Chapter 29
Cold War, Decolonization and Transformation
The end of the war witnessed tremendous confusion and chaos in Central Europe. Destruction and
displacement were everywhere. Eight million Germans fled westward from the Soviet areas of control to
escape persecution. Twelve million Soviet and German prisoners of War migrated in opposite directions.
Survivors of concentration camps made their way home. In spite of the end of the Holocaust, the vastly
reduced Jewish communities in Eastern Europe continued to face discrimination from the Soviets and
many East Europeans. Three million refugees from the Balkans immigrated to Central Europe.
The biggest threat to the allied triumph was the Soviet absorption of Eastern Europe and North Korea into
the Soviet sphere of influence. President Roosevelt had thought he could “control” Stalin to keep his
promises but even before his death in April of 1945, Roosevelt realized that Stalin had not changed and
was still a brutal dictator. Nevertheless, the Western allies made no attempt to roll back Soviet hegemony
(power) where it existed at the end of the war and “allowed” Stalin to methodically install puppet
governments in the eastern half of Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria,
using rigged election and military intimidation.
It must also be remembered that from the Soviet perspective, much of the mutual distrust and ill feelings
between Stalin and the West came from the West’s previous actions in the Spanish Civil War and the
insult of the Munich Conference. Moreover, the extending of Russia’s borders to the west was a logical
compensation for the dreadful losses the Soviet people had suffered during the war. Thus, the Stalin saw
American resistance to their expansion as a threat to their security and legitimate claims.
Stalin also continued his occupation of the Baltic countries. Both under Stalin and then Hitler, Estonia,
Lithuania and Latvia suffered mass deportations and mass murders. After their reconquest, Stalin called
them (laughingly) republics of the Soviet Union. [And it must be remembered that the United States and Great
Britain never recognized the legality of the 1940 Soviet occupation and, after World War II, still considered the
Baltic republics under Soviet occupation] Yugoslavia also became communist under Marshal Tito but
steered a semi-independent course from Stalin. Korea was divided in a similar manner as Germany, but
the United States alone administered Japan.
As 1945 came to a close, it became obvious that a postwar hostility was dividing the world into two
opposing camps. In February 1946, both Stalin and his foreign minister, Vyacheslav Molotov, were
referring to the West as their enemy. In March of the same year, Winston Churchill in Fulton Missouri,
gave his famous Iron Curtain Speech, in which he said, From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the
Adriatic an "iron curtain" has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of
the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest,
Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia; all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I
must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but
to a very high and in some cases increasing measure of control from Moscow.
Moreover, to complicate matters, Stalin had abandoned his Socialism-in-One-Country approach
and began, like his old enemy Leon Trotsky, to export Communism. Stalin alarmed the Western
Democracies as he began to threaten democratic governments in Iran, Turkey and Greece – and this
brought him perilously close to the valuable oil fields of the Middle East. Soviet directed Communist
groups were also active in many war torn West European nations, especially France and Italy. Stalin’s
goal was gain as much as he could and to push the United States, short of going to war.
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The Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan
Since 1944, a civil war had been raging in Greece between the legitimate royalist government (supported
by Great Britain) and communist backed rebels based in Yugoslavia. In 1947, Britain informed the United
States that it could no longer financially support the royalists. In reaction to this Communist threat and a
growing threat in Turkey by other communist rebels, President Truman committed the United States to a
policy of Containment, which came to be known as the Truman Doctrine. The idea was to “contain”
communism where it was and prevent its spread into other nations. The United States spent huge
sums of money in Greece and Turkey to counteract Soviet influence. But Stalin “fought back” and soon
both superpowers were peddling (offering) money, advisors and influence around the world.
The Marshall plan was the economic arm of the Truman Doctrine, by which the United States developed
a plan to shore up the destroyed infrastructures and economies of Europe. The European Recovery Plan,
commonly called the Marshall Plan after U. S. Secretary of State George C. Marshall, proposed to
rebuild European economies through cooperation and capitalism, financed by the United States, in order
to forestall communist or Soviet influence. Proposed in 1947 and funded in 1948, the Marshall plan
provided more than 13 billion dollars to reconstruct Western Europe.
Even the Soviet Union and her satellites were invited to participate in the Marshall Plan. Finland
(independent but still threatened by Stalin) and Czechoslovakia were willing to participate. Poland and
Hungary showed interest but Stalin – realizing he would lose influence and power – kept any of the Soviet
Satellites from participating. Nevertheless, the Marshall plan restored prosperity to Western Europe and
set the stage for Europe’s stupendous economic revival in the 1950s. The Marshall Plan also inspired the
Christian Democratic Parties in Europe to counter Stalin’s export of Communism.
N.A.T.O. and the Warsaw Pact
In 1949, the United States established the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) as a regional
military alliance to counter Soviet aggression. The original members included Belgium, Canada,
Denmark, France, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and the
United States. In 1955, West Germany was admitted and allowed to rearm. The Soviet Union responded
by forming the Warsaw Pact or military alliance of the seven communist European nations.
Joseph Stalin's desire to enforce Soviet domination of the small states of Central Europe and to mollify
some states that had expressed interest in the Marshall Plan were the primary factors in the 1949 formation
of COMECON or the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance in order to increase trade within the
Soviet Union and eastern Europe as an alternative to the Marshall Plan. Member nations were Bulgaria,
Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union. Later in 1949, Albania joined. In 1950
East Germany joined; in 1960 Mongolia; and in the 1970s Cuba and Vietnam.
The United Nations
Despite rivalries and different political visions, the superpowers were among the nations that agreed to the
creation of the United Nations (U.N.), a supranational organization dedicated to keeping world peace. The
commitment to establish the U.N. (a dream of the Wilsonian idealism of Franklin Roosevelt) came from the
Dumbarton Oaks Conference in Washington D C in 1944 and the final version of the U.N. charter was
hammered out by the United Nations Conference in San Francisco in 1945. But the U.N. was composed of
many nations, most of whom were allied to one of the two superpowers, and these nations, mixed with the
emerging nations of Africa and Asia and the smaller republics of the Americas, were not able to ensure
international peace, security and even cooperation.
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Bipolar Transformation in the West
Western Europe seemed at an all-time low in 1945. The hegemony she had held less than a century earlier
had vanished and the new Cold War seemed to dwarf European concerns. The Yalta Conference had
effectively divided Europe into East and West, entire economies had to be rebuilt, the European colonies
were restless for independence and Europeans were looking for a happier future.
Among the losers Germany was divided into four zones of control administered by Russia, France, Great
Britain and the United States. The allies differed on how Germany should be treated. In the eastern zone,
the Russians dismantled everything of German industry they could and transported it all to Russia. The
result was great economic distress and suffering for the Germans living there. The Western powers
realized that the western zones needed to be rebuilt to make the Germans living there self-sufficient and
ready to accept democratic government. Thus West Germany rose from ruins to become the strongest
economic powerhouse of Western Europe. The deeply respected Konrad Adenauer became chancellor of
West Germany from 1949-1963 and brought West Germany back into the family of nations. He had been
mayor of Cologne from 1917 to 1933 and was imprisoned by the Nazis in 1944. After the war he was the
co-founder of the Christian Democratic Union, (a successor to the Centre Party) which tied to embrace
Protestants as well as Catholics in a single party.
Italy had tried to negotiate a separate surrender with the allies in 1943 and had dumped Mussolini. Hitler
however, rescued his old friend and the Germans occupied Rome until it was liberated in 1944 - and
Northern Italy until Germany surrendered in 1945. Mussolini himself was killed by Italian partisans. On
June 2nd 1946, Italy held a referendum and rejected both Fascism and the monarchy. A peace treaty was
signed with the allies in 1947 and Italy became a republic the following year. There was much Communist
and Socialist agitation and Marshall Plan contributed greatly to the success of frustrating Communist
attempts to pull off a coup. In the 1948 elections. The Christian Democratic Party won an astounding
and unexpected forty eight percent of the vote over the socialist and communist parties. Thus, Italy had
become firmly tied to the West and was a founding member of N.A.T.O. the following year.
The Western European winners were also prostrate (devastated, flattened) and it was clear that Europe’s
day as the leader in world affairs had passed to the other side of the Atlantic. The best example was Great
Britain, which was literally bankrupt after the war. Her leadership role in world trade, shipping, and
banking had vanished. Moreover, her overseas investments had been largely liquidated and wartime
rationing lasted until 1953 in order to pay the cost of the war. In mid-1945, the wartime Prime Minister,
Winston Churchill was voted out of office and replaced by Clement Attlee and a new Labour party
government which immediately nationalized many industries including electricity, gas, water, and health.
Nevertheless postwar austerity and nationalization was followed by the economic miracle of the 1950s
which the nation rebounded, modernized and the standard of living grew dramatically. In the 1960s, the
economy slowed and by the early 1970s, the British economy was in stagnation.
France had been utterly devastated by the war and Nazi occupation, but with the help of the Marshall Plan,
France recovered, proclaimed the Fourth Republic in 1946 and experienced strong growth in all modes
of economic activity. Most other European democracies followed similar pathways. But Charles de
Gaulle, France’s only real W. W. II war hero, felt that France and all of Europe would never regain great
power status as long as it depended upon the United States for military protection. In spite of his myopic
(short sighted) political vision, he had been a visionary before the war, known for advocating concentration
of tanks and air power much as the Germans did with Blitzkrieg. He became the leader of the Free French
in World War II and president of the provisional government from 1944 to 1946. In 1959, he was called to
form a new government under a new constitution which became the Fifth Republic with himself as its
first president. His ideology of walking France down an independent path was known as Gaullism.
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In 1963, De Gaulle refused to sign a partial nuclear test ban treaty, which had been signed by the USA,
USSR and Great Britain. He refused to cooperate with N.A.T.O. and recognized the communist People’s
Republic of China. He tried to bring the French military up to parity with the super powers. When he left
office in 1969, it was obvious that he had failed, but his vision would (in a major sense) succeed in 1993
with the creation of the European Union or E.U.
What De Gaulle wanted politically (with France in the leadership position) came about through economic
necessity as Europeans came to realize the danger they were in because they had become de-facto second
class powers. So they began to work together to increase their economic strength. In 1952, six nations
(Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Italy, France and West Germany) joined to form The European Coal
and Steel Community. In 1957, they signed the Treaty of Rome, which established the EEC (European
Economic Community), also known as the European Common Market. Its goal was to eliminate tariffs
and other internal barriers, which would impede free market movement of money, goods, services and
labor. In 1973, Britain, Ireland and Denmark joined; Greece in 1981; Spain and Portugal in 1986. In1993,
the member nations signed the Treaty of Maastricht, which formally created the European Union. Two
years later, Austria, Finland and Sweden joined.
After the breakup of Soviet Empire, many of its former [unwilling] members became interested in joining
the union. On May 1, 2004, Slovenia, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia
and Estonia joined the union with Cyprus (the Greek half) and Malta; creating a community of 450 million
people with an economic output almost equal that of the United States. (Gross Domestic Product: E.U. = 9
trillion, U.S. = 10.4 trillion) Of even more interest is that Bulgaria, Romania and Turkey plan to join by 2007
and that Croatia and Macedonia are interested in joining.
The Creation of the State of Israel
In Chapter 24, we saw how Theodor Herzl became convinced that Jews would never be safe in Europe
and founded the World Zionist Movement which called for the establishment of a Jewish state in
Palestine. A Russian born chemist, Chaim Weizmann (1874-1972), continued Herzl’s work and, having
immigrated to England where he became a Lecturer of Chemistry at Manchester University, became a
close friend of an influential Member of Parliament, Alfred Balfour. Balfour became Foreign Secretary in
1917 and authored the Balfour Declaration which stated; His Majesty's government views with favor the
establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people…
After the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire and coming of the Mandate System, thousands of Jews
immigrated to the British mandated Palestine. The Jewish community or Yishuv, evolved its own political
parties, news media, labor unions and educational system. The resident Palestinians considered the Jewish
immigration and expansion a threat to them and their interests – and violent clashes ensured. The British
tried to mediate these clashes – but failed. All this changed with World War II because Hitler’s Holocaust
united Jews around the world in supporting the foundation of a Jewish state in Palestine. Even for many
non-Jews (especially in the United States and Western Europe), it seemed the right thing to do.
In 1947, the British, who still could not control Palestinian-Israeli violence, turned the problem over to the
United Nations. In the same year, the United Nations passed a resolution which divided Palestine into two
halves: one Jewish and one Palestinian. The Palestinians were outraged and resisted any such
implementation. Matters came to a head in May 1948, when the British withdrew and the Israelis declared
themselves to be an independent and sovereign nation. Two days later, President Truman got the United
States to recognize the new nation and its first Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. Almost immediately,
Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Egypt and Iraq invaded Israel but Israel astonished the world and not only threw
back the invaders but enlarged the size of their nation at their invaders expense.
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Even though the actual fighting ended with an armed truces signed in early 1949, it was inevitable that the
United States and the Soviet Union would become involved. The United States, dependent on MiddleEastern (Arab) oil (particularly from Saudi Arabia), nevertheless became a close ally of Israel and the Soviet
Union began to furnish aid to most of the Arab nations. The issue of Israel and its relationship with its
Arab neighbors would continue to be a point of Cold War tension until the breakup of the Soviet Union in
1991 – and long after, to our very day.
Social Politics
In social politics, the postwar period reacted to discredited Fascism and extreme right wing movements by
moving toward leftist ideals (i.e., socialism and communism) and liberal democracy. As Europe flourished
economically in the 1950s, so too did the movement toward the Welfare State. As the Labour Party had
done in Britain, so the Christian Democrats in France, Italy and other Western European countries set up
economic and social programs in which the state began to play a key role in the protection and promotion
of the economic and social well-being of its citizens.
By 1948, most European democracies had established welfare states with state funded medical care,
housing assistance, and regulation of parts of the economy, such as crop sizes or airline fares. The United
States moved more slowly, but in the 1960s, under President Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society, medical
assistance programs (i.e., Medicare) were created for the poor and elderly. Canada also enacted the
European model of the Welfare State. It is important to note that the welfare state made the government
more centralized in the lives of people with new and pervasive regulations and higher taxes. Only the
United States avoided complete government planning.
By the 1970s, both Europe and the United States discovered that their blend of capitalism and socialism
had flaws and that decade saw a period of extended economic malaise (weakness). Inflation and recession,
which was commonly called stagflation, (i.e. stagnation + inflation). Coupled with unemployment, this
economic malaise created economic crises in the Euro-American world and a devalued U S dollar led to
instability across the globe. The first oil embargo of 1973, imposed by the nations of the Middle East and
other OPEC nations, further damaged Euro-American economies.
Nevertheless, Euro-American Economies bounced back in the 1980s. They also often took a turn to the
political right to escape the economic malaise of the 1970s. Margaret Thatcher in Great Britain steered a
course back to a free market economy and entrepreneurialism. She lowered unemployment, won a war
with Argentina (recapturing the distant Falkland Islands); and became the only British Prime Minister in the 20th
century to serve three consecutive terms (1979-1990). After a speech in which she referred to the Russians
as “preferring guns to butter”, the Russians called her the Iron Lady, and the name stuck.
In 1980, Ronald Reagan was elected the 40th president of the United States. He advocated a balanced
budget to combat inflation and engineered a supply-side economic program of tax and non-defense budget
cuts. He took a hard stance with the Soviet Union, which he called the Evil Empire and oversaw the
largest peacetime escalation of military spending in American history. However, he was unable to restrain
or control overall spending and huge government deficits accumulated, but the United States recovered
from stagflation and his military spending put great pressure of the Soviet Empire.
Willy Brandt, Chancellor of West Germany from 1969 to 1974 followed the steps of Konrad Adenauer
by his Ostpolitik or détente (a relaxation of strained relations or tensions) with Eastern Europe. Helmut Kohl, a
conservative like Regan and Thatcher who was five times Chancellor from 1982 to 1998, led his country
to economic dominance in Europe during the 1980s. His great legacy was his managing the process of
German reunification that started with the fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989 and completed on
October 3, 1990.
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Although a socialist, France’s president, Francois Mitterrand, was forced to make various concessions to
the right. Thus, the 80s and 90s were a time when Euro-American governments often stepped back a little
from their social-welfare systems and rebuilt their sagging military forces. Unemployment, racial and
economic discrimination seemed to balance prosperity, democracy and technological (i.e. computers and
internet) advances. Thatcher and Regan took a strong military stand against the Soviet Empire. In
response, the Soviet Union tried to build up their defenses. The financial strain on the Soviets brought
about economic disaster and helped hasten the demise of the Soviet Empire.
Bipolar Transformation in the East
In 1945, not only was Western Europe in shambles, but so was Eastern Europe. Although Stalin and his
propagandists tried to keep it a secret, the fact was that USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) had
been badly hurt by the war. Thirty million dead and a third of their economy destroyed! The bottom line
was that the Soviet Union was in no position to fight the United States. Therefore, Stalin tried to catch up.
First, he tried to create a buffer zone. From 1945 to 1948, Stalin absorbed all of Eastern Europe installing
soviet style, puppet governments in East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and
Bulgaria. He also aided Communist governments in Yugoslavia and Albania. Second, he abandoned his
Socialism in One Country approach of the late 20s and 30s and began to export communism, thus
gaining influence in Turkey, Iran, Greece – and even France and Italy. Third, he continued to rebuild the
Soviet economy, taking as much as he could from Eastern Europe and Germany. He used German
scientists to catch up to the United States in rocketry and nuclear capabilities.
Stalin’s goal was to push the Americans as hard as he could short of an open conflict. At Yalta, Stalin
had promised to allow free elections in Eastern Europe. When he broke these promises and began setting
up a Soviet Sphere of Influence so that he became a military threat, President Truman responded with
Containment, NATO and the Marshall Plan. Stalin naturally resisted and responded with COMECON
(Council for Mutual Economic Assistance) and the Warsaw Pact. The Bipolar World had been created
and the Cold War was on.
Stalin also fought Containment and the Marshall Plan by shoring up socialist support. In the autumn of
1947, he called a meeting in Warsaw of all communist parties in the world. They organized Cominform
or the Communist Information Bureau whose mission was to spread revolutionary communism
throughout the world. In Western Europe, Cominform caused a decisive split between Western socialists
and Western communists. In Western Communist parties hard liners, who supported Moscow’s every
order, expelled any leaders who favored collaboration and reform.
In February 1948, Stalin used Czechoslovakia as an object and brutal lesson that he intended to be the
master of Eastern Europe. His Communist-led forces expelled the democratic members of what had been a
coalition government and murdered Jan Masaryk (1886-1948), the Foreign Minister and son of Thomas
Masaryk. The president Edward Benes (1884-1948) was forced to resign. Czechoslovakia was then
brought under complete Soviet control. Stalin’s message to Europe was crystal clear: there would be
no multiparty systems in the Soviet Sphere of Influence.
Like Western Europe, the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe also experienced substantial economic growth
after World War II. The Soviet Union finally became a fully industrialized society and its urban
population rose to more than 50% of its total population. Massive industrialization campaigns were
undertaken and, although not as brutal as forced collectivization, the Soviet System nonetheless required
each East European nation to specialize in the production of certain goods or natural resources.
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The Soviet system included the great socialist umbrella, which provided education, medical care, old age
pensions and other basic services for all citizens. Nevertheless, production standards were notoriously
poor and consumer goods were constantly in short supply, as military production for the Arms Race took
higher priority. Moreover, the entire system was harsh and repressive and filled with corruption; and
environmental concerns (pollution) were totally ignored.
Thus, it is not surprising that the earliest resistance to Soviet hegemony took place in Eastern Europe. In
Yugoslavia, Josip Broz, also known as Marshal Tito, who had served in the Austrian Army in WWI and
joined the Communist Party in the 1920s, became the resistance leader against the Nazis and was able to
gain control of Yugoslavia after the war. Tito, however, managed to escape the Soviet block and pursue a
non-aligned course. His resistance to Soviet control led to a break with Stalin, who expelled Tito from the
Soviet Bloc in 1948. (Yugoslavia was then considered pink) At the same time, Tito maintained good relations
with East European states and worked hard with Egypt’s Nasser and India’s Nehru to make a third path
of nonalignment a reality. After his death in 1980, Yugoslavia quickly collapsed into ethnic divisions and
broke up into Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Macedonia and Serbia (still called Yugoslavia).
In 1953, Joseph Stalin died; nobody cried. Cautiously several top Soviet leaders denounced Stalin and his
reign of terror. The most important was his successor, Nikita Khrushchev (1894-1971), who not only
denounced Stalin but also instituted a policy of de-Stalinization, which condemned Stalin for his
treatment of political opponents, his narrow (self-serving) interpretations of Marxist doctrine and his failure
to prepare adequately for World War II. This de-Stalinization (even though it was not obvious to the West)
marked the beginning of a huge change in Russian/Soviet politics and led to some de-centralization, even
though Communist party control and centralized economic planning remained intact. Nevertheless, the
repressive political ice had been broken and monuments to the former dictator were torn down.
Khrushchev called for Peaceful Coexistence with the Capitalist nations. This warming period caused a
partial liberalization of Soviet society, especially in cultural life. In October 1964, Khrushchev was
removed from power mostly because he could not increase agricultural production or reform corruption in
the bureaucracy. He lived in obscurity outside Moscow until his death in 1971. A shrewd politician, his
most famous quote was, “Politicians are the same all over. They promise to build a bridge even where
there is no river.”
The life of Alexander Solzhenitsyn illustrates how Soviet cultural life evolved after the death of Stalin.
Solzhenitsyn was born into an old Cossack family and educated at the University at Rostov on the Don
River. In World War II, he rose to the rank of captain of artillery, but was arrested in 1945 for writing a
letter critical of Stalin and sent a forced labor camp. Freed in 1956, he settled in Ryazan in Central Russia,
became a mathematics teacher and began to write. In 1962, he published One Day in the Life of Ivan
Denisovich, a short a moving description of life in a Siberian Gulag based on his own experiences. After
Khrushchev’s fall from power, he continued to write, but was increasingly criticized by the government.
He won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1970, but did not travel abroad to accept it for fear he would not
be allowed to return to Russia.
Although not all his works dealt with political repression or even politics, his most famous work, The
Gulag Archipelago, published in the early 1970s, dealt with the arrest, interrogation, conviction,
transportation, and imprisonment of Gulag's victims as practiced by Soviet authorities for over four
decades. He was attacked by the press, arrested, charged with treason and expelled from the Soviet Union.
Even in exile, he found the West too materialistic; and favored the formation of a benevolent authoritarian
regime that would draw upon the resources of Russia's traditional Christian values. He even espoused a
return to monarchy. After Gorbachev’s policy of Glasnost (openness), Solzhenitsyn had his citizenship
restored and returned to Russia in 1994.
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Khrushchev was succeeded by Leonid Brezhnev who had been Khrushchev’s protégée. Like
Khrushchev, Brezhnev had fought in World War II and when Stalin died in 1953, he began to rise in the
party leadership. He was part of the plot to remove Khrushchev and became General Secretary of the
Communist Party from 1964 to 1982. Under Brezhnev, the Soviet Union finally achieved nuclear parity
with the United States. The first challenge to his authority came in the spring of 1968 in Czechoslovakia
when a liberal government, under Alexander Dubcek (1921-1992) came to power and - in a less
threatening manner than Hungary – again challenged Soviet hegemony. Dubcek promised "socialism with
a human face." Brezhnev acted decisively and the Soviets put down the Prague Spring Rebellion by
force but not as violently as the repression of Hungary a decade earlier.
Out of this Soviet intervention came Leonid Brezhnev’s Doctrine of Limited Sovereignty or the
Brezhnev Doctrine, which allowed the Soviet Union to prevent any satellite state from leaving Soviet
influence. The irony was that Dubcek was a fervent, but more forward thinking communist than Brezhnev.
His Democratic Communism advocated freedom of the press and freedom of speech - and, even though
he was forcibly removed, his Prague Spring anticipated the fall of the Soviet satellite system. Dubcek
would live to see the breakup of the Soviet Empire and would try (but in vain) to prevent the separation of
Czechoslovakia into Slovakia and the Czech Republic in what come to be called the Velvet Divorce.
Brezhnev also faced a deteriorating situation with China. The Soviet Union had enjoyed great relations
with China in the 1940s and early 1950s when they worked together as the two principal forces promoting
international communism and challenging the West. However, as the Korean conflict was heating up in
1950, Mao Zedong went to Moscow to try to get aid. What he was offered was too little with too many
strings attached. Moreover Mao resented the fact that he was treated as a social inferior and the treaty he
had to sign (to get some aid) smacked too much of the old Unequal Treaties of the 19th Century. Therefore,
Mao began to re-think his relationship with Russia.
By the late 1950s, China began criticizing Soviet Union for not challenging the Americans more actively.
The Russians responded by calling the Chinese “left-wing adventurers” and the Chinese retorted by
calling the Soviets “revisionists”. As this Sino-Soviet Split deepened, both the Soviet Union and China
competed for influence in nonaligned nations. In 1979, the American President Richard Nixon split the
crack a little wider when he went to China which was an act that eventually led the United States to
recognize and formalize diplomatic relations with Communist China. Thus began a triangular Washington
– Moscow – Beijing diplomatic relationship that changed the focus of the Cold War.
To prevent a Sino-American alliance, Brezhnev opened closer relations with the United States, which led
to the signing of the SALT I (Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty) in 1974, which marked the beginning
of an era of détente between the superpowers. However, Brezhnev also faced serious internal problems.
The dual problem was a stagnating economy and huge military expenditures. His last years were marked
by a growing (but benign compared to Stalin) cult of personality and the two big events of 1979: the
invasion of Afghanistan and the signing of the SALT II treaty. In March 1982, Leonid Brezhnev suffered
a stroke and died later that year. He took Soviet military and political might to great heights, but he left a
legacy of economic stagnation (the Brezhnev Stagnation) and growing disaster in Afghanistan. [Note,
economic stagnation = slow or no economic growth]
Bipolar Confrontation
When the USSR tested its first atomic bomb in 1949, that explosion marked the acceleration of the Cold
War. The bomb now made the USSR equal to the United States. Like the HMS Dreadnought that made
all battleship fleets obsolete, so the atom bomb made conventional war weapons obsolete. Thus 1949
marked the beginning of a 40-year arms race that, at times, threatened the earth with global annihilation.
However, conventional weapons were needed for all the small conflicts that would mark the cold war.
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The Cold War was a fundamental disagreement between political, economic and social systems. It
was a war for the hearts and minds of people; a war between Capitalism and Communism. The
United States attacked the socialist economics of Communism, its dismal record on human rights and its
suppression of civil and religious institutions. The Soviets attacked the failings of laissez faire capitalism
and the wide gulf between rich and poor in Euro- American countries.
Nevertheless, whatever they said, the Soviets and Euro-Americans were both changing in the
Bipolar World - that is to say, they were evolving.
For example under Khrushchev, the Soviets recognized the failings of collectivization and the counter
productiveness of Stalin’s terrorist KGB (Secret Police). Khrushchev offered a New Communism that tried
to balance industrial growth and agricultural output. Nevertheless, in the end Communism was never able
to liberate society (the dream of Marx and Lenin) or create a dynamic economic community.
The Berlin Blockade and the Korean War
In Europe, these competing goals resulted in an east-west split along, (to use Churchill’s words), the Iron
Curtain. The most visible element in this split was the division of Germany and Berlin. This first hot spot
of the cold war flared in 1948 when the Soviets suddenly cut off highway and railroad traffic between
West Berlin and West Germany. Stalin hoped the allies would abandon West Berlin but the United States
responded by the famous Berlin Airlift, which was an incredible effort of supplying everything a city
needed by air – coal, gasoline and food.. Stalin – still vulnerable - did not want war and so did not
interfere with the airlift – and by May 1949, quietly reopened land and rail routes. The same year saw the
division of Germany into two parts: the German Democratic Republic (East Germany) and the Federal
Republic of Germany (West Germany). However, Berlin remained the greatest symbol of the Cold War.
The next Hot Spot flared in Korea. By 1948, Korea had been split into communist North Korea under
Kim Il Sung and South Korea under Syngman Rhee. On June 25 1950, North Korea ignored treaty
agreements and crossed the 38th parallel driving back South Korean and American troops in an attempt to
occupy the entire peninsula. The Americans counter attacked and pushed the North Koreans back up
almost to the Chinese border along the Yalu River, as they too attempted to occupy the entire peninsula.
Suddenly however, 300,000 Chinese troops poured across the border, pushed American, South Korean
and United Nations forces back to the 38th parallel and for three years fought a seesaw conflict in the
middle of the country. The Korean War ended in a cease-fire not a peace treaty in July of 1953, but
nearly three-million people, mostly Korean civilians, died and the war left a legacy of lingering hostility.
The Three Cold War Crises of 1956
In July, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser (1918-1970) nationalized the Suez Canal. Great Britain
and France, which controlled the private company that had run the canal, were afraid that Nasser would
close the canal for their use – especially oil imports from the Persian Gulf. Then in October, war broke out
between Egypt and Israel; and the British and the French used this as an opportunity to intervene and
regain their interests. But the United States refused to support their action, the Anglo-French forces were
forced to withdraw and Egypt retained control of the canal. The Suez Canal Crisis demonstrated two
important historical changes. First, Europe could no longer force her will on the rest of the world and,
second, it was the United States and the Soviet Union that restrained their allies from escalating a local
conflict into a regional or global conflict.
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In the autumn, Poland moved toward partial independence when the Polish Communist Party members
refused to replace the deceased Prime Minister with Moscow’s nominee but rather, in spite of
considerable pressure from the Soviets, were able to nominate and keep Wladyslaw Gomulka (1905-1982)
as the Communist Prime Minister of Poland. He was both the choice of the Poles and acceptable to
Moscow as he continued Polish military and economic cooperation with COMECON and the Warsaw
Pact. However, he was also able to stop the collectivization of Polish agriculture and improve
relations with the Polish Roman Catholic Church.
Late October1956 also witnessed the most serious challenge to the Soviet control of Eastern Europe, when
reform-minded Hungarians demanded democracy and a break with Russian domination. For a short time,
they expelled the Soviets and tasted freedom, until the Soviets outright invaded Hungary and used heavy
tanks to crush the rebellion. The two Hungarian leaders suffered contrasting fates: Imre Nagy fought for
freedom, was betrayed and executed; but Janos Kadar collaborated with the Soviets and became
Hungary’s leader. Khrushchev and the Soviets took much bad press about this brutal re-assertion of
power. Nevertheless, in spite of its apparent failure, the Hungarian Revolution planted the seeds of dissent
in other Eastern bloc leaders and hastened the spread of de-Stalinization.
Sputnik, the U-2 Incident and the Second Berlin Blockade
In 1958, the Soviet Union launched the first manned spacecraft, Sputnik, starting the space race. Because
Sputnik made it appear that the Soviet Union had gained an enormous technological advantage, the United
States reacted by speeding up its space efforts and stressing math and science in secondary education.
Tensions seemed to relax, however and in 1959, Nikita Khrushchev visited the United States and an
American delegation led by Vice President Richard Nixon visited Moscow, during which the two leaders
engaged in the Kitchen Debate which were a series of mostly-friendly, informal, televised debates in
which the merits of the Communism and Capitalism were candidly discussed. In general, it foreshadowed
Margaret Thatcher’s Guns versus Butter comment of the 1980s.
In 1960, Khrushchev was preparing for peace talks in Paris with United States President Eisenhower,
when an American U–2 Spy Plane, piloted by Francis Gary Powers, was shot down over Russia. The
peace talks were cancelled and tensions were strained, but war was avoided, most likely because the world
knew [and the Soviets knew that the world knew] that the Soviets knew about the flights anyway – and
because Mao and his government were becoming increasingly independent. [Powers himself was imprisoned
in Russia for two years, exchanged for a Russian spy and spent twenty years as a helicopter newscaster in Los
Angeles]
In 1961, came a Second Berlin Blockade and the superpowers were again uncomfortably close to war.
On August 13 1961, the East German government, frustrated over the hemorrhaging (bleeding) of East
Germans fleeing to the west, built the Berlin Wall, thus closing off West Berlin from East Germany,
although it was still possible to travel by rail and highway from West Berlin to West Germany only.
The Cuban Missile Crisis
The United States had dominated and often intervened in Cuba (only a hundred miles off the coast of Florida)
ever since the Spanish American War of 1898. In 1957, Fidel Castro (b. 1926) overthrew the dictator
Fulgencio Batista (1901-1973) and became an ally of the Soviet Union. In April 1961, the United States’
newly elected president, John F. Kennedy, had given his approval to the Bay of Pigs Operation, in
which Cuban expatriate rebels (backed by the American Central Intelligence Agency or CIA) attempted
to invade Cuba and oust Castro. The operation failed and embarrassed the United States badly.
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Then in early 1962, the Soviets began secretly to ship nuclear rockets to Cuba and began to set them up,
aimed at the United States. By October, American spy planes had discovered what was happening and the
resulting Cuban Missile Crisis brought the world to the very brink of nuclear holocaust. Had Kennedy
chosen to invade Cuba, such a holocaust might have incinerated the globe, but he chose instead to
blockade Cuba and block the Soviets from sending more missiles. Cooler heads eventually prevailed and
Khrushchev agreed to remove the missiles already there.
The testing of the first Soviet A-bomb, the Berlin blockades, Korea and the Cuban Missile Crisis mirrored
another Cold War reality: the Nuclear Arms Race. At first, the United States had the advantage, but by
the mid-1960s, the Soviet Union under Khrushchev’s successor Leonid Brezhnev caught up and the
superpowers reached a state of nuclear parity. By 1970, this loose strategic arrangement was known as
MAD or Mutually Assured Destruction. This uneasy arrangement of deterrence kept both side from the
unthinkable insanity of global holocaust and finally led to arms limitation talks.
In 1957, Neville Shute published an end-of-the-world novel, On the Beach, which was a story about
survivors after World War III, who faced six months of life because of the growing radiation. The tragedy
of the novel and the two subsequent movies caught the spirit of this unthinkable insanity. On a more
comedic side, Dr. Strangelove tells the story of an out of control Air Force general who launches B-52
Bombers against the Soviet Union leading to World War III.
The Domino Theory and Vietnam War
The most frustrating challenge to American hegemony [superiority] during the Cold War was the Vietnam
War. After 1893, Indo-China including Vietnam was a French colony; but in the 1930s, a revolutionary
leader named Ho Chi Minh (1892-1969) launched a pro-communist movement called the Viet Minh to
fight for independence. The French were able to suppress his movement but all that changed with World
War II and the Japanese conquest of Indo China. The pro-Vichy French administration (collaborating with the
Japanese) allowed Ho Chi Minh to become the most powerful resistance leader in Indo China. In 1945, as
the Japanese were surrendering, Ho Chi Minh declared the independence of Vietnam. The French tried to
reclaim Vietnam but were decisively defeated in 1954 at Dien Bien Phu.
In June 1954, a peace settlement divided Vietnam (almost in the middle) into North Vietnam, which was
controlled by Ho Chi Minh and supported by Communist China; and the south which was left under
French control. But this was temporary and, as the French began to withdraw, the United States became
involved and helped another anti-colonial leader who also had not collaborated with Vichy or the
Japanese, Ngo Dinh Diem (1901–1963) form the Republic of Vietnam. In 1960, Ho Chi Minh oversaw the
formations of the National Liberation Front with the goal of ousting Diem and uniting the country under
a Communist government. As a result, Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy sent substantial military
support to Diem and his anti-communist government in its struggle to defend itself.
In 1964, North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked American warships in the Gulf of Tonkin, which led to
the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in which the American government authorized military action in Vietnam.
The paradox the Americans faced was that Diem and his government were hopelessly corrupt and
unstable, but on the other hand, the Americans felt they had to contain Communism by defending South
Vietnam. As in Korea, the United States was working on the Domino Theory an expression coined by
President Eisenhower. The Domino Theory postulated that if one country fell to Communism, more
would fall like Dominos. Eventually, Diem was overthrown and Nguyen Van Thieu was elected
president. Thieu was a great improvement, but, unfortunately, the South Vietnamese government did not
become more effective or less corrupt.
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The United States, under Lyndon Johnson, increased its commitment to the growing war. By 1966, there
were 150,000 American troops in Vietnam; by 1969, 550,000. In 1968, North Vietnamese forces launched
a massive Tet Offensive, which stunned the Americans but did not dislodge them. Nevertheless, the Tet
Offensive was the turning point in the war because it showed that the Vietcong soldiers of Ho Chi Minh
could not be defeated, especially with Chinese and Soviet military aid pouring into North Vietnam. In
addition, the American bombing of North Vietnam polarized American public opinion and serious
negotiations to end the war began after President Johnson's decision not to seek reelection in 1968.
In 1969, President Richard Nixon intensified the war but wisely pursued the peace talks in Paris. A peace
treaty (The Paris Peace Accords) was signed in January of 1973 and America soon withdrew its forces.
In 1975, the North Vietnamese opened the war again, and easily conquered South Vietnam, creating the
nation of Vietnam. Vietnam was America’s only major defeat in the Cold War, even though her military
forces ironically won almost every military engagement. American emotional scars caused by this conflict
are still bitter and not forgotten.
The emotional scars of the Vietnam War reflected a social upheaval rooted in the global changes caused
by the Cold War. Euro-Americans became more cynical of their leaders and their cultural institutions as
the 1964 Film Dr. Strangelove demonstrated. Morals dramatically changed. College demonstrations for
peace or to protest nuclear arms or abolishing rules and regulations (along with rock and roll, and musical
groups like the Beadles and the Rolling Stones) all pointed to radicalism unknown before the 1960s.
The Soviet Vietnam
The Soviets suffered their “Vietnam” in Afghanistan. In 1978, a pro Soviet coup split the Muslim state
into a civil war between the PDPA (People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan) and Islamic religious
and ethnic leaders. By the summer of 1979, the Islamic rebels controlled much of the countryside and the
Soviet Union with token interference from the Carter administration, intervened and set up a puppet
government of Babrak Karmal. What followed was a frustrating attempt by the Soviets to pacify the
country. Nevertheless, the Karmal government remained unpopular and the rebellion intensified. For nine
years, the Soviet army tried to destroy the Afghan Mujahedeen (or Islamic warriors). The gleeful United
States and China along with Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran sent supplies to the Mujahedeen and by 1986,
the Soviets admitted defeat by withdrawing from a war that had become too costly and un-winnable.
Afghanistan remained locked in turmoil, however, until 1996, when the Taliban, an organization claiming
to be an army of religious students, took control and established a strict Islamic state.
Growing Détente
From 1969 to 1979, the USSR, China and the United States gradually evolved a policy called détente, or a
permanent relaxation in Cold War tensions rather than just a temporary relaxation, like the thaw of the
Khrushchev years. This reduction in hostility grew both out of the horror at the bloodshed in the hot spots
of the Cold War, especially Korea and Vietnam, as well as the growing fear of nuclear holocaust.
Détente gained strength because China was fearful of her isolation in the world. She was also fearful of
what the United States had done in Vietnam. China was also afraid of deepening the Sino-Soviet split and
that border fights might also turn into nuclear holocaust. The United States realized that there were better
ways of containing communism than the militancy she had shown in the early cold war years. She was
also aware of the massive cost of weapons production and maintaining a huge armed force. A peaceful
relationship with the USSR would be very beneficial to USA especially after the cost of the Vietnam War.
The USSR was spending a huge amount on weapons at the expense of basic household goods. Living
standards were poor and USSR was aware that her relationship with China was far from good while USA
was trying to improve hers with China.
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Summary of the growth of détente:
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1959 – The Kitchen Debate between Nixon and Khrushchev
1963 - hot-line established between White House in Washington D.C and the Kremlin in Moscow
after the Cuban Missile Crisis
1963 – Along with Great Britain, U S and USSR agreed to use only underground tests for nuclear
explosions (Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty).
1969 – After the Pueblo Incident of 1968 (North Korean warships capture and hold hostage the crew
of an American “spy ship” Pueblo) brings the world close to nuclear holocaust, Strategic Arms
Limitation Talks (SALT) start between U S and USSR.
1971 – Ping Pong diplomacy (China invited an American table tennis team to China);
Early 70s - In Europe, the Ostpolitik of Willy Brandt was decreasing tensions; the Soviets hoped that
with Détente, more trade with Western Europe would be possible.
1972 - President Nixon goes to China and opens diplomatic relations
The Basic Treaty of 1972 was the treaty by which East Germany and West Germany established
formal relations and recognized each other’s sovereignty for the first time since their partition after
World War II.
1972 - President Nixon visits Moscow and with Brezhnev signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
This treaty was the fruit of the SALT I talks, which negotiated freezing the number of strategic
ballistic missile launchers at existing levels, and provided for the addition of new submarine-launched
ballistic missile launchers only after the same number of older intercontinental ballistic missile and
submarine missile systems had been dismantled.
1973 - Leonid Brezhnev visits Washington
1974 – President Nixon visits Moscow a second time
1975 - Helsinki Agreement — USA, USSR, Canada along with the major European powers accept
European frontiers set up after World War II. This recognized that Germany was divided and East
European countries agreed to allow their people human rights such as freedom of speech.
1978 President Carter withdraws recognition of Taiwan
1979 – United States gives official recognition to the People’s Republic of China
The Soviet Union’s Growing Troubles in the 1980s
The massive defeat of President Jimmy Carter in the presidential election of 1980 and opening of the
Thatcher-Regan era marked both an end to détente and the beginning of a new arms race – a race that
would lead to the collapse of the Soviet Empire. The USSR’s invasion of Afghanistan had given the
Soviet Union bad world press. Moreover, there had been mounting tension caused by the 1979 Sandinista
revolution in Nicaragua where the Soviets supported the Communist Sandinista and the United States
supported the Sandinista opponents, the Contras.
The Soviets began to face mounting internal and external problems, although they were not always visible
to the Soviet citizenry.
 First, pushed by President Regan, the arms race escalated in the early 1980s. Although the Soviets
could maintain quantity, they were hard pressed to keep up with the quality and various delivery
systems of American weaponry.
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Second, the political system in the Soviet Union was hopelessly corrupt and economy was in
shambles. From the late 1970s until Brezhnev’s death in 1982, the Soviet stagnant economy was
plagued by shortages of consumer goods as more and more economic resources went to the arms race.
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Third, the failure of the Afghan war, which Regan decried as Soviet Adventurism, caused much
disillusionment.
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Fourth, a growing dissident movement of humanitarians and intellectuals grew louder and larger.
Perhaps the best known was Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, a Russian novelist and historian, whom we
have already discussed and who was responsible for exposing the horror of the Gulag system.
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Fifth, growing unrest in Eastern Europe underscored the Soviet inability to tap into the nationalism
inherent in Eastern Europe. Romania under Nicolae Ceausescu gained more autonomy. Under
Janos Kadar who had betrayed and killed Imre Nagy in 1956, Hungary introduced limited
capitalism called the Democracy Package, marking Hungary one of the wealthiest and happiest
states in the Eastern Block. Czechoslovakia witnessed demonstrations led by Vaclav Havel who
would become the last president of Czechoslovakia and first president of the Czech Republic.
Poland, however, would bring the greatest threat to Soviet hegemony. In Poland, Lech Walesa
led a combined Trade Union and political movement called Solidarity, which was immediately
supported by Roman Catholic Clergy and most intellectuals – and quickly became the catalyst for
protest and anti-Soviet outrage. In late 1981, the Communist government of Poland under
Wojciech Jaruzelski declared martial law, arrested Walesa and drove Solidarity underground.
However, Solidarity did not go away and its “illegal” activities became both a political and
financial drain to the USSR. Bulgaria saw gentle steps toward liberalization in spite of its hard
line ruler Todor Zhivkov.
In addition to Eastern Europe, there was China which had undergone painful and sometimes misguided
modernization under Mao Zedong. Nevertheless, after Mao’s death in 1976, Deng Xiaoping (1904-1997)
came to power in 1978 after a two-year power struggle. Deng was pragmatic, patient and willing to
compromise. He was more concerned with China than abstract Marxist ideals. Thus, unlike Mao who was
vigorously anti-capitalistic, Deng allowed more and more free market reforms under the slogan “create
wealth for the people.” [Deng also once quipped, “It doesn't matter whether a cat is white or black, as long as
it catches mice.”] Although not a direct financial drain to the Soviet Union, it was a political and diplomatic
challenge that would plague the USSR during the 1980s.
The Gorbachev Revolution
Leonid Brezhnev died in 1982 and was succeeded by two, hardline successors, Yuri Andropov (19141984), a former KBG chief who had played a key role in crushing the Hungarian Revolution in 1956, and
Konstantin Cherenko (1911-1985), who had Brezhnev’s confidence. But both Andropov and Cherenko
not only died within thirteen months of each other, but they also failed dismally to reform the Soviet
economic system and lift the malaise (paralysis) of Brezhnev Stagnation. But 1985, also saw the rise of a
reform-minded politician Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev.
Gorbachev was born in 1931 to a peasant family and was raised on a collectivized farm. While studying at
Moscow University for his law degree, he joined the Communist Party and rose rapidly and was appointed
to the Politburo in 1979. To put it mildly, Gorbachev inherited a worsening crisis of epidemic
proportions. Drastic action was called for and Gorbachev was up to the challenge – and would make the
most dramatic changes in the Soviet Union since the 1920s.
First, on April 20, 1985, at a party congress speech, Gorbachev used the expression Uskorenie, which
came to be a slogan acceleration of social and economic development of the Soviet Union. By Uskorenie,
he meant to urge forward the human factor in Soviet revitalization. The following month, Gorbachev
gave a speech, in which he acknowledged Russia’s economic slowdown and the inadequacy of living
standards. Such an admission of the true economic situation had never been admitted at any time since the
October Revolution of 1917.
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Gorbachev implemented the policy of Perestroika or restructuring. The aim was to strengthen the Soviet
economy by deemphasizing traditional party and bureaucratic management and emphasizing local control
over central planning. In 1989, worked to settle a coal miners’ strike in Siberia because the economy
needed their product. In early 1990, he abandoned traditional Marxism and began to advocate private
ownership of property and moving the economy toward free market goals. In many ways, Perestroika
resembled the reforms of Deng Xiaoping, but Perestroika failed mostly because the USSR was too deeply
mired in corruption and inefficiency dating back to the Five Year Plans of Stalin.
Finally, Gorbachev allowed political and cultural liberalization in his policy or Glasnost or openness.
Glasnost allowed for greater freedom of the media, open debate (especially of the Stalinist period), public
criticism of Soviet social and economic problems and exposure of corruption and workplace abuses.
Leaders like Nikolai Bukharin, who had been murdered by Stalin in the Purges, were recognized for their
contributions. Censorship was relaxed and dissidents were released from prison. Gorbachev also legalized
non-Communist parties. However, like Perestroika, Glasnost was too little, too late, for a political and
social system stuck in inefficiency and corruption.
At the same time, Gorbachev worked for more friendly relations with the west. He understood that the
USSR could not win the arms race and so in 1987 he and President Regan negotiated the Intermediate
Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (IMF Treaty), which removed short and mid-range nuclear weapons from
Europe. In Eastern Europe Gorbachev called for economic reforms and more attention to human rights.
Gorbachev was walking a tight rope. He risked angering the hard line, stalwart members of the
Communist Leadership if he liberalized too much. On the other hand, if he made no reforms and made no
efforts at détente, he risked financial and perhaps military disaster. These attitudes and policies would
make Gorbachev immensely popular in the west and they would help to end the Cold War. However, the
unintended side effect would be the dissolution of the Soviet Union.
In Eastern Europe Gorbachev replaced the Brezhnev Doctrine with the Sinatra Doctrine (named for
American singer Frank Sinatra’s popular song “My Way”). In essence, the Sinatra Doctrine now allowed the
countries of Eastern Europe to follow their own separate paths. Gorbachev also informed the leaders of the
Communist governments of these countries that they could no longer count on money or political support
from the Soviet Union – even in the event of a military crisis. The result was a massive wave of
liberalization and revolution in 1989 and 1990.
1989: Revolution in Eastern Europe
1989 was a pivotal year in Eastern Europe mostly because of Gorbachev’s policies. Even during the days
of the tsars, Eastern Europe was accustomed to the idea of an expanding Russian Empire but that was all
now gone. Glasnost in particular brought out a wave of unexpected discontent in the Soviet Union but in
all of Eastern Europe – and Gorbachev was not able to control the discontent.
Poland: In the early 1980s Solidarity continued to struggle for freedom and was encouraged when the
Polish government relaxed martial law and released many solidarity prisoners. In 1988, new strikes
surprised even the leaders of Solidarity and the government could regain control. Lech Walesa again took
center stage and became a kind of mediator between the government and Solidarity. Jaruzelski with
Moscow’s tacit consent promised reforms and free elections. In the summer of 1989, Solidarity was made
legal and free elections were held. The government lost overwhelmingly and Solidarity won a huge
majority and led Poland to become the first Warsaw Pact Nation to free itself from Communism – with no
interference from Gorbachev. Lech Walesa became the country’s first president in 1990. Most
importantly, Poland’s achievement opened the floodgates.
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Hungary: As far back as Czechoslovakia’s 1968 Prague Spring, Hungary quietly introduced modest
economic reforms. The Hungarian Communist Party opened relations with the west and voted itself out of
existence. In early 1989, Hungary opened its border with Austria and allowed free travel between the two
countries. The created a breach (hole) in the Iron Curtain and thousands of East Germans used this breach
to move from East German to Hungary to Austria to West Germany. In May, the revolution broke out
when Janos Kadar was stripped of power and the Hungarian Communist Party became the Hungarian
Socialist Party. In a powerful moment, thousands of Hungarians gave an honorary burial to Imre Nagy,
whom Kadar had murdered in 1958. In the free elections of 1990, Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF)
led by József Antall (1932-1993) won an overwhelming majority in the Parliament and gradually moved
Hungary towards a gradual transition to open markets.
East Germany: In the autumn of 1989, popular disruptions erupted in many East German cities and – to
the surprise of many - the East German Communist Party, led by hard-liner Erich Honaker, collapsed
and younger Communist leaders took over but quickly resigned and a new government was formed. In
November, the new government ordered the destruction of the Berlin Wall and tens of thousands East
Berliners crossed to West Berlin to celebrate and shop. Soon, West Germany soon became involved and,
under the leadership of West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl, the two German states became a united
Germany in 1990. Even though the former West Germany assumed the former East German’s debts and
poverty, the new Germany quickly gained economic dominance in Europe. In 1994, Berlin again became
the German capital.
Czechoslovakia: Revolution in Czechoslovakia came quickly after the breach in the Berlin Wall. In
November, the Velvet Revolution (velvet in the sense of bloodless or non-violent) deposed Gustav Husak
(the Communist ruler since 1968) and overthrew the Czechoslovakian Communist government in bloodless
coup. On December 28, Alexander Dubcek became chairman of the Parliament, and the next day, Vaclav
Havel was elected president. Then, in 1993, the Velvet Divorce divided Czechoslovakia into the Czech
Republic and Slovakia.
Bulgaria: In the autumn of 1989, after years of gentle movement away from Marxism, democratic
reforms were introduced and the long ruler (even though he was never a Stalinist), Todor Zhivkov, was
removed from power by the Bulgarian Communist Party. In 1990, the Bulgarian Communist Party
changed its name to the Bulgarian Socialist Party, adopted a center-left political system and renamed the
Peoples’ Republic of Bulgaria the Republic of Bulgaria.
Romania: In the only revolution that involved significant violence, Nicolae Ceausescu, who had
governed without opposition since 1965 and ordered that demonstrators be shot by police, was overthrown
on December 22nd, and executed on December 25th. In 1990, the National Salvation Front, led by Ion
Iliescu, restored partial multi-party democratic and free market reforms.
A New Russian Republic
Gorbachev knew that the Soviet Union could no longer support the Soviet Block dictators and the collapse
of Eastern Europe hurt Gorbachev’s prestige. He knew that the Soviet Union had to restructure itself but
Glasnost and Perestroika had both failed and the economy had not improved. In early 1990, Gorbachev
formally proposed to the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party that they abandon their
monopoly on power. After intense debate, the committee abandoned the Leninist position that only a
single elite party must lead the revolution to forge a Marxist society. In addition to internal unrest,
Gorbachev had to fact the increasing agitation from the non-Russian Republics of the USSR who were
restless and in some cases agitating for outright freedom.
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Opposition to Gorbachev’s policies began to grow and crystalized around two groups. The first were the
Soviet hard-liner conservatives who were angry at Gorbachev’s failures and wanted to retain their power
in the government and the armed forces. They complained about the country’s economic stagnation and
growing political turmoil and in response (or better said, retreat), Gorbachev began to appoint members of
the hard-liner conservatives to key positions in the government. The second group to oppose Gorbachev
was those who wanted even more openness and change. Their support centered around Boris Yeltsin who
wanted the Soviet Union to move quickly to a market economy, democratic government and a break with
Communism.
Aggravating the situation for Gorbachev, was the collapse of the Communist states in Eastern Europe and
the growing regional unrest those revolutions caused in the Soviet Union. The greatest unrest came from
the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, which had won independence after World War I but
been brutally absorbed by Stalin in 1940. In 1989 and 1990, all three countries tried to decrease Soviet
control and Lithuania actually declared independence. Gorbachev kept control with military intervention.
Unrest also broke out in the Soviet Islamic Republics in Central Asia and the Caucuses especially in
Azerbaijan and Tajikistan. During 1990 and 1991, Gorbachev tried to renegotiate constitutional
arrangements with these republics but repeatedly failed.
In August 1991, the hard line Communists, whom Gorbachev had given more power in the government,
staged a coup and placed Gorbachev under house arrest, while he was on vacation in the Crimea.
However, before the hardliners could take over the government, Boris Yeltsin, chairman of the Supreme
Russian Soviet Republic, called for all citizens to oppose their coup and within two days, the coup
collapsed. The USSR was finished. During the months that followed the various republics of the USSR
including Russia itself decided to become independent of the Soviet Union. By September, Lithuania,
Estonia, Latvia, Ukraine, Byelorussia, Moldavia, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan
and Armenia had all declared their independence.
World War I was finally over and on December 25, 1991 the Soviet Union ceased to exist and the
Commonwealth of Independent States was created. Boris Yeltsin led the Russian Republic during the
1990s in a period marked by widespread corruption, economic collapse, and enormous political and social
problems. He was soon opposed by a majority in the Russian Parliament most of whom were former
Communists. An impasse that crippled the government was reached in October 1993 and Yeltsin
suspended the Parliament. The leadership tried to depose Yeltsin but the army supported him and Yeltsin
crushed their rebellion. Western leaders also added their support for Yeltsin’s position.
In December 1993, a new parliament was voted in and they approved a new constitution. In 1994, Yeltsin
faced a rebellion in the Caucuses province of Chechnya, a conflict the dragged on and on with no
solution. During the mid-90s, former state owned properties were privatized which was a slow, frustrating
process marked by opportunism and corruption. One result was the formation of a small group of
extremely wealthy individuals, which the press called “The Oligarchs.” In 1998, Russia defaulted on its
international debt payments. Political assassinations broke out and the economy went into recession.
Yeltsin grew tired (his health was failing) because he was unable to solve these problems and retired in
1999, when Vladimir Putin, a former hard liner communist, was elected president. Putin renewed the war
against the Chechnyan rebels, which, despite heavy casualties, increased his political support in Russia
itself. In September 2001, Putin supported the American attacks in Afghanistan, mostly because he was
afraid the Islamic extremism would spread beyond Chechnya into other regions of Russia including the
former Russian republics in Central Asia. Nevertheless, the Chechnyan conflict dragged on and turned
ugly, especially the 2003 Chechnyan attack of a school in Ossetia in which 330 hostages were killed.
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However, Putin remained strong in the Russian Republic and worked hard to undo the reforms of Boris
Yeltsin by centralizing central authority at the expense of local autonomy. He also took action against The
Oligarchs which strengthened his popularity because most Russians considered The Oligarchs to be
nothing but thieves who brought hardship to ordinary people. It is important to note that although Putin
took a giant political step backwards and Russia still had to deal with major hurdles in regards to
corruption, violent crime and economic stagnation, Russia (in the first decade of the twenty-first century) was far
more democratic than it had ever been under the Soviet system.
The Collapse of Yugoslavia and Civil War
Before 1991, Yugoslavia consisted of six republics (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia, Macedonia and
Montenegro) dominated by Serbia and the Communist party. Thus Yugoslavia was a patchwork of
different languages, ethnic traditions and religions. Marshal Tito kept these competing factors at bay by
creating around himself a cult of personality (much as Stalin and the Fascist dictators had done) but, after his
death in 1980, economic difficulties and ethnic differences weakened the authority of the central
government in Belgrade. In the late 1980s, two strongmen, Slobodan Milosevic (1941–2006) in Serbia and
Franjo Tudjman (1922–1999) in Croatia dominated their ethnic states. Under Milosevic, the Serbians
complained that Serbia did not have sufficient influence in Yugoslavia as a whole and that they were not
able to help Serbians living outside Serbia deal with discrimination from other ethnic groups.
In 1991, war over Serbs living in Croatia, broke out between Croatia and Serbia. The war took a new turn
in 1992, when Serbia and Croatia determined to divide Bosnia. The Muslims in Bosnia, who had lived
among the Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croatians, were caught in the middle. Milosevic and the Serbs in
particular pursued a policy called “Ethnic Cleansing” which was a euphemism for genocide and the Nazi
policies of World War II – and many Muslims were murdered or forcibly relocated. Meanwhile, in 1994,
NATO troops forced the Serbs to withdraw and in 1995 carried out strategic air strikes. Later that year,
under the leadership of the United States, a peace agreement was negotiated in Dayton, Ohio.
Toward the end of the 1990s, Serbia renewed its ethnic aggression against Muslim Albanians living in the
province of Kosovo, where the Albanians were the majority of the population. The world watched in
horror and Milosevic used the same ethnic cleansing policies and in 1999, NATO again intervened with
air strikes and peace-keeping ground troops in the largest military operation since World War II. In 2000,
Milosevic was overthrown and the government handed him over to the International War Crimes Tribunal
in the Netherlands, where he died before the conclusion of his trial. All that remained of Yugoslavia was
Serbia and Montenegro. Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Macedonia were independent nations.
Decolonization and Transformation
One of the most powerful trends shaping the postwar era was Decolonization, which is defined as the
achievement of independence by the various Western colonies and protectorates in Asia and Africa
following World War II. Technically, Decolonization began during the Age of Anxiety when Great
Britain was forced to give Home Rule to Ireland in 1922. The next step was the 1931 Statute of
Westminster, which transformed the British Empire into the British Commonwealth. Not every nation
in the Commonwealth received the same degree of autonomy, but it was the beginning of Decolonization.
Then, from the mid-1940s to the 1970s dozens of new nations came into being. It may be argued that the
breakup of the Soviet Empire in the early 1990s is but a continuation of that trend. These new nations
obtained their freedom in different ways and they faced different problems. They were wooed by both of
the superpowers and many of them chose a separate path called non-alignment.
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Nevertheless, the transformation of most of Africa and much of Asia from European colonies into
independent nations was the most remarkable event in the second half of the twentieth century – after the
Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Empire. The First World War had shaken Europe’s hegemony
over their colonies and the Second World War shattered what was left of that hegemony. The ideals of
President Roosevelt as expressed in the Atlantic Charter and his desire for a United Nations recognized
the equality of nations as well as human beings and so laid the foundation for the opposition to the
continuation of colonial empires. It should be remembered that Churchill resisted decolonization and
Stalin wanted to amass power through the expansion of international Communism.
Egypt won independence from Great Britain in 1922 and Ethiopia was freed after World War II. In 1946,
the United States granted full independence to the Philippines. In 1947, Britain granted independence to
India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan; in 1948 to Burma, now Myanmar. In 1949, the Dutch were forced out the
East Indies and formed the nation of Indonesia the next year. In 1951, Libya gained independence; in
1953, Cambodia; 1954, Laos and Vietnam gained independence; in 1956, Tunisia, Sudan and Morocco
gained independence; in 1957, Ghana; in 1958, Guinea; in 1959, Senegal, Cyprus and Mali. 1960 was
called the Year of Africa because Mauritania, Ivory Coast, Upper Volta, Niger, Chad, Nigeria, the Central
African Republic, Cameroon, Togo, Dahomey, Congo, Gabon, Madagascar, Zaire and Somalia gained
independence. Tanzania, Sierra Leone and Kuwait gained independence in 1961, in 1962, Algeria,
Uganda, Rwanda and Burundi; in 1963, Kenya and Malaysia; in 1964, Zambia, Malawi and Malta; in
1965, Gambia, the Maldives, Lesotho and Singapore; in 1966, Botswana; in 1967, Yemen and South
Yemen; in 1968, Swaziland and Equatorial Guinea; in 1971, United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar; in
1973, Bangladesh (from Pakistan); in 1974, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau; in 1976, Angola; in 1977,
Oman and Djibouti, in 1980, Zimbabwe; in 1991, Eritrea (from Italy in 1947; then from Ethiopia); in 1990,
Namibia (from South Africa); 1997, Hong Kong returned to China (from Great Britain).
Nonalignment was a reaction to the superpowers and their political strings. Nonalignment emerged at the
April 1955 Bandung Conference in Indonesia, where 23 nations, led by India’s Jawaharlal Nehru (who
coined the term nonaligned), Marshal Tito of Yugoslavia, Sukarno of Indonesia, Gamal Abdel Nasser of
Egypt and Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, charted a third path of neutrality in the Cold War, choosing neither
the Soviet sphere nor the American. Although officially non-aligned, many members had close ties to one
bloc or the other. In addition, both blocs wooed the non-aligned nations with military and economic
assistance, like the Peace Corps. It is important to note the many non-aligned leaders considered Cold War
Politics and the choice of American or Soviet spheres of influence nothing more than continued or even a
new form of Imperialism.
The Radicalization of Islam
Islam has always had internal and external tensions with which it has had to deal. When Muhammad died
in 632, there was some confusion, but soon, after a troubled process, Abu Bekr, Muhammad’s father-inlaw and close friend, was chosen as Caliph, or deputy. Caliphs were head of state, chief judge, religious
leader and military commander. As Islam expanded, he was succeeded by Omar, Uthman (two of
Muhammad’s closest followers) and finally by Ali, Muhammad’s cousin. But Ali was murdered in 661 and
succeeded by Mu’awiya who founded the Umayyad Dynasty which lasted until 750. This caused as split
in the rapidly growing Islam between the followers of Mu’awiya (or the Sunnis) and the followers of the
slain Ali, who became known as the Shiites. It is important to understand that from the seventh century,
the minority Shiites have never accepted the majority Sunnis. The Shiites, however are dominate in
Southern Iraq and Persia (Iran) while the Sunnis dominate in almost all other Muslim countries. In the
early modern world, the Ottoman Turks were Sunnis but the Safavid Persians were Shiite.
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But Islam has also opposed the Christian West. Islam slowly absorbed the Byzantine Empire, North
Africa and Spain. Islam generally fared well during the Crusades but began to lose its grip on Spain as the
Reconquista gained momentum. The Ottoman Empire during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries posed a
strong military challenge to Central Europe but receded after their defeats at the naval battle of Lepanto
(1571) and the Siege of Vienna (1683). The Ottoman Empire declined and became the Sick Man of Europe
as the Western Powers won more victories and economically dominated the Turks. In the nineteenth
century, they kept Muhammad Ali from capturing Istanbul and propped the Ottoman Government
because of their own mutual distrust.
Three factors came into play during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. First, Muslims disagreed
among themselves about whether or not to adopt Western learning and technology. The Tanzimat
Reformers supported Western learning but the, Ulamas and Wahhabis strongly opposed it. Second, the
Balfour Declaration of 1917 clearly stated that the British government supported the establishment of a
Jewish state in Palestine. Third, the Mandate System of the Paris Peace Talks created bitter distrust
among Middle Eastern Muslims towards the imperialistic West. Thus it should be no surprise that the
radicalization of Islam began to take form in countries like Egypt and Syria in the 1920s. Unlike Turkey
and many Islamic thinkers who believed that strength would come through imitation the institutions of the
West, the radical Islamic thinkers wanted to reject Western ideas and create (of recreate) a society based
on Islamic religious principles.
After World War II, many Arab Nationalist leaders leaned toward non-alignment neutrality or even a prosoviet stance because they felt that socialism and communism were opposed to Western imperialism. Both
democratic and anti-democratic governments emerged. Turkey is the most stable of the democracies. Antidemocratic were usually monarchies, such as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan and Egypt – until Nasser was
ousted in 1954. Saudi Arabia’s oil reserves made the country rich and powerful; and friendly to the West.
All four, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Jordan and Egypt are still monarchies along with Bahrain, Oman, the
United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
After World War II, Iraq was a monarchy until the army ousted the king in 1958. In 1979, General
Saddam Hussein became president-dictator. Although Lebanon’s post war history was sometimes stable
and sometimes not, its government is a shared democracy in which its president is a Maronite Christian,
the speaker of the parliament a Shiite Muslim, its prime minister a Sunni Muslim, and the Deputy Speaker
Greek Orthodox. Syria was a republic until 1966 when the military took over the country. Yemen is a
republic and Palestine, which gained independence in 1988, is a republic as well, dominated by the
Palestine Liberation Organization.
The Iranian Revolution
In Persia, Agha Muhammad Khan founded the Qajar dynasty in 1781 which lasted until 1925 when
Reza Khan (1919-1980) overthrew the Qajars and his Pahlavi dynasty lasted until 1979 when his son,
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, was overthrown in a fundamentalist Islamic revolution led by the Ayatollah
Ruhollah Khomeini (1902-1989). Uniting both the middle and lower classes, Khomeini presided over a
religious theocracy that defined its purpose as Islamic and nationalistic and which unified government and
religion. The new Islamic constitution gave the clergy – acting on behalf of Allah – full authority (the final
say) in all matters. The Khomeini regime not only challenged the West and rocked the world, it also
challenged the secular thinking of Arab nationalists in states like Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Algeria that
feared their Iranian revolution would undermine their own power bases. As a result, these conservative
regimes paid more attention to Islamic religious authorities.
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