Transcript File - Beechen Cliff School Humanities Faculty

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE COLD
WAR IN EUROPE.
SALAMI TACTICS (1945–48)
‘Slice-by-slice’, Stalin ensured all E European countries had Communist
governments
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Albania (1945) – the Communists took power after the war
without opposition
Bulgaria (1945) – the Communists executed the leaders of all the
other parties.
Poland (1947) – the Communists forced the non-Communist
leaders into exile.
Hungary (1947) – Russian troops stayed but Stalin allowed
elections (non-communists won a big majority). Communists were
led by the pro-Russian Rakosi. Rakosi demanded that groups which
opposed him should be banned. He got control of the police,
arrested his opponents and set up a secret police unit, the AVH.
Romania (1945–1947) – the Communists gradually took over
control.
Czechoslovakia (1948) – the Communists banned all other parties
and killed their leaders.
East Germany (1949) – Russians turned their zone into German
Democratic Republic.
THE IRON CURTAIN.
(THE FULTON SPEECH MARCH 1946 – CHURCHILL).
“From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the
Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern
Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia, all these
famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all
are subject in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and, in many
cases, increasing measure of control from Moscow.”
SOVIET REACTION TO CHURCHILL’S SPEECH.
Winston Churchill's "Iron Curtain" speech was never published by the Soviet press -only in May 1998 did it appear in Russian in a historical archival journal. Stalin
himself informed his people about it in Pravda. He compared Churchill to Hitler and
described him as "a warmonger" who aimed at "Anglo-Saxon ... racial“ world
domination. At the same time, he claimed that the Soviet Union, despite recent war
losses, was capable of waging and winning another war.
Stalin's harsh reaction was calculated, not emotional. After the fall of 1945, the
Soviet dictator had begun preparations for a possible confrontation with the West.
In addition to atomic and other military projects, he launched a campaign to disabuse
his lieutenants of any "illusions" about the West's -- and Churchill's -- good will. The
"Iron Curtain" speech gave him a pretext for mobilizing the Soviet people against
their former allies.
WESTERN VIEWS OF COLD WAR IN EUROPE
REALITIES OF THE ‘IRON CURTAIN.
THE TRUMAN DOCTRINE AND THE MARSHALL PLAN
Background Events
The Truman Doctrine was a response to a crisis. Behind it lay the Communist/Soviet takeover of many of
the countries of eastern Europe by ‘salami tactics’ – which, Truman alleged, was in breach of Stalin’s
promises at the Yalta Conference.
Then, in February 1947, the British government – which had been helping the Greek government resist
Communist rebels – announced that it could no longer afford to keep its soldiers there. It seemed to
Truman and his advisers that, of they did nothing, it was only a matter of time before the communists took
over YET ANOTHER country.
The Truman Doctrine:
And so – he told the Congress – the nations of the world were faced with a choice. This section of the
speech is very famous, in which Truman defined the Cold War as a conflict between good and bad, and as a
choice between capitalism and communism, dictatorship and democracy, and freedom and oppression:
At the present moment in world history nearly every nation must choose between alternative ways of life.
The choice is too often not a free one.
One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free institutions,
representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual liberty, freedom of speech and religion,
and freedom from political oppression.
The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies
upon terror and oppression, a controlled press and radio; fixed elections, and the suppression of personal
freedoms.
In such a world, he told Congress, America was OBLIGED to get involved:
Marshall Announces His Plan
The speech George C. Marshall delivered was drafted by Charles E. Bohlen, a State
Department official and future ambassador to the Kremlin. As its basis, he used a
memo prepared by a State Department Policy Planning staff directed by Sovietexpert George Kennan as well as reports by other State Department officials.
Marshall then prepared the final version. In the speech Marshall outlined the
problem:
"Europe's requirements are so much greater than her present ability to pay that
she must have substantial additional help or face economic, social, and political
deterioration of a very grave character." He then suggested a solution: that the
European nations themselves set up a program for the reconstruction of Europe,
with United States assistance. The significance of Marshall's plan was immediately
recognized. On June 13, British Foreign Secretary Ernest Bevin (1891-1951)
predicted that his address "will rank as one of the greatest speeches in world
history."
SOVIET REACTION - COMINFORM
The Soviet Union hated Marshall aid (see Source D). Stalin
forbade Communist countries to ask for money.
Instead, in October 1947, he set up Cominform. Every
Communist party in Europe joined.
It allowed Stalin control of the Communists in Europe.
Source E
'Can he block it?' This cartoon of 1947 about Cominform
shows Stalin trying to stop the basketball of 'Marshall aid'
scoring the basket labelled 'European recovery'.
THE CZECHOSLOVAKIA CRISIS 1948
At first, the American Congress did not want to give the money for Marshall
Aid. But then, in February 1948, the Communists took power in
Czechoslovakia, followed on 10 March by the suspicious suicide of the popular
minister Jan Masaryk. Congress was scared, and voted for Marshall Aid on 31
March 1948.
Source F
A British cartoon of June 1947 shows Truman and Stalin as two taxi-drivers
trying to get customers. The 'customers' are labelled 'Turkey', 'Hungary',
'Bulgaria', 'Austria'.
THE BERLIN BLOCKADE
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