The Cold War
The Cold War was not a war in the accepted sense. Instead, it described the political conflict, military tension and economic competition that existed between the Soviet Union and the Western Powers from 1945-1991. The Soviets created the Eastern Bloc along with the countries it occupied. In 1946, Churchill made a speech at Westminster College, Missouri where he said “From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent.” Thus, the term “Iron Curtain” was born.
The Cold War run for 35 years and there were periods of relative calm and high tension. Leaders on both sides came and went but the Cold War remained until 1991, the Soviet Union collapsed.
Cold War 1945-1950
After the end of World War II, the Soviets started to annex several states including East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Romania and Albania and these were added the Eastern Bloc. These Eastern Bloc countries adopted both Soviet economics and their brutal methods employed by Stalin.
Berlin was unusual in the fact the city was split in two. East Berlin was controlled by the Soviets and West Berlin was controlled by a combination of Britain, France and the USA. However, Berlin was also deep inside East Germany. In 1948, Stalin put in place the Berlin Blockade which was the first crisis of the Cold War. From 24th June 1948 – 11th May 1949, the Western Allies airlifted in 13,000 tons of supplies per day on 200,000 flights. It was a humiliation for the Soviets who had claimed it would never succeed.
In 1949, the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) was formed. It was a formal alliance between countries of Europe and North America to defend each other from the possibility of the Communists taking control of their country.
Cold War 1951-1960
In 1950, the Ministry for State Security or STASI was formed in East Germany. It was regarded as one of the most ruthless and effective secret police services in the world. Some sources believe that at its height, one person in seven in East German was an informer.
In 1953, Joseph Stalin died and was replaced in the Kremlin by Nikita Krushchev. In 1953, a strike by East German workers turned into an uprising against the Soviets and it took the intervention of Soviet troops to restore order. In 1956, the Hungarian Revolution took place, again protesting against the Stalinist government. This time, the government fell. However, at the start of November, the Politburo sent their forces in and by the start of 1957, a Soviet controlled government was in place once more.
Meanwhile, in the Caribbean, another iconic Communist leader was taking control. The Cuban Revolution began in 1953 and it took nearly 6 years before Fidel Castro took charge of the island nation just 60 miles south of the United States. As Castro was taking over in Cuba, another major conflict between Communist and Western forces was starting in Vietnam.
Cold War 1961-1970
The 1960s produced some of the most memorable events of the Cold War. In 1960, a U2 spy plane piloted by Gary Powers was shot down over Soviet territory and was a huge embarrassment to the Americans. The following year, JFK was elected President of the USA and the Soviets started work on the Berlin Wall in an attempt to stop the ‘brain drain’ of the brightest young East Germans to the West. This prompted a tank standoff at Checkpoint Charlie which ended peacefully.
A year later, a far more serious stand-off took place in Cuba which took the world to the brink of nuclear war. The Soviets had placed nuclear missiles in Cuba which was just 60 miles south of Florida. The SS-4 and SS-5 missiles had a range of up to 2,400 miles so this was unacceptable to the Americans. The placing of the missiles was partly in response to the failed Bay of Pigs assault which had attempted to overthrow Castro in 1961. The US placed a blockade on Cuba and although some army commanders wanted to invade Cuba, eventually, a diplomatic solution was reached. The Soviets withdrew their missiles from Cuba and some months later, the Americans removed their Jupiter missiles from Turkey.
In 1964, Krushchev was replaced by Leonid Brezhnev who had led a plot to remove him as leader. In August 1968, the Soviet Union, Bulgaria, East Germany, Hungary and Poland invaded Czechoslovak to stop the liberal reforms of Alexander Dubcek. This was Brezhnev’s first big test as leader. His belief that the Soviet Union had the right to interfere with the internal affairs of it satellite states to “safeguard socialism” was to become known as the “Brezhnev doctorine”.
Cold War 1971-1980
The Cuban Missile Crisis had shown the world just how dangerous relations between the US and USSR had become. Consequently, a long series of talks aimed at stabilizing arms numbers took place. This was known as ‘Détente’. Ultimately, the fear of Mutually Assured Destruction had helped avoid direct conflict.
In Britain, part of the nuclear deterrent was the V Bomber Force. This was the nickname given to the Vickers Valiant, Aero Vulcan and the Hadley Page Victor. The Vulcan was the best known of the 3 aircraft with its famous delta wing design. Ironically, the only time it was used in action was when Vulcan 607 flew from Ascension Island to drop 21 1,000lbs bombs on Port Stanley airport during the Falklands War in 1982.
Towards the end of the decade, two of the most important factors in the fall of the Soviet Union took place. In 1979, Soviet forces invaded Afghanistan and a year later, Polish shipworkers in Gdansk formed the Solidarity Union and Lech Walesa was elected as its leader. With these two events, the seeds were sown that would trigger the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Cold War 1981-1991
Leonid Bezhnev died in 1982 and his successors realized that dialogue was the way forward. In 1983, US President Ronald Reagan proposed the Strategic Defense Initiative which focused on the defence against a nuclear attack rather than an offensive strategy. In 1985, Michael Gorbachev took control in the Soviet Union. He tried to put in place reforms to the stagnating state by introducing glasnost (openness), perestroika (restructuring), demokratizatsiya (democratization) and uskoreniye (acceleration – of economic development).
In 1986, Gorbachev ended economic aid to the Soviet satellite states and later that year, he agreed with Reagan to remove all intermediate nuclear missiles from Europe. This was followed by a further treaty to remove all medium and short-range nuclear missiles. In 1987, Ronald Reagan visited West Berlin to commemorate the 750th year of the founding of the city. On 12th June 1987, he gave a speech next to the Brandenburg Gate where he challenged Gorbachev to “Tear down this wall”.
In 1988, Gorbachev address the UN renouncing the “Brezhnev Doctorine”, effectively ending the Cold War. Poland had negotiated free elections, Hungary become independent in September 1989. Two months later, there were memorable scenes in Berlin when East German guards opened the crossing points as the Berlin Wall fell. The communist governments of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia and Romania also fell as the Soviet Empire came to an end.
Lithuania became independent in March 1990 and in May of that year, Boris Yeltsin was elected as President of Russia. In October, Germany was officially reunified into a single nation. The Soviet Union was finally dissolved in December 1991.
Tours for 2010
During 2010, there are a number of tour dates visiting Berlin and other places in Germany to learn about the Cold War, the Stasi and the eventual Fall of the Berlin Wall.
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