AG
• Ethnic cleansing
•people killing people of other ethnic
groups
• War crimes
•violating rules of war that forbid
atrocities such as the mass killings of
prisoners or civilians
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Wasn’t much on the world stage
Many countries became independent in 1919
During WWII, Germany gained control of many
Those went to the Soviets
• The USSR army was in a lot of Eastern Europe when WWII
ended
• Lots of areas had local Communist parties in power
• The Soviets came along and helped them
• Got rid of all cries against them
• Other parties
• Critics
• Religion
• Soviets stopped privately-owned businesses
• Those countries became satellites, client states
• The Soviets got a little more controlling in the 1950s
• They had to sell natural resources to the Soviet Union
• Didn’t benefit the satellites very much
• Forced to support the Warsaw Pact
• USSR troops were stationed in many places in the satellites
• Some people didn’t like the Soviets very much
• Imre Nagy (NOJ) rose to power in Hungary in 1956
• Communist reformer and strong nationalist in Hungary
• Got his country out of the Warsaw Pact
• Asked Western countries for help
• No one did
• He was executed and many people died
• Soviets… bum bum bum
• Alexander Dubcek tried in Czechoslavakia
• Warsaw Pact troops came
• Communist dictator
April 5, 1968
• The USSR had the power to involve themselves in anything with
its satellites
• Yogoslavia escaped the Soviet control.
• Josip Tito had fought against the Germans in WWII
• He was a guerrilla leader
n.
1a. a member of an irregular usually politically motivated armed force that
. combats stronger regular forces, such as the army or police
b. ( as modifier ): guerrilla warfare
• A communist leader
• Wouldn’t be in the Warsaw Pact
• Neutral in the Cold War
• The USSR had lots of trouble with Poland
• Wanted more freedom, like Hungry and Czechoslovakia
• Stalin was very strict with Poland
• Then they persecuted the Catholic church.
• Bad idea….
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Poland people rallied around the Church
1956- riots and strikes occurred
The government of Poland had some reforms
The Poles really didn’t like communism
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Lech Walesa (VAH LEHN SAH) created Solidarity
Independent trade union
Lots of strikes in 1980
Millions strong, and they wanted change
The USSR… didn’t
Poland banned the group and arrested Walesa
Poles still liked Walesa
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He visited in 1979, and met with leaders of Solidarity
Talked out against the communists
He, Karol Wojtyla, was the former archbishop of Cracow
He helped Jews escape during WWII
Very outspoken critic of communism all over the world
Walesa said, “We know what the pope has achieved. Fifty
percent of the collapse of communism is his doing.”
• Some people disagree that his part was that huge
• Gorbachev said he wouldn’t mess with Eastern Europe in the
1980s
• Poland was reforming many things, like Gorbachev had done in
the USSR
• Solidarity was made legal
• First free elections were in 1989
• First in fifty years
• Solidarity won
• Walesa became the president
• Transition time for Poland
• Democracy was spreading throughout Eastern Europe
• 1989
• People went on marches
• Wanted things better, through reforms
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A human rights activist was elected president of Czechoslovakia
Berlin Wall went down
Germany became whole
Romania was the exception in these democratic reforms
• Violence
• Dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu, wouldn’t step down
• Executed
• Those countries weren’t part of the Warsaw Pact
• Soviets weren’t doing very well
• The newly freed countries had many challenges ahead of them
• Privatized industries
• Didn’t monitor prices of goods
• Had been unrealistically low
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Lots of inflammation
High unemployment
Quite a bit of crime
Higher quantity of products, but people didn’t have money
Due to the many problems, some communist supporters were voted
into parliaments
• Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic became members of NATO
in 1999
• Others became members after that
• Those countries began to be more involved in international affairs
• Poland and some others helped in Iraq
• Many European countries had very diverse populations
• Had a majority, but many smaller ethnicities
• Nationalism worked well in some countries, and terribly in others
• Czechoslovakia split
• The Czech Republic
• Slovakia
• Yugoslavia had a civil war in the 1990s
• Yugoslavia was for the South Slavs
• Created after WWI
• Had many republics
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Serbia
Croatia
Bosnia
Herzegovina
Macedonia
Slovenia
Montenegro
• The country had:
• Serbs- Roman Catholics
• Bosnians- Muslims
• Spoke the same language, Serbo- Croatian
• Very different customs
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Tito was very strict with Yugoslavia
Put his critics in jail
Made religious and nationalist people be quiet
Nationalism created problems there after he died
Groups were rebelling against the Serbs
Slovenia became independent in 1991
Macedonia, Bosnia, and Croatia soon did the same
It was only Serbia and Montenegro
• Muslims, Serbs and Croats had a civil war in Bosnia
• The Yugoslav president, Milosevic, gave money to the Serbs
• Wanted self-governing regions
• Muslims were the majority in Bosnia
• Didn’t want the country to be made up on ethnic regions
• There was lots of ethnic cleansing- people killing people of
other ethnic groups
• Serbs killed Bosnian Muslims
• Mass executions, always very brutal
• Muslims were mad, so the attacked the Serbs
• Many innocent people were killed
• Seemed like Nazi Germany
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UN, NATO, and Russia tried to help
In 1995, NATO had some air strikes on the Serb military
That started some peace talks
The US led Bosnia, Croatia, and Serbs to sign the Dayton
Accords
• This was a series of peace agreements
• Lots of international help
• The groups were still very hostile and did not get along
• Kosovo was a Yugoslav province in a historic part of Serbia
• Many ethnic Albanians settled there
• This mainly Muslim group made up 90% of the population by
1990
• Everyone else was probably a Serb
• President Milosevic ended the Muslims’ limited self-rule in 1989
• The Muslim Kosovars really didn’t like that
• A war by them against the Serbs
• More ethnic cleansing… Milosevic was very much in support of
that everywhere
Two-year-old boy refuge… series won
the Pulitzer Prize
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UN and NATO demanded peace negotiations
Nothing happened, so NATO launched air strikes
Many Serbian massacres
Yugoslav forces left Kosovo
Peace talks began
Many refugees also returned
International aid helped build homes and organize government
Milosevic was overthrown in 2000
Yugoslavia became Serbia and Montenegro in 2003
Still internal problems
Still ethnic feuds
• NATO and international aid occurred much faster in Kosovo
than Bosnia
• War crimes- violating rules of war that forbid atrocities such as
the mass killings of prisoners or civilians
• Milosevic and others were charged
• http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/10/howcommunism-took-over-eastern-europe-after-world-war-ii/263938/
• http://gstoddard.blogspot.com/2010/12/good-map-of-nato-andwarsaw-pact.html
• http://www.52insk.com/footnotes-to-slovak-culture/dubcekalexander/
• http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/guerilla
• http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/the_pope_and_communism/
• http://www.biography.com/people/imre-nagy-9419948
• http://traumaofconflict.wordpress.com/2012/04/15/josip-broztitos-period/
• http://stillperception.wordpress.com/2011/10/15/carol-guzykosovo-refugees/