Chapter Summary

From 1945 to the 1980s the Cold War ordered the world into two-opposing blocks. At the same time it preserved an uneasy peace between the superpowers. Beginning in the mid-1960s, growing discontent among citizens of the Soviet block began to show stresses in the Communist regimes.

Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev (1966-1982) declared the right of the Soviet Union to intervene in the internal affairs of the members of the Warsaw Pact in order to suppress counterrevolution. During the 1970s the confrontational nature of diplomatic relationships between the USSR and the U.S. was replaced by a spirit of cooperation called detente. Nuclear weapons limitation treaties were negotiated and signed. During the 1980s, there was a temporary return to the Cold War. President Ronald Reagan of the U.S. revived the traditional enmity between the superpowers. Reagan attempted to restart the arms race by seeking to place weapons in space. Despite Reagan’s militancy, Cold War tensions generally lessened.

By the 1980s it was clear that the Brezhnev doctrine had failed to end dissent within the Soviet Block. In the Soviet Union there also was growing dissent especially among leading intellectuals. One of the leading dissidents was Andrei Sakharov who along with other intellectual dissidents produced literature, censored by the government, that revealed the abuses of the Soviet government. For his pains, Sakharov was exiled in the closed city of Gorki until 1986 when the former nuclear scientist was rehabilitated during the government of Mikhail Gorbachev.

With the accession of Mikhail Gorbachev in 1985 the atmosphere of repression in the Soviet Union lightened. Gorbachev attempted to address the relatively low standard of living endured by Soviet citizens. While workers had money to spend, there were virtually no better-quality goods available for consumption. Unfortunately, Gorbachev was unable to increase sufficiently the production of consumer goods. Soviet citizens turned to the black market to purchase products from the U.S. and western Europe. Gorbachev responded by creating a limited free market and lessening restrictions on importation of Western goods. Gorbachev also attempted to limit military expenditures in the hope of increasing investment in consumer goods.

Gorbachev’s reforms in the Soviet Union opened the possibility of change in eastern Europe. Polish resistance to Soviet rule was centered in the industrial city of Gdansk. To forestall price rises of food and necessities, the Polish government depended on foreign loans in the 1970s. When the government could no longer borrow, it ordered price increases in 1976 that were soon rescinded in the face of strikes. When prices were again raised in 1980, the shipyard workers of Gdansk under the leadership of Lech Walesa formed a non-Communist union, Solidarity, and shut down the shipyards. The union’s success in forcing government reforms gave it political power. In 1981 the government attempted to use the military to crack down on labor dissidents, but the Soviet Union refused to add its military power. Solidarity was finally legalized in 1989. In elections held in that year, Solidarity candidates swept the Communist party out of office. Solidarity faced the same economic problems that had baffled their Communist predecessors. In the 1990s Poland pursued free market policies by attracting western companies to open subsidiaries in Poland. In 1989 Hungary opened all its borders to the West and immigrants poured into western Europe. The Communist government in Hungary was replaced by a new socialist regime. Student protests that mushroomed into a mass democratic movement initiated the political change in Czechoslovakia. Like its Hungarian neighbor, the Czech Communist government was voted out of power and replaced by the democratic opposition led by Vaclav Havel. Only in Romania did revolutionaries violently overthrow the government of Nicolae Ceaucescu. After the government ordered the military to fire on protestors, a popular revolution seized the former ruler and executed him in 1989.

East Germany and West Germany developed as two separate countries and societies in the 1960s and 1970s. However, economically they were virtually a single economy by 1980. When West Germany joined the EEC in 1957, it required that East and West Germany be treated as a single nation for purposes of trade. West Germany established important trade markets in its eastern neighbor. Economic linkage led to cultural identity. The major problem caused by the economic relationship between East and West Germany was the tendency of skilled laborers and professionals to leave the East in search of higher salaries and better living conditions in the West. Emigration became a flood by the late 1980s. In 1989 the East German government was forced to remove the Berlin Wall and open its borders. Within a year political unification of East and West Germany was accomplished. The new nation faced immediate problems. Other European nations were wary of a reunited Germany. The former East Germans were concerned about marginalization and economic subservience within the new nation.

Gorbachev’s rhetoric of reform brought forth grass-roots political movements dedicated to reducing the role of the Communist party. In 1990 Gorbachev ended the political monopoly of the Communist party in the Soviet Union. Criticism of Gorbachev’s unwillingness to embark on even more radical reforms grew. In August 1991 Communist party conservatives attempted to seize power and overthrow the Gorbachev government. Although the coup failed, Gorbachev’s political prestige was fatally damaged. Boris Yeltsin replaced Gorbachev as the most influential politician in Russian politics. Gorbachev’s attempt to open the Russian economy to greater market influence foundered on the combined problems of an insecure currency and the development of the Russian mafia. Despite economic struggles, the greatest threat to Gorbachev’s more open system was the “nationalities problem,” the existence of ethnic minorities, in the USSR. There were three major areas of nationalism within the Soviet Union: Central Asia, Armenia, and the Baltic states. In Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, ethnic minorities demanded nationalist self-determination instead of Communist party solidarity. Violence broke out in Armenia between groups of ethnic Azerbaijanis and Armenians. Soviet troops were sent to the area. Rioting in Central Asia was instigated by university students. By 1991 all fifteen Soviet republics declared their independence from the Soviet Union. Gorbachev resigned as head of the Soviet Union on 25 December 1991, and Boris Yeltsin became the leading political figure of Russia. Eleven republics formed the Commonwealth of Independent States. Control of the Soviet military and serious economic problems remained unresolved as a new constitution was created for Russia in 1993, but political instability continued to exist. An uneasy alliance of former communists and radical nationalists challenged Yeltsin for control of the new nation. He withstood the challenge and was elected to a second term in 1996.

The collapse of communism unleashed a wave of violence, terrorism and ethnic cleansing over long-standing grievances.

In 1994 Boris Yeltsin committed Russia’s military forces to suppress a nationalist rebellion in the province of Chechnya. Attacks on civilian targets roused international opposition to the conflict. Although he promised an end to the war in his political campaign of 1996, Yeltsin was slow to begin a withdrawal of Russian forces from Chechnya. Although a truce was declared, Yeltsin’s disappearance from political events seemed to signal insecurity at the top of the Russian government. In 1999 Chechen terrorism in Moscow led to renewed war to suppress the Chechen revolutionaries. In 2001 Russian president Vladimir Putin declared the war over, but the violence continued to escalate between Russian and Chechnyan fighters. The continuing Russian occupation pushed the Chechnyans to turn to terrorism against Russian civilians, including the killing of 339 hostages at a school. President Putin responded by curtailing democracy.

Of all the former Communist states, Yugoslavia had appeared most free of Soviet influence and closer to economic integration in the western European economy. By 1991, however, Yugoslavia, disintegrated into competing ethnic groups, attempted to restore ethnic homogeneity in regions of the former Yugoslav state.

Dating back to the outset of the twentieth century, there were hostilities among the various ethnic groups in the Balkans. Serbs, typically Orthodox, and Croats, typically Catholic, were traditionally opposed to each other. Conflicting territorial claims of the two groups were complicated by the existence of a sizable minority of Muslims living in the disputed territory of Bosnia. Beginning in 1992, the Serbs attempted to seize the territory of Bosnia as part of a “greater Serbia,” and began a policy of “ethnic cleansing” of Muslims living in the region. Muslim volunteers from outside of Bosnia supported Muslim defenses. In 1995 NATO intervened in the conflict to halt the Serbian advance. Eventually the Dayton Peace Accord halted conflict. Despite the peace, ethnic differences continued to exist, and the nation remained divided.

In 1998 conflict broke out over Kosovo, a portion of Serbia with a large Albanian ethnic minority. Ethnic Albanians desired to break away from Serbia and unite with Albania and Macedonia to form a new nation in the Balkans. The Serb government began a calculated plan to force the emigration of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo. In 1999 NATO forces intervened to halt the “ethnic cleansing” of Kosovo. When the Serb forces withdrew, Albanians returned to Kosovo and began to drive out Serbs from the region. All of the Balkans continued to experience weak economies. But Albania was in the worst economic shape. With the collapse of communism, Albania disintegrated into a primitive society plagued by banditry.

Western economies, fueled by a growing supply of cheap labor from southern Europe and former colonies, continued to grow until the oil crisis of the 1970s. During the 1970s and 1980s, the expense of the welfare state prompted political reevaluations. Economic integration in the Common Market continued to reflect the Western European trend to a single market and unified economic policies.

The founders of the European Economic Community (EEC) intended the creation of a united Europe; but until the oil crisis of the 1970s abated, the EEC had little power over its individual national governments. In order to compete against Japan and the U.S. for foreign markets, greater economic integration was desirable. In 1985 the Single European Act was drafted and accepted by all member states. It was intended to establish a single, integrated European market by the end of 1992. The act, removed all tariff barriers and effective frontiers to limit movement or trade. At Maastricht in 1991, the various governments approved the Treaty on the European Union, but there remained doubts about the ability of the various nations to create a single European state. In the 1990s Europe began to move to a unified defense system, common social and economic policies and in 2002 adopted a single currency called the euro. By 2004 there were 25 member states in the European union including several from eastern Europe. The potential of a unified European economy caused concern in trading rivals, including the United States and Japan. Nevertheless, by the end of the 1990s, the United States was embarking on a closer economic relationship with the European union as American companies entered into partnerships and joint ventures with European companies.

Industrial growth in Western European nations depended on ready supplies of cheap, unskilled labor. Southern Europe, Asia, the Caribbean, and Africa supplied immigrants to fill the labor pool. Most migrants were males without families, who intended to make their fortunes and return to their homelands. In most cases they did not. Foreign laborers—men and women—endured harsh living conditions in keeping with the low prestige associated with their menial labor. Cultural acceptance proved impossible, even after several generations in the adopted country. Poor relations between immigrants and natives led to violence. Right-wing politicians in western Europe demanded limitations on immigration and portrayed foreign workers as threats to domestic workers. Racial rioting directed against communities of foreign workers broke out in France and Great Britain. In response to the flood of immigration and growing opposition to foreigners in the workforce, most countries enacted restrictions against foreign immigration after 1973 and the oil crisis. Even non-European political refugees were refused entry into some countries. France halted immigration entirely in 1974. In general, the restrictions failed to diminish the numbers of foreign workers in western Europe. By the 1990s immigration had become a major issue in electoral campaigns that allowed extreme right wing politicians to become prominent. The presence of large numbers of foreign workers resulted in a cultural clash. In 2004 France enforced cultural uniformity by prohibiting the wearing of clothing in school that denoted religious affiliation.

Western women were more educated and had access to more professional positions in the last quarter of the twentieth century. Feminist scholarship incorporated women’s issues into school and university curricula. Parallel to the increase of economic and educational opportunities for women was the development of an international women’s movement. Women’s political action led to changes. Italian women gained the limited right to divorce their husbands in 1970; French women gained access to legalized abortion in 1975. Radical feminists urged separatism—a war between the sexes, because they saw women as an oppressed sex. Feminists in the 1970s and 1980s adopted a number of related political issues such as peace and nuclear weapons, and in the 1990s they also became prominent in the environmental issues. The women’s movement also affected social relationships in the Soviet Union, but to a lesser extent. Like their Western counterparts, Soviet women were better educated at the end of the twentieth century. Eastern women actually enjoyed better representation in parliamentary bodies, but held virtually no offices with actual power within the Communist party. In the work force, Soviet women were numerous—often performing menial jobs—but held few managerial positions. Support mechanisms—child care, kindergartens, pre-natal care—were lacking in the Soviet Union. Birthrates in the Soviet Union continued to fall, as they did in western Europe.

Terrorism continued to be a significant means of political expression in the late twentieth century. The creation of the state of Israel in the Middle East and the loss of autonomy by Palestinian Arabs led to international terrorism. Palestinians, Islamic Fundamentalists and European supporters—the Red Army Faction of Germany and the Red Brigades of Italy—carried terrorism to the citizens of western Europe and the U.S. Terrorism was the heir of the European tradition of anarchism as a weapon of oppressed nationalist minorities. Victims were randomly chosen as symbols of oppression. Citizens of western Europe and the U.S. were important targets for terrorism, because their sacrifice offered the promise of media exposure of acts of violence. The U.S. status as the major power in the world made it a major terrorism target beginning in the 1980s. On September 11, 2001 a terrorist attack organized by Osama bin Laden destroyed the World Trade Center and part of the Pentagon leaving more than 3000 people dead. In the aftermath of the attack the U.S. and Great Britain invaded Afghanistan in what is called the “war on terrorism.” Using the cover of the “war on terrorism” the United States invaded Iraq in March of 2003 and overthrew Saddam Hussein. Within months of the invasion the American occupation forces began to face resistance from insurgent fighters fighting American occupation. Terrorist groups represented all shades of the political spectrum from Marxists to right-wing nationalists, but formed cooperative networks of training bases and information. Terrorism was effective in gaining publicity for political causes and in disrupting western European society. Terrorists were able to avoid surveillance and detection. Yet despite the helplessness of the West in limiting acts of political violence, terrorists accomplished few concrete political goals. Western reactions to terrorism have varied from negotiation for the release of hostages to anti-terrorist military action. Israel and the U.S. have been most aggressive in striking back at identified terrorist groups. In 2004 it was revealed that the United States had resorted to torture and interrogation techniques that violated the Geneva Convention. Despite the tactic of meeting violence with violence the U.S. had not succeeded in ending its vulnerability to terrorism.