the evolving nature and character of the Cold War in Europe from 1948 through to détente, Flashcards
1
Q
Division of Germany
A
- May 1949 – Western Powers brought their zones together to form the Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany)
- October 1949 – eastern sector became a separate state calling itself the German Democratic Republic (East Germany)
2
Q
NATO
A
- The Communist Party’s seizure of power in Czechoslovakia led by Kelment Gottwald in February 1948 (Prague Coup) and the Berlin Blockade persuaded the USA that there was a need to commit to the defence of Europe
- As the Soviet armed forces greatly increased in numbers, other countries and nations feared that the Soviet Union would expand their control and take over other countries, in response to this, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization was formed
- NATO is a formal alliance between the territories of North America and Europe
- From its inception, its main purpose was to defend each other from the possibility of communist Soviet Union taking control of their nation.
- North Atlantic Treaty signed on 4 April 1949 establishing the North Atlantic Treaty Organization
- Included Canada, USA, Belgium, Britain, France, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Italy and Portugal (by 1955 Greece, Turkey and West Germany had also joined)
- Came into force in August 1949
- First allied military commander was General Dwight Eisenhower (the future President)
- The USSR said that NATO was an offensive alliance against the USSR and responded by creating Comecon (Council for Mutual Economic Assistance) in 1949 to coordinate the economic policies of the eastern bloc states in line with Soviet economic policies
3
Q
Warsaw Pact
A
- The Warsaw Treaty Organisation (also known as the Warsaw Pact) was a political and military alliance established on 14 May 1955 between the USSR and the Eastern European states
- The Treaty was signed as a response to the FRG’s entry into NATO
- It served as a counter balance to NATO
- The original signatories to the Warsaw Treaty Organisation were the Soviet Union, Albania, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria, Romania, and the German Democratic Republic
- Although the members of the Warsaw Pact pledged to defend each other if one or more of them came under attack, and although it emphasised non-interference in the internal affairs of its members, and supposedly organised itself around collective decision-making, the Soviet Union ultimately controlled most of the Pact’s decisions.
4
Q
Arms Race and Threat of Nuclear War
A
- The USA had a nuclear monopoly after 1945 and the a-bomb made the USA seem very powerful
- Stalin was determined that the USSR would also have an atomic bomb and authorised the Soviet bomb programme
- On 29 August 1949 Russia successfully detonates its first atomic bomb
- The Korean War and the Soviet development of the atomic bomb forced Truman to make rearmament his government’s overriding priority in Europe
- Stalin attempted to counter the threat of German rearmament with the Communist-led World Peace Movement and offered the FRG the prospect of joining a neutral and united Germany
- British PM Attlee called it a “bogus forum of peace with the real aim of sabotaging national defence”
- The Cold War has become very serious as both sides focused on the development of the Hydrogen Bomb (H Bomb), 2500 times stronger than the Hiroshima bomb
- Mutual Assured Destruction (known as M.A.D.) became increasingly more likely, e.g. in the event of nuclear war, both sides would be wiped out
- However, this was also was a deterrent to each other as they knew it would result in total annihilation – and some historians believe that this also prevented a war (due to fear of M.A.D)
- Both USSR and USA began development on missile technology that could put rockets in space which opened up possibilities for the delivery of nuclear weapons
- By the 1950’s, US intelligence estimated that in a Russian missile attack, 20 million Americans would die and 22 million would be injured
- The Americans increased their expenditure on weapons massively as a result of the ‘Missile Gap’ - the belief that the Russians were way ahead
- DEW Line – Defence/Distant Early Warning System along the arctic
- Both USSR and USA could deliver nuclear weapons across continents at high speeds through the use of Inter Continental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs)
- Eventually the USA had 8,000 ICBMs and USSR 7,000 ICBMs
- By the end of the 60s both sides had developed Anti Ballistic Missile systems (ABM) to counteract the ICBMs
- Troops: NATO had 2.6 million, Warsaw Pact had 4 million
- As each superpower increased their weapons and armies MAD became increasingly more likely
- Nevertheless as a result of deep suspicion, distrust and fear, each side continued to build up their weapons and armies
5
Q
U2 Crisis
A
- A summit meeting was arranged in Paris for 16 May 1960 to discuss Berlin and the arms race
- Nine days before the meeting, however, the Soviets shot down an American U2 spy plane After claiming that it was an off-course weather plane, the Americans had to admit it was a spy plane when the Russians produced the pilot, Gary Powers, who they had captured
- As a result, the first thing Khrushchev did at the summit was to demand an apology from President Eisenhower
- When Eisenhower refused, Khrushchev went home, and the summit collapsed
- It was a very frightening time. If the two sides resorted to all-out nuclear war, their stockpiles of nuclear weapons guaranteed that civilisation would be devastated
6
Q
Space Race
A
- The Space Race was a competition of space exploration between the United States and Soviet Union from approximately 1957 to 1975
- It involved efforts to explore outer space with artificial satellites, to send humans into space, and to land people on the Moon
- It can be seen as a part of the larger arms race, as developments in space research could easily be transferred to military research
- Both countries started work on developing reconnaissance satellites (military observation of a region to locate an enemy or ascertain strategic features) well before the height of the Space Race
o E.g. The Vostok spacecraft used by the USSR to put Yuri Gagarin into space, for example, was developed from the Zenit spy satellites used by the Soviet military - The populations of both countries took a great interest in their respective space programmes and it was a useful way for both superpowers to demonstrate their superiority
- In America the space programme was headed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, who were given control of all non-military activity in Space
- On 5 October 1957 the Soviet Union succeeded in putting the first human made object into orbit around the Earth – this Satellite was called Sputnik
- It was followed a month later by Sputnik II, which carried the first space traveller, Laika the dog
- Their launch caused a huge shock all around the world, but especially in the United States, where people had grown used to their country’s technological superiority
- Despite the successful launch of Explorer 1 by the USA in March 1958, there was still a fear of the Soviets gaining the upper hand in space and thus NASA was created
- However, the Americans were again beaten by the Soviet Union, when Yuri Gagarin became the first man to orbit the Earth in April 1961
- It was not until almost a year later, in February 1962, that John Glen became the first American to enter Earth’s orbit
- Set backs to the Soviet programme saw America pull ahead of the Soviets in the space race and on 20 July 1969 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin successfully landed on the moon.
- Although plans for a Russian mission continued into the 1970s, the Soviet programme was eventually cancelled in 1974
7
Q
The Thaw
A
- East-West relations improved in Europe after 1951 as a result of:
o US attention shifting to communism in Asia
o Economic recovery in Europe
o The USSR recognised the new government of Greece (non-communist)
o 1953 Joseph Stalin died - However, there were limits of the thaw as:
o A nuclear arms race developed
o Soviet control of Eastern Europe remained tight
o The USSR supported the Communist government in China
o Soviet aid was offered to non-western nations
o The USA signed an alliance with Spain (who was ruled by fascist dictator Francisco Franco who was now seen as an anti-communist statesman)
o The Superpowers secretly monitored each other through spy networks
8
Q
Peaceful Co-existence
A
- In 1956 Khruschev’s stated his belief that:
o “There are only two ways: either peaceful co-existence, or the most destructive war in history. There is no third way”
This differed from Stalin’s view that war was inevitable - This was the idea that the Soviet Union should live peacefully with America and should work for Communist revolutions in other countries through peaceful means (that the East and West could agree to disagree)
- The USSR still continued to protect its vital interests:
o Khrushchev’s statement that he wanted to “de-Stalinise” Eastern Europe led to anti-Soviet rebellions in 1956 in Poland and Hungary, and Khrushchev sent in Russian troops to re-establish Soviet control
o Russia and America waged an arms race, developing H-bombs and ICBMs
o Khrushchev set up the Warsaw Pact in 1955
o Russia and America competed in every way possible (e.g. space race)
o In the US Senator McCarthy led a series of public trials of suspected Communists (McCarthyism)
o Both sides spied on each other. The Americans also used U2 spy planes to spy on Russia (U2 crisis) - Khrushchev offered large amounts of aid to the new (decolonised) nations in Asia and Africa which won the USSR many friends in the Third World
- However, later events in Berlin and Cuba led to brinkmanship with the Cuban Missile Crisis
9
Q
De-Stalinisation
A
- On February 24, 1956 before assembled delegates to the Communist Party’s Twentieth Congress, as well as observers from foreign Communist parties, Nikita Khrushchev delivered a speech denouncing Stalin for his transgressions and the development of the cult of personality
- The speech gave details about:
o The unwarranted arrest and execution of high-ranking loyal party members during the Terror of the late 1930s;
o The unpreparedness of the country at the time of the Nazi invasion in June 1941;
o Numerous wartime blunders;
o The deportation of various nationalities in 1943 and 1944 (one of Stalin’s reason for this was collaborating with the Germans); and
o The banishing of Tito’s Yugoslavia from the Soviet bloc after the war - His speech was ‘secret’ in the sense that it was read in a closed session without discussion and was neither published as part of the Congress’ proceedings nor reported in the Soviet press
o However, copies were sent to regional party secretaries who were instructed to brief rank-and-file members
o Moreover, the US State Department received a copy of the speech from East European sources and soon released it - Khrushchev de-stalinised the state by:
o Encouraging reappraisal of Stalin in the media and the arts
o Removing Stalin’s body from Lenin’s tomb
o Closing many of the forced labour camps and allowed many of Stalin’s victims to return home (although the USSR remained a police state)
o Allowing books and films that criticised Stalin to be produced
o Allowing more consumer goods to be produced
o Giving strong support for scientists
10
Q
1956 Poland
A
- In June 1956, workers in the Polish city of Poznan demonstrated against cuts in wages and the insensitivity of local authorities to their grievances
- The demonstrations were suppressed but they did afford reformist Communists the opportunity to advance an agenda that included significant concessions to workers
- After tense negotiations with Soviet leaders who flew uninvited to Warsaw, the Polish Communists rallied around the reformist, Wladyslaw Gomulka, who was appointed first secretary
- Gomulka succeeded in containing popular discontent and thereby avoided the fate that befell Hungary
11
Q
1956 Hungarian Uprising
A
- After WW2, Matyas Rakosi became Prime Minister of Hungary (with the support of Stalin)
- He was not very popular amongst the communists or Hungarians
- He purged all public institutions of non-communists and by 1952 approximately 2000 people had been executed and 200,000 were in prison
- This was damaging to the economy and the standard of public administration
- The death of Stalin led many Hungarians to hope that Hungary also would be ‘de-Stalinised’
- In July 1956, the ‘Stalinist’ Secretary of the Hungarian Communist Party, Rakosi, fell from power and was replaced by Imre Nagy
- Nagy fought the Nazis during WW2 and he was considered ‘acceptable’ to the USSR and to the Hungarian Communists
- He eased Rakosi’s policies and stopped persecuting the Catholic Church
- However, in October 1956 there were demonstrations against the USSR
- Students, workers and soldiers in Hungary attacked the AVH (the secret police) and Russian soldiers, and smashed a statue of Stalin
- Nagy asked Khrushchev to move the Russian troops out. Khrushchev agreed and on 28 October 1956, the Russian army pulled out of Budapest
- For five days, there was freedom in Hungary. The new Hungarian government introduced democracy, freedom of speech, and freedom of religion (Cardinal Mindszenty, the leader of the Catholic Church, was freed from prison)
- Then, on 3 November 1956, Nagy announced that Hungary was going to leave the Warsaw Pact.
o However, Khrushchev was not going to allow this – he claimed he had received a letter from Hungarian Communist leaders asking for his help - At dawn on 4 November 1956, 1,000 Russian tanks rolled into Budapest. They destroyed the Hungarian army and captured the Hungarian Radio and the last words broadcast were “Help! Help! Help!”
- Hungarian people – even children – fought the Russian troops with machine guns
- Some 4,000 Hungarians were killed
- Khrushchev put in Russian supporter, Janos Kadar, as Prime Minister
- Impact:
o Soviet control was brutally asserted and followed by repression in Hungary
o Russian control remained unchallenged in the Eastern Bloc (until 1968)
o The US failing to intervene to help Hungary demonstrated that they would not risk war to help East European nations
o 200,000 Hungarians fled to the West
o Western communists were dismayed and many left their various national parties in the following years
o Nikita Khrushchev’s standing was boosted
12
Q
Berlin Wall
A
- In the 1950s FRG’s economy grew, consumerism spread and post-war hardship disappeared
- The arrival of goods like TV’s, washing machines, fridges and transistor radios made West Germany a successful capitalist nation
- On the other hand, the GDR (DDR/East Germany) seemed to be stagnating and economic reconstruction was slow
- The flood of East Germans westward meant that the East German economy was unable to keep pace
- In November 1958 Khrushchev called for a peace treaty between the two German states
- He then issued an ultimatum demanding the demilitarisation of West Berlin, the withdrawal of Western troops, and change of status into a free city (and this would have seen it absorbed into the Soviet sphere)
- Khrushchev threatened to conclude a peace agreement just with the GDR and to recognise its sovereignty over East Berlin (this would enable it to control access to West Berlin and interfere at will with traffic using the land corridors from the FRG)
- Both the Geneva Conference (May to Aug 1959) and Paris Summit (May 1960) failed (Khrushchev walked out after the U2 Crisis)
- Berlin continued to remain an unresolved issue
- East Germans could escape through Berlin to the West and Adenauer and the USA encouraged movement to FRG
- Between 1945 and 1961 approximately 1/6 of the whole East German population had fled westwards
- Leaving the East posed an economic threat as East Germany was losing its workers (which included skilled workers) and this could only be remedied by preventing the flight of workers to the FRG
- West Berlin was also a hub for US espionage
- Khrushchev decided in early August that the border between East and West would be closed
- On 13 August 1961, the border was sealed with barbed wire, and when no Western countermeasures followed, a more permanent concrete wall was built in the following years
- The people of East Germany had no option but to remain in the GDR
- Ulbricht developed what he called the New Economic System which was supposed to revolutionise the GDR’s economy and gain enthusiastic acceptance for socialism
- The Berlin Wall became a symbol of the Cold War and the Iron Curtain that divided all of communism and democracy
- US President JFK, once it was clear that the USSR was not going to invade Berlin, made a statement of support to West Berliners and sent vice President Johnson to visit them
o He later in 1962 visited Berlin and made his famous “Ich Bein Mein Berliner”
o This demonstrated the depth of commitment of the USA to West Berlin and West Germany
13
Q
Cuban Missile Crisis
A
According to Schlesinger (1973) it was “the most dangerous moment in human history”
* Background:
o 1 January 1959, Fidel Castro ousted Fulgenico Batista (corrupt US backed dictator)
o Castro was anti-American and as relations with the USA deteriorated he began to reach out to the USSR
o Khrushchev provided military and economic aid; KGB officers and assisted Castro with the establishment of a secret police force
o US responded by authorising the CIA to organise/support a coup to seize power from Castro
o The Bay of Pigs invasion was a failure (1400 Cuban exiles invaded Cuba with the hope that the invasion would spark civil unrest and an eventual Cuban civil war and Castro’s removal from power but were beaten by Castro’s forces)
Note – The Monroe Doctrine of 1823 had influenced US foreign policy and had defined the Americas as the USA’s “sphere of influence” and had warned the Europeans to stay out of their affairs. In the 1950s the US continued to see Central and South America as a US sphere of interest and intervened to remove pro-Communist leaders and install US-friendly leaders
* In August 1962 Khrushchev negotiated the Soviet-Cuban accord with Castro
* The Soviets then began to secretly deploy medium-range missiles on Cuba
o This would give the Soviet a base from which the USA could be threatened by medium-range Soviet missiles and correct the strategic imbalance caused by US missile bases in Turkey and Western Europe (and in the pacific/Japan)
o 4 October 1962 the Soviets arrived at the port of Mariel in Cuba with enough nuclear warheads to equip at least 158 strategic and nuclear weapons
o Subsequently on 14 October US spy planes discovered the missiles
* On 22 October 1962 JFK announced on US television the news of the existence of Soviet missiles on Cuba and had ordered the naval blockade of the island
* He declared if any nuclear missile was fired from Cuba, he would order a massive nuclear attack on the USSR
* However, on 26 October Khrushchev informed the Americans that he would withdraw the missiles if the USA guaranteed that they would not invade Cuba (followed by a second message demanding the dismantling of US Jupiter missiles bases in Turkey)
* On 27 October Kennedy responded by agreeing and secretly agreeing to remove the missiles from Turkey once the Cuban Crisis was over (however, this information was not to be made public and was carried out six months later)
* On 28 October Khrushchev agrees to dismantle the missiles and the crisis is over
* The incident weakened Khrushchev’s position within the USSR
* The Cuban Missile Crisis brought both the USA and the USSR to the brink of nuclear war
* A ‘hotline’ was established which was a direct communication link between the US and Soviet leaders to prevent nuclear war
* Khrushchev was forcibly retired by the Politburo in 1964 due to:
o His handling of agriculture led to bad harvests 1962-1964
o The USSR had been humiliated over the Berlin Wall and the Cuban Missile Crisis
14
Q
Prague Spring
A
- Leonid Brezhnev replaced Khrushchev as the sole leader of the Soviet Union and he was less tolerant of criticism from within the Soviet Union and from countries in the Soviet Bloc
- When democratic trends developed in Czechoslovakia in 1968, the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact invaded
- Economic difficulties were experienced by all members of the Soviet bloc from the early 1960s
- In Czechoslovakia concerns about the economy led to a rift between the conservative pro-Moscow government and reformers within the government who wanted greater democracy
- The Czechoslovakian economy was controlled through the Soviet centralised process, where all raw materials were purchased from Soviet bloc states
- Quality was not considered – the states purchased these goods from each other regardless of whether better products or raw materials could be purchased outside the Soviet sphere
- This inhibited economic growth and symbolised to the reformers the basic problems of Soviet-controlled industrial processes and the collectivisation of farming
- On 5 January 1968 Alexander Dubcek replaced Antonin Novotny (who was forced to resign) and became the new party leader
- Dubcek began a process of reform and brought in the following changes which concerned Brezhnev:
o Removed censorship of the press and television;
o Competitive retail markets established;
o Industry was decentralised;
o De-collectivisation of farms began;
o Trade unions given greater powers;
o More trade with the West;
o Border with West Germany which had been closed since 1948 was reopened - Dubcek wanted Czechoslovakia to remain communist but have the features of democracy – he felt that the party should earn the right to be in power by responding to public opinion – ‘socialism with a human face’
- Dubcek reassured the Kremlin that they would remain in the Warsaw Pact and would continue to be a military ally of the Soviet Union
- The USSR watched with interest and only decided to act when
o Dubcek made the suggestion that the formation of non-communist political parties would be allowed
o Criticisms of the USSR began to appear in the Czech press - There was concern from other leaders of Soviet bloc states as well as from the Czech conservatives who felt that the reformation had gone too far
- On 20-21 August approximately 500,000 Soviet and Warsaw Pact troops moved into Prague and other Czech cities
- They faced little resistance from the Czech army but were faced with 250 000 Czech citizens (mainly students)
- The intellectual basis for the protests was the reforms known as the ‘Prague Spring’
- By September 1969 the protests had begun to subside when it was clear that the Soviet tanks were staying
- Dubcek and his colleagues were arrested and taken to Moscow and forced to agree to drop the reform programme
- Dubcek was replaced as leader by Gustav Husak who would follow the directions of the USSR
- The Soviet intervention put a stop to any further official moves towards reform in the Soviet bloc
- Husak led Czechoslovakia through a period of ‘normalisation’, which involved reinstating censorship and full government control
15
Q
Brezhnev Doctrine
A
- In November 1968 Brezhnev issued a statement which became known as the Brezhnev Doctrine
- It proclaimed:
o Warsaw Pact countries were not allowed to follow policies involving any departure from a one-party state
o If any developments took place in any member country which seemed to be a threat to socialism, it was the right and the duty of the other member states of the Pact to intervene militarily in order to bring the reforms to an end - The USSR would stop any country in the Warsaw Pact which tried to go its own way
- The Doctrine was almost an admission that countries would only stay communist if the USSR forced them to do so
- Whenever there was a threat to communist unity in the Eastern Bloc, the individual nation’s rights were less important than those of the broader communist community
- The USSR’s reputation among other communists was damaged by its treatment of Czechoslovakia (both Nicolae Ceausescu from Romania and Tito from Yugoslavia condemned it, as did the Chinese and communist parties in Britain, France, Italy and Spain)
