for strong anti communists, they claim the soviets would see any sign of weakness and try to take over the world. but this is a conspiracy theory not backed by evidence. most communist movements were local and not controlled by moscow. stalin had just lost over 20 million people and was exhausted and paranoid. his number one fear was a rearmed germany allied with the us, and truman made his nightmare real with the marshall plan. truman's blunders are at least half responsible for the cold war and neither wallace nor taft would have made them.on top of that, stalin was dying and in poor health. his successor khrushchev was a reformer who ended the forced labor camps, set many political prisoners free, criticized stalin, and declined to build a powerful soviet navy to confront the us. stalin actually proposed a neutral united germany. a paranoid american gov't turned him down, guaranteeing a continued cold war for decades more.