RUSSIA AND THE SOVIET UNION
Who were the Romanovs?
The Romanov family ruled Russia from 1613 until 1917, when Nicholas II (1868–1918) was overthrown during the Russian Revolution (1905–1917). The dynasty was established by Michael Romanov (1596–1645), grandnephew to Ivan the Terrible. There were eighteen Romanov rulers, including Peter the Great and Catherine the Great.
Why were tsars Peter and Catherine known as “the Great”?
Tsars Peter the Great (1672–1725) and Catherine the Great (1729–1796) are among the best known of the Romanov dynasty, and both had many accomplishments during their reigns. They are also known for having increased their power at the expense of others.
Peter the Great, who ruled from 1682 to 1725, is recognized for introducing western European civilization to Russia and for elevating Russia to the status of a great European power. But he also relied on the serfs (peasants who were little more than indentured servants to the lords) not only to provide the bulk of the funding he needed to fight almost continuous wars but for the manpower as well since most soldiers were serfs.
Peter was responsible for establishing schools (including the Academy of Sciences), reforming the calendar, and simplifying the alphabet. However, he also carried out ruthless reforms. Peter’s most vainglorious act was, perhaps, to move the capital from Moscow to the city he had built for himself on the swampy lands ceded by Sweden: Saint Petersburg (called “Petrograd” from 1914 to 1924 and “Leningrad” from 1924 to 1991). Peter succeeded in making the city, his “window on Europe,” into a brilliant cultural center.
For her part, Catherine the Great, who ruled from 1762 to 1796, was a patron of the arts and literature (one who corresponded with the likes of French writer Voltaire [1694–1778]), but she, too, increased the privileges of the nobility while making the lives of the serfs even more miserable. Her true colors were shown by how she ascended to power in the first place. In 1744, she married Peter III, who became tsar of Russia in 1762. That same year, Catherine conspired with her husband’s enemies to depose him. He was later killed, which led to Catherine rising to power, proclaiming herself tsarina. She began her reign by attempting reforms, but a peasant uprising (1773–1774) and the French Revolution (which began in 1789) prompted her only to strengthen and protect her absolute authority. Like Peter the Great, she, too, extended the frontiers of the empire through a series of conquests. By the end of her reign in 1796, Catherine had reduced even the free peasants to the level of serfdom.
What is the movie Russian Ark?
This fascinating 2002 experimental film is set and filmed in the Winter Palace in Saint Petersburg. The ninety-six-minute film is a single camera shot. As the camera moves from room to room, the scenes change to show real and fictional people from the three hundred years of Russian history, including World War II. Figures include Peter the Great, Catherine the Great, and Tsar Nicholas II.
What does the word “tsar” mean?
The word can be spelled as csar, tzar, or czar and is derived from the Latin title for the Roman emperor: “Caesar.” Interestingly, the German title “Kaiser” is also based on the Latin title “Caesar.”
THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION
What was Bloody Sunday?
The January 22, 1905, event, which is also known as Red Sunday, marked the beginning of revolutionary activity in Russia that would not end until 1917. A young Russian Orthodox priest, Georgi Gapon (1870–1906), carrying a cross over his shoulder, led what was intended to be a peaceful workers’ demonstration in front of the tzar’s Winter Palace at St. Petersburg. He had intended to deliver to Tsar Nicholas II a petition on behalf of the workers. But, as a London Times correspondent reported that day, when the crowd was refused entry into the common gathering ground of the Palace Square, “the passions of the mob broke loose like a bursting dam.”
Father Gapon believed that the Cossack guards and troops on hand for the demonstration would join the protest, but he was wrong. Still loyal to the Romanov tsar Nicholas II (1868–1918), they shot into the crowd of demonstrators, killing about 150 people—children, women, and young people among them.
The event sent shockwaves through the country, where hostilities had been mounting against Nicholas’s ineffective government. It also stirred up unrest elsewhere. In the countryside, the peasants revolted against their landlords, seizing land, crops, and livestock. The events foreshadowed the downfall of tsarist Russia.
The charismatic mystic Grigori Rasputin became a close adviser to the Romanov family, and his influence over the royals is what eventually got him assassinated.
Who was Rasputin?
Grigori Rasputin (1872–1916) was a Russian mystic and quasi-holy man who rose from peasant farmer to become adviser to Tsar Nicholas II and his wife, Tsarina Alexandra (1872–1918). Rasputin had met Alexandra and demonstrated that he was able to effectively treat the tsar and tsarina’s severely hemophiliac son Alexis (1904–1918). Rasputin quickly gained favor with the Russian rulers, but the prime minister and members of the legislative assembly, the Duma, could see Rasputin was a disreputable character, and they feared his influence on the tsar. Rasputin was known for his sexual liaisons with many women.
By 1913, one year before the outbreak of World War I, the Russian people had become acutely aware of Tsar Nicholas’s weaknesses as a ruler—not only was his government subject to the influence of a pretender like Rasputin, but the events of Bloody Sunday had irreversibly marred the tsar’s reputation. That year, the Romanov dynasty was marking its 300th anniversary: members of the royal family had ruled Russia since 1613. But public celebrations, intended to be jubilant affairs, were instead ominous as the crowds greeted Nicholas’s public appearances with silence.
Russia’s entry into World War I proved to be the beginning of the end for Nicholas, with Rasputin front and center in the controversy that swirled around the royal court. During the first year of fighting against Germany, Russia suffered one military catastrophe after another. These losses did further damage to the tsar and his ministers. In the fall of 1915, urged on by his wife, Nicholas left St. Petersburg and headed to the front to lead the Russian troops in battle himself. With Alexandra left in charge of government affairs, Rasputin’s influence became more dangerous than ever.
However, in December 1916, a group of aristocrats put an end to it once and for all when, during a palace party, they laced Rasputin’s wine with cyanide. Though the poison failed to kill Rasputin, the noblemen shot him and deposited his body in a river later that night. Nevertheless, the damage to Nicholas and Alexandra had already been done. By that time, virtually all educated Russians opposed the tsar, who had removed many capable officials from government office only to replace them with the weak and incompetent executives Rasputin favored. The stage had been set for revolution.
What movie tells the story of the last years of Nicholas and his family?
The 1971 movie Nicholas and Alexandra provides an excellent window into the world of the last Romanov ruler.
What was the Bolshevik Revolution?
It was the November 1917 revolution in which the Bolsheviks, an extremist faction within the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (later renamed the Russian Communist Party), seized control of the government, ushering in the Soviet age. The event is also known as the October Revolution since by the old Russian calendar (in use until 1918), the government takeover happened on October 25.
The Bolshevik Revolution was the culmination of a series of events in 1917. In March, with Russia still in the midst of World War I, the country faced hardship. Shortages of food and fuel made conditions miserable. The people had lost faith in the war effort and were loathe to support it by sending any more young men into battle. In the Russian capital of Petrograd (which had been known as St. Petersburg until 1914), workers went on strike, and rioting broke out. In the chaos (called the March Revolution), Tsar Nicholas II ordered the legislative body, the Duma, to disband; instead, the representatives set up a provisional government.
Russian soldiers fire on protesters during the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917.
Having lost all political influence, Nicholas abdicated the throne in March 1918. He and his family were imprisoned and later executed together in July. They were buried in unmarked graves. (In 1979, many of the bodies were found and identified with DNA testing. The remaining bodies were found in 2007.)
Hearing of Nicholas’s abdication, longtime political exile Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) returned from Europe to Petrograd, where he led the Bolsheviks in rallying the Russian people with calls for peace, land reform, and worker empowerment; their slogan was “Land, Peace, and Bread.”
The Bolsheviks grew in numbers and became increasingly radical despite efforts by the provisional government headed by revolutionary Alexander Kerensky (1881–1970) to curb the Bolsheviks’ influence. The only socialist member of the first provisional government, Kerensky proved ineffective and failed to meet the demands of the people. He also failed to end the country’s involvement in World War I, which the Bolsheviks viewed as an imperialistic war.
On November 7, the Bolsheviks led workers and disgruntled soldiers and sailors in a takeover of Petrograd’s Winter Palace (the scene of Bloody Sunday in 1905), which had become the headquarters of Kerensky’s provisional government. By November 8, the provisional government had fallen.
What was the Red Terror?
The Red Terror was the brutal coercion used by the communists during the tumultuous years of civil unrest that followed the Bolshevik Revolution of November 1917. After the revolution, the Bolsheviks, now called communists, put their leader, Vladimir Lenin, into power.
Delivering on the Bolshevik promise to end the country’s involvement in World War I, Lenin immediately called for peace talks with Germany, ending the fighting on the eastern front. Lenin, needing to stop Russian involvement in the war, signed the Brest-Litovsk Treaty in March 1918, which dictated harsh—and many believed humiliating—terms to Russia, which was forced to give up vast territories, including Finland, Poland, Belarus, Ukraine, Moldavia, and the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.
Lenin then disbanded the parliamentary assembly. In its place, Lenin established a dictatorship based on the communist secret police, the Cheka. Furthermore, the radical social reforms he had promised took the form of a government takeover of Russia’s industries and the seizure of farm products from the peasants.
Lenin’s hard-handed tactics created opposition to the communists—colloquially known as the Reds. The opposition organized their White Army, and civil war ensued. In September 1918, a political opponent nearly assassinated Lenin, prompting his supporters to organize the retaliative initiative that came to be known as the Red Terror.
Doctor Zhivago was a novel written by Boris Pasternak, first published in 1957, which follows the character of Yuri Zhivago, a poet and physician. The complicated and dramatic story, set against events in Russia from the Russian Revolution into the 1930s, gives a window into this traumatic period of Russian history.
The novel became the 1965 movie Doctor Zhivago, directed by David Lean and starring Omar Sharif as Zhivago and Julie Christie, Geraldine Chaplin, and Alec Guinness. The movie won five Oscars, including Best Original Score. The movie’s running theme music, known as “Lara’s Theme,” became the popular song “Somewhere, My Love.”
Though thousands of communist opponents were killed as a result, the ruthless repression of the Red Terror lasted into 1924.
THE SOVIET UNION
How was the Soviet Union formed?
The Soviet Union was officially created in 1922, when Russia joined with Ukraine, Belorussia, and the Transcaucasian Federation (Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia) to form the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.). Nine other republics later joined, and territories were redrawn so that by 1940, the union consisted of fifteen Soviet socialist republics: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belorussia (now Belarus), Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kirghiz (now Kyrgyzstan), Latvia, Lithuania, Moldavia (now Moldova), Russia, Tadzhikistan (also spelled Tajikistan), Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan.
How many leaders did the Soviet Union have?
From its formation in 1922 (just five years after tsarist Russia had fallen in the revolution of 1917), the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.) had only ten leaders. But just five of these had meaningful tenure either due to length of time served or true authority: Vladimir Lenin, Joseph Stalin, Nikita Khrushchev, Leonid Brezhnev, and Mikhail Gorbachev.
After tsarist Russia ended with the revolution of 1917, Bolshevik leader Vladimir Lenin became head of the Soviet Russian government as chairman of the Council of People’s Commissars (the communists), dissolving the elected assembly and establishing a dictatorship. This lasted six years.
When Lenin died of a stroke in 1924, an associate of Lenin, Joseph Stalin (1879–1953), promptly eliminated all opposition and in 1929 established himself as a virtual dictator. Stalin ruled the U.S.S.R. during World War II (1939–1945), and though he was aligned with the United States, Britain, and the other Allied nations during that conflict, soon after the war, he began a buildup of power in Eastern Europe, leading to the Cold War (1945–1990). Even though Stalin’s domestic policies were extremely repressive and he ruled largely by terror, he remained in power until his death in 1953.
Bolshevik leader Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, better known as Lenin, was head of Soviet Russia from 1917 until his death in 1924.
Who was Leon Trotsky?
Leon Trotsky (1879–1940) was a Marxist leader who later joined the Bolshevik Revolution under Lenin’s leadership. He was a charismatic leader of the Red Army and later served as the People’s Commissariat for Military and Naval Affairs of the Soviet Union under Lenin.
After Lenin’s death, Trotsky became opposed to the growing power of Joseph Stalin. Trotsky eventually had to flee the country, as Stalin had him expelled from the Communist Party and exiled from the country. Trotsky first went to Turkey and then later to Mexico, where he lived for more than a decade. He was assassinated there in 1940 by a Soviet agent who used an ice axe, used by mountain climbers, to kill him.
What were the five-year plans?
These were the plans initiated by Premier Joseph Stalin of the Soviet Union to speed industrialization of the U.S.S.R. and organize agriculture under the collective control of the communist government. The first five-year plan began in 1928, and subsequent plans were carried out until 1958, at which time the new Soviet leadership developed a seven-year plan (1959–1965) aimed at matching—and surpassing—American industry.
Later, under Premier Leonid Brezhnev (1906–1982), the five-year plans were reinstated in 1966 and continued until the dissolution of the Soviet Union during 1990 and 1991. Other communist countries also instituted five-year plans, all with the goal of bringing industry, agriculture, and the distribution of goods and services under government control.
What were the gulags?
Gulags were prisons for political dissidents in the Soviet Union; the prisons existed from 1919 into the 1950s. “Gulag” is an abbreviation of the Russian name of the system, Glavnoye Upravleniye Ispravitelno-trudovykh Lagerey, which translates to “Chief Administration of Corrective Labor Camps.” The camps were first used during the collectivization of agriculture in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
Under Soviet leader Joseph Stalin’s purges of the 1930s, anyone who posed, or seemed to pose, a threat to his hardline communist regime was rounded up and sent to a gulag. During World War II, prisoners of war were held in the gulags. After the war, Stalin continued to use the camps to punish those who opposed him.
Though exact figures are unknown, it is believed that as many as thirty million people were imprisoned in gulags, where they faced forced labor, grueling conditions, and maltreatment, including starvation. (Official Soviet figures place the number around ten million.) Millions are believed to have died in the gulags. After Stalin died in 1953, the system was dismantled, with some of the prisoners receiving amnesty.
One of the most important writings on the gulag system is the three-volume work
The Gulag Archipelago (1973) by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, who was a gulag prisoner.
THE COLD WAR
Who coined the term “Iron Curtain”? What does the term mean?
The Soviet Union and the territories it controlled in Eastern Europe were closed societies. Travel in and out was greatly restricted, and an intentional effort was made to keep out influences from Western Europe and the United States.
The term “Iron Curtain” was coined by former British prime minister Winston Churchill (1874–1965) to describe the situation. In a March 1946 speech in Fulton, Missouri, he remarked that “an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.” The statesman, who had been instrumental in coordinating the Allied victory in World War II, was commenting on Soviet leader Joseph Stalin’s tactics in Eastern Europe, which indicated the Soviets were putting up barriers against the West—and building up Soviet domination behind those barriers.
Just as he had issued warnings of the threat posed by Nazi Germany prior to World War II, Churchill astutely observed the rapidly emerging situation in Eastern Europe. In 1946, the Soviets installed communist governments in neighboring Romania and in nearby Bulgaria; in 1947, Hungary and Poland came under communist control as well; and the following year, communists took control of Czechoslovakia. These countries, along with Albania, Yugoslavia, and East Germany, soon formed a coalition of communist allies, and the Eastern bloc was formed. The United States and its democratic allies formed the Western bloc. The stage was set for the Cold War.
Why did the Soviet Union take control of all these countries?
The Soviet Union wanted to keep a buffer between itself and Western Europe. Napoleon had invaded Russia in 1812. The Russians fought the Germans in World War I, and it was a disaster for Russia. The treaty that ended Russian involvement in the war resulted in Russia giving up immense territory. And finally, Germany, despite signing a nonaggression treaty with the Soviet Union, invaded the U.S.S.R. in 1941. Although the Soviet Army eventually pushed out Germany and defeated its army, the Soviet Union suffered the greatest loss of human life by any country in war in history.
A term coined by Winston Churchill, the “Iron Curtain” was a political and sometimes physical border between NATO and other western countries (dark gray) and the Soviet Union and its communist satellite countries (light gray) in the east.
The Soviet Union lost 10.6 million soldiers who died in the war, ten million civilians who died due to military action or crimes against humanity, and six million civilians who died because of disease and famine caused by the war.
What was the issue with Germany after World War II?
The eroding relationship between the Western powers and the Soviet-led countries of Eastern Europe was in part fueled by disagreements over Germany. At the close of World War II, Germany was controlled by a joint government of the Allies—the Soviet Union, the United States, Britain, and France. But the arrangement quickly proved unworkable. By 1948, Germany was in serious economic straits, and the United States, Britain, and France began to discuss uniting their zones.
The Cold War, which lasted from 1945 to 1990, was a standoff between the Soviet Union and its allies and the United States and its Western European allies. It was called “cold” because an open war between the two sides never happened. However, a number of wars happened around the world with the Soviets supporting one side to promote communism, while the United States and its allies supported the other side to stop the spread of communism.
The United States and its allies created NATO, while the Soviets created the Warsaw Pact.
The Soviets ordered a blockade of land and water traffic into the German capital of Berlin. Berlin had been divided: the Soviets controlled East Berlin, and the other Allies controlled West Berlin. To counter the blockade, Great Britain and the United States ordered an airlift operation to provide food and other supplies to the people of West Berlin, alleviating the effects of the eleven-month Soviet blockade.
In 1949, the East-West differences resulted in the formal division of Germany into two countries: West Germany, formed by the zones occupied by the United States, Great Britain, and France and allowed to form a democratic government; and East Germany, formed out of the Soviet zones and folded into the “Eastern bloc” countries.
What is NATO?
NATO stands for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a military alliance formed in April 1949, when twelve countries signed the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington, D.C. The original twelve NATO countries were Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Each member nation agreed to treat attacks on any other member nation as if it were an attack on itself. In other words, any aggressor would have to face the entire alliance. This was NATO’s policy of deterrence, a way of discouraging any attacks by the Soviet Union or other Eastern bloc countries. The organization had the further benefit of discouraging fighting among the member countries.
What is the status of NATO today?
Currently, there are twenty-nine member countries, with NATO headquarters in Brussels, Belgium. However, some have questioned the role and mission of NATO as well as its costs. NATO was originally created because of fear of the Soviet Union during the Cold War. However, the Soviet Union broke apart in 1991.
Although there is much worry about the intentions and actions of Russian president Vladimir Putin (1952–), there is disagreement among its members on the role of NATO in responding to Russia.
What was the Warsaw Pact?
The Warsaw Pact was the Eastern bloc countries’ answer to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Seeing the Western nations form a strong alliance, in May 1955, the Soviet Union and its allies met in Warsaw, Poland, where they signed a treaty agreeing that they, too, would mutually defend one another. The eight member nations were Albania (which withdrew in 1968), Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union. The Warsaw Pact was headquartered in Moscow and, in addition to discouraging attacks from Western bloc/NATO countries, the organization also sought to quell any democratic uprisings in Warsaw Pact nations.
What eventually happened to the Warsaw Pact?
In 1990, the pact and the Soviet Union’s control of it weakened as democracy movements in member nations could not be put down. As the former Eastern bloc countries underwent relatively peaceful revolutions, Warsaw Pact members began announcing their intentions to withdraw from the organization. East Germany withdrew when it was reunified with West Germany, and the restored Germany joined NATO (in 1990). The Warsaw Pact was dissolved by the remaining member nations in 1991.
Did the Cold War lead to an arms race?
The United States used two nuclear weapons in 1945. The United States alone had the technology but rejected the idea of creating an international agreement to ban the future use and manufacture of such weapons.
In 1949, the Soviets tested their own nuclear bomb. The West was frightened by this development. As a result, an arms race took place between the Soviet Union and the United States that would last some fifty years. Massive amounts of weaponry—both conventional and nuclear—were created at great cost. Enough nuclear weapons were built to destroy life on Earth several times over.
Tragically, much of this weaponry still exists. In the United States, despite the end of the Cold War and the end of the Soviet Union, military budgets have not gone down but have in fact increased dramatically.
What was the Cold War attitude in the West?
In the years following World War II, the nations of Western Europe and the United States became alarmed by Soviet advances into Eastern Europe, and many voiced concerns that communists, led by the Soviet Union, were plotting to take over the world. Political leaders in England, the United States, and elsewhere referred to this new menace in grim terms. In 1947, U.S. president Harry S. Truman (1884–1972) announced a policy of containment of communist incursion into other countries. This policy came to be known as the Truman Doctrine, and it remained an integral part of American foreign policy for the next forty years, ultimately leading to the nation’s involvement in the Korean War (1950–1953) and the Vietnam War (1955–1975).
What were the hallmarks of the Cold War era in the United States?
In the United States, the hysteria of the Cold War era reached its height with the so-called McCarthyism of the 1950s; historian Doris Kearns Goodwin described it as “one of the most destructive chapters in American political history.” In early 1950, Republican senator Joseph McCarthy (1908–1957) of Wisconsin claimed to possess a list of more than two hundred known communists in the U.S. State Department. The startling accusation launched congressional inquiries conducted by the senator’s subcommittee and the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).
Republican U.S. senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin led a witch hunt against people he said were supporters of communism in places such as the U.S. State Department and the acting world of Hollywood. His unsubstantiated accusations ruined many careers.
Suspicions of communist subversion ran high—even in Hollywood, where a “blacklist” named those who were believed to have been involved in the Communist Party. McCarthy never produced his laundry list of offenders in the State Department, and the sorry chapter was closed when, on live television, the senator’s bitter attacks went too far: In televised hearings in 1954, the senator took on the U.S. Army, determined to ferret out what he believed was a conspiracy to cover up a known communist in the ranks.
Faced with McCarthy’s slanderous line of questioning, Army counsel Joseph Welch (1890–1960) delivered a reply that finally disarmed McCarthy, saying, “Have you no sense of decency, sir? If there is a God in heaven, your attacks will do neither you nor your cause any good.” The retort was met with applause in the courtroom, heralding the end of the communist-in-our-midst hysteria.
Who led the Soviet Union after Stalin?
After Stalin died in 1953, the Soviet Union entered a brief period of struggle among its top leaders. Deputy Premier Georgy Malenkov (1902–1988), a longtime Stalin aide, came to power. In 1955, Malenkov was forced to resign, and he was succeeded by his (and Stalin’s) former defense secretary, Nikolai Bulganin (1895–1975). However, Bulganin was a premier in name only, as the true power rested with Communist Party secretary Nikita Khrushchev (1894–1971), who expelled Bulganin and officially took power as premier in 1958.
Khrushchev denounced the oppression of the long Stalin years, which had ended only five years earlier, and worked to improve living standards. On the international front, he pursued a policy of “peaceful coexistence” with the West and even toured the United States in 1959, meeting with President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969).
What were other effects of the Cold War?
Competition between the Eastern bloc and the West spilled over into athletics, the arts, and the sciences. In 1957, the Soviets beat the West into space with the launch of the first artificial satellite, Sputnik, which they followed in 1961 by completing the first successful manned space launch. The United States responded by stepping up its space program and vowing to put a man on the moon.
What is the story of Francis Gary Powers and his U-2 spy plane?
In the 1950s and 1960s, U.S. Intelligence agencies had difficulty getting accurate information on what was happening in the Soviet Union, particularly with its nuclear weapons. The United States created the U-2 spy plane to fly over the Soviet Union and take photographs. The plane was designed to fly so high it could not be shot down. However, in May 1962, a U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union. Pilot Francis Gary Powers survived the crash and was arrested and convicted of espionage. He was later released in a prisoner exchange.
The story of the shooting down of Powers’s U-2 spy plane and the prisoner exchange is told in the 2015 movie Bridge of Spies, starring Tom Hanks.
How did the Cold War play out in the Caribbean?
The Soviet Union supported the rule of Fidel Castro (1926–2016) in Cuba. Castro was a communist revolutionary who came to power in Cuba in 1959 as the prime minister. The Soviets gave him both military and financial support, which worried the American government. The United States greatly feared the expansion of communism in the Western Hemisphere. This fear led to the Bay of Pigs disaster.
What was the Bay of Pigs?
The Bay of Pigs is the name of an unsuccessful 1961 invasion of Cuba, backed by the U.S. government. The invasion had been planned under the administration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890–1969). However, his successor, President John F. Kennedy (1917–1963), gave the go-ahead. About 1,500 Cuban expatriates living in the United States had been supplied with arms and trained by the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). On April 17, 1961, the group of men who opposed the regime of Cuba’s Fidel Castro (1926–2016) landed at the Bahía de Cochinos (Bay of Pigs) in west-central Cuba. Cuban forces captured most of the rebels; the others were killed. The fighters had assumed that when they invaded, the people of Cuba would rise up and overthrow the government of Castro, but that did not happen.
In order to secure the release of the more than 1,100 men who had been captured during the invasion, private donors in the United States accumulated $53 million in food and medicine, which was given to Castro’s government in exchange for the rebels’ release. The failed invasion came as a terrible embarrassment to the administration of President Kennedy, and many believe the Bay of Pigs incident directly led to the Cuban Missile Crisis.
What was happening in Berlin at the same time?
Germany had been divided into West Germany and East Germany, and Berlin itself was divided. The Soviet Union controlled East Berlin. Yet, many citizens found living conditions very difficult under communist control, and they began fleeing into West Berlin. The East Germans then built a wall with armed guards to isolate West Berlin.
The concrete, electrically fortified wall was first built in 1961 as a barbed wire and cinder block structure. Communist East German leader Walter Ulbricht (1893–1973) convinced Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev that the wall was needed to prevent people from fleeing communist Eastern Europe. (Before the wall was erected, an estimated 2.5 million people had fled to the free world through West Berlin; after its completion, perhaps 5,000 managed to escape. Hundreds died trying.)
When the wall was complete, it had an average height of twelve feet and ran more than one hundred miles, along which there were posts where armed East German guards stood sentinel, preventing citizens from escaping to the West. The wall completely surrounded West Berlin and divided the German capital into East and West, communism and the free world.
What was Checkpoint Charlie?
There were several crossing points between West Berlin and East Berlin. Checkpoint Charlie (Checkpoint C) became the most famous. It became a symbol for the separation of the communist world from the democratic world.
What was the Cuban Missile Crisis?
The Cuban Missile Crisis, which lasted thirteen days (October 16–28, 1962), developed very quickly, yet nevertheless constituted a major confrontation of the Cold War (1945–1990). After the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion, the Soviet Union quietly began building missile sites in Cuba as a threat to future possible U.S. invasions. Since the island nation is situated just south of Florida, when U.S. reconnaissance flights detected the Soviet military construction projects there, it was an alarming discovery. On October 22, 1962, President Kennedy demanded that the Soviet Union withdraw its missiles from Cuba. Kennedy also ordered a naval blockade of the island.
Six days later, the Soviets agreed to dismantle the sites, ending the crisis. Part of the agreement was that the United States would remove nuclear missiles in Turkey and Italy that could reach the Soviet Union. The resolution of the crisis showed the importance of good communication between opposing sides and the willingness to negotiate a solution.
Checkpoint Charlie, as seen from the American side, was the famous crossing point between East and West Berlin.
What is the movie Dr. Strangelove?
The 1964 movie Dr. Strangelove; or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb is a classic satirical dark comedy about the Cold War and fears of nuclear war. Stanley Kubrick cowrote and directed the movie. Actor and comedian Peter Sellers played three different roles in the movie: a British officer, the president of the United States, and ex-Nazi scientist Dr. Strangelove.
How close did the United States and the Soviet Union come to nuclear war in the Cuban Missile Crisis?
Unknown to all but a handful of people at the time was how close the world came to nuclear war. During the Cuban Missile Crisis, the U.S. Navy located a Soviet submarine, B59, and dropped small depth charges, signaling the submarine to surface. The submarine had been out of radio contact with Moscow but had earlier heard news broadcasts from Florida. The officers and crew did not know if a war had broken out.
The submarine commander, Captain Valentin Savitsky, believing that war had started, wanted to launch a nuclear torpedo against the American ships. The political officer on the submarine agreed with the captain. However, the commander of the entire four-submarine detachment, Vasily Arkhipov, was also on board the submarine. Arkhipov refused to approve launching the torpedo without word from Moscow. The submarine surfaced near the American ships and then sailed to Moscow. Had the submarine launched a nuclear torpedo, it could have led to nuclear war with the Soviet Union, which would have destroyed both countries and much of the world.
The leader of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, Nikita Khrushchev (left, shown here with U.S. president John F. Kennedy) became unpopular with his party, and he was forced to retire.
The story of Vasily Arkhipov is told in the 2012 PBS documentary The Man Who Saved the World.
What happened to Nikita Khrushchev?
Khrushchev had to deal with problems in the Soviet Union, such as widespread hunger due to crop failures. His stance on international issues, which included a rift with Communist China, led to his downfall. He was removed from power in October 1964. Khrushchev’s ouster (which was a forced retirement) had been engineered by his former ally and political adviser Leonid Brezhnev (1906–1982).
With Khrushchev out of the way, technically, Brezhnev was to lead the country along with Premier Alexei Kosygin (1904–1981). But as head of the Communist Party, it was Brezhnev who truly held the power. By the early 1970s, Brezhnev emerged as the Soviet chief—even though Kosygin remained in office until 1980. During his administration, Brezhnev kept tight control over the Eastern bloc (communist countries), built up the Soviet Union’s military (continuing the arms race with the United States), and did nothing to try to reverse the downward trend of the Soviet Union’s economy.
THE SOVIET INVASION OF AFGHANISTAN
What was the impact of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan?
In December 1979, the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan to bolster a pro-communist government. No one could have anticipated the far-reaching effects of this decision. What followed was a ten-year civil war, in which Soviet troops fought Afghan guerrillas, or the Mujahideen. The war in Afghanistan became a jihad, or holy war, and a rallying point for many Muslims, with the conflict drawing young men from across the Muslim world to fight on the side of the guerrillas.
The war was a virtual stalemate for seven years. But a turning point came in 1986 after the United States and Great Britain supplied shoulder-fired, surface-to-air (Stinger) missiles to the Afghan guerrillas. The weaponry gave the scrubby ground forces a fighting chance against Soviet air power. Together with Saudi Arabia, the United States supplied billions of dollars’ worth of secret assistance to rebel Afghan groups resisting the Soviet occupation. In April 1988, the Afghans declared victory, and early the next year, the Soviet troops began to withdraw.
The war was over, but it had fueled an extremist Islamic ideology and put into place an infrastructure out of which emerged a powerful and deadly terrorist network. Though most Muslims hold peaceful views, a minority of Muslims view all non-Muslims as unbelievers. It was from this minority, trained and financed in part by the United States, that the global network of terrorists called al-Qaeda emerged. Al-Qaeda terrorists would carry out the 9/11 attacks in 2001.
What is Charlie Wilson’s War?
This is the name of the 2003 book Charlie Wilson’s War: The Extraordinary Story of the Largest Covert Operation in History, written by George Crile III, which became the 2007 film Charlie Wilson’s War, directed by Mike Nichols and starring Tom Hanks, Philip Seymour Hoffman, and Julia Roberts.
The book and movie tell the story of Charlie Wilson (1933–2010), a Democratic congressman from Texas who served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1973 to 1997. Wilson sat on key appropriation committees in Congress and was thus able to get funding to buy weapons to support the Mujahideen in their fight against the Soviet Army in Afghanistan. Working with CIA officer Gust Avrakatos (1938–2005), Wilson got enough U.S. government money to create the “largest covert operation in history.” A key weapon was the handheld Stinger missile launcher that proved devastating to Soviet helicopters and airplanes.
To this day, questions are asked about the legality, morality, and long-term strategic effects of what Wilson and Avrakatos did. In their efforts to support the Afghans, they also supported many bad actors in Afghanistan and Pakistan who would create serious problems in future years. Wilson himself was a ladies’ man and a heavy drinker who died from his alcoholism.
The tragedy of the whole story of Charlie Wilson’s War can be seen at the end of the movie and the book when, after the withdrawal of the Soviets, Wilson asks for money to rebuild Afghanistan and try to create a stable society. Despite over twenty billion dollars spent to support the Mujahideen military efforts, Wilson could get no money for such things as schools to rebuild Afghanistan. America ignored Afghanistan, and in the years that followed, Afghanistan would become a breeding ground for terrorists. In 2001, American forces entered Afghanistan to begin the longest war in American history.
What happened when Brezhnev died?
When Brezhnev died in 1982, he was succeeded by Yuri Andropov (1914–1984). However, Andropov died two years later, and Konstantin Chernenko (1911–1985) replaced him as premier. When Chernenko, too, died an untimely death in March 1985, Mikhail S. Gorbachev (1931–) became head of the Communist Party and leader of the Soviet Union.
With Gorbachev, the reign of the old guard of Stalin-trained leaders had come to an end. Gorbachev’s policies of openness to the West and economic development led to the disintegration of the Soviet Union, with communist rule ending in 1991 and each Soviet republic setting up its own government.
Gorbachev pulled Soviet troops out of Afghanistan. He also agreed to a treaty with U.S. president Ronald Reagan that banned intermediate-range nuclear weapons (approved in 1987). This was an important step in trying to control nuclear weapons. In 2018, however, President Donald Trump announced that the United States would withdraw from the treaty.
What led to the decline of communism in Eastern Europe?
Anticommunist sentiment among Eastern Europeans was bolstered by the actions and policies of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. When Gorbachev took office in 1985, the Soviet economy was in decline. In order to reverse the trend, he advocated dramatic reforms to move the economy away from the government-controlled (communist) system and toward a decentralized system, similar to those of Western democracies. Gorbachev’s efforts to modernize the Soviet Union were not limited to the economy; he further proposed a reduction in the power of the Communist Party, which had controlled the country since 1917.
President Mikhail Gorbachev—easily recognizable with his prominent birthmark—tried to modernize the Soviet Union’s economy and foreign policies but without much success.
Gorbachev’s programs for reform were termed perestroika (meaning “restructuring”). In the meantime, Gorbachev opened up relations with the West, which included visits with U.S. president Ronald Reagan (1911–2004), who strongly supported the Soviet leader’s programs. Gorbachev referred to his policy of openness as glasnost. Both Russian terms quickly caught on around the world. While the economic reforms produced a slow and painful change for the Soviet people and Gorbachev had many detractors (including government officials), he also had many supporters—both inside and outside the Soviet Union.
What happened in other communist countries?
People in other Eastern European countries watched with interest the Soviet move toward a more democratic system. Strikes in Poland had begun as early as 1980, where workers formed a free labor union called Solidarity. But the following year, the communist leaders of the Soviet Union pressured the Polish government to put an end to the movement—which it did. After Gorbachev became head of the Soviet Union and initiated sweeping changes, the reform movements in other countries soon realized that the Soviets under Gorbachev would no longer take hard-handed tactics toward anticommunist efforts in other countries.
In 1989, the Polish government ceased to prohibit Solidarity, and the Communist Party there lost influence. The same was true in Hungary, East Germany, and Czechoslovakia. By the end of the decade, most of the Eastern European communist governments were overthrown in favor of democratic-oriented governments. The transition was effected differently in each country: the “overthrow” in Czechoslovakia was so peaceful that it was called the Velvet Revolution, while in Romania, a bloody revolt ensued, and that country’s hard-line communist dictator, Nicolae Ceausescu (1918–1989), and his wife were executed.
In 1990, multiparty elections were held in Romania, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, East Germany, and Bulgaria. The noncommunist party that was put in power in East Germany agreed to unification with West Germany, again creating one Germany on October 3, 1990. That same year, Gorbachev received the Nobel Peace Prize for his contributions to world peace.
What happened to the Berlin Wall?
The wall was a symbol of communism’s oppression and of the Cold War. On June 26, 1963, President John F. Kennedy had delivered his memorable “I am a Berliner” speech in its shadows, saying, “There are some who say communism is the wave of the future.… Let them come to Berlin.” He went on to say that the wall was “a vivid demonstration of the failure of the communist system” and that though democracy is not perfect, democratic nations had “never had to put up a wall to keep our people in.”
On June 12, 1987, President Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) addressed West Berliners at the wall’s Brandenburg Gate; his now famous speech was audible on the East Berlin side of the wall as well. There, Reagan issued a challenge to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev ((1931–), saying, “If you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization … come here to this wall.… Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
East Germany’s communist government was finally toppled in October 1989. Restrictions between the two Berlins were lifted, and the wall was opened. The resulting celebration brought the wall down, with gleeful Berliners chipping away at the barrier; it was gradually dismantled. A few sections of the wall still stand, many of which have been covered by graffiti artists.
A map at Checkpoint Charlie still shows how the city of Berlin was divided by a wall until 1989.
How did the Soviet Union fall apart?
Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s liberal reforms met with the opposition of conservative communist officials who were angered by the hardships produced by the transition to a free-market economy and dissatisfied with the Soviet Union’s loss of influence over neighboring countries, where communism had fallen by 1990. In August 1991, communists attempted to overthrow Gorbachev as president of the Soviet Union. Though the effort failed in the face of widespread public opposition, it nevertheless weakened Gorbachev’s leadership.
Soon, the fifteen Soviet republics declared independence but indicated their willingness to become part of a loose confederation of former Soviet republics. Though Gorbachev tried to prevent the complete dissolution of the Soviet Union, on December 8, 1991, the republics of Russia, Ukraine, and Belorussia (Belarus) broke away completely from the Soviet Union and formed the Commonwealth of Independent States. All the remaining republics, except Georgia, followed suit. On December 25, 1991, Gorbachev resigned as president, and the Soviet Union ceased to exist.
VLADIMIR PUTIN
Who is Vladimir Putin?
Vladimir Putin (1952–) is the current president of Russia, a position he has held since 2012. He was also the president from 2000 to 2008. In between, he was the prime minister.
After law school, Putin served in the KGB foreign intelligence office for sixteen years and became a lieutenant colonel. (The KGB was the security agency for the Soviet Union from 1954 to 1991. This was the immense spy agency of the Soviets that was known for its use of brutal tactics.) When the Soviet Union broke apart in 1991, Putin went into politics.
With the end of the Soviet economic and political systems, many saw it as an opportunity to create both a democratic society and a free-market economy. However, despite early hopeful signs, this did not happen. A key problem was that all the industries had been previously owned by the Soviet government. When that collapsed, the industries were grabbed up by a handful of people with the right connections and bought for bargain prices. What emerged was an oligarchy of a few powerful people with influence over both the economy and the government. Making things worse is that some of these oligarchs are connected to Russian organized crime. Vladimir Putin is connected to these oligarchs.
Putin has built his economy on exports of oil and national gas. However, this has produced a roller-coaster economy based on the ups and downs of these markets.
As president, Putin has been effective in controlling much of the media in Russia so that it provides a positive image of him with little criticism. Thus, he has remained popular there. (A similar situation existed in the Soviet Union with the state-run news agency TASS.) Russia is not a democracy with free speech. Putin has jailed political opponents. And he is accused of having opponents assassinated.
Under Putin, Russia has tried to influence events and nations around the world. His goals include weakening NATO, tearing apart the European Union, encouraging extremist groups in many countries to weaken those countries, and sowing discord in the United States. Putin is suspected of using influence to bolster support for Brexit, the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union.
Russia has also tried to interfere with countries created out of the Soviet Union, such as Ukraine. In 2014, Russia took over and annexed the region of Crimea in Ukraine, claiming that it was part of Russia.
Putin has also been accused of interfering in the American 2016 presidential election. (See the chapter “The Twenty-First Century.”)
