Transcript 04 Cold War Review: Challenges to the Soviet System

The Cold War:
Challenges to the Soviet Empire
Daniel W. Blackmon
Coral Gables Sr. High
The Challenges
East Germany 1953
 Poland 1953
 Hungarian Revolution 1956
 Prague Spring 1967
 Solidarity

East Germany 1953

The origins of the crisis were that as late
as the early 1950's, Stalin was willing to
trade German neutrality for reunification
of Germany
East Germany 1953

This was very much against the interests
of Walter Ulbricht, who would certainly
be turned out of power
East Germany 1953

Ulbricht’s response was to increase the
pace of industrialization in order to make
East Germany too valuable to the
Soviets to lose
East Germany 1953

Stalin’s death raised hopes of an
improvement in conditions

June 1953, demonstrators marched in
Berlin, demanding that the leaders
answer for their policies.
East Germany 1953

The demonstrations were spontaneous
and not well organized
East Germany 1953

The government had imposed new work
norms, demanding an increase of 10% in
productivity or else there would be a cut
in wages of 33%
East Germany 1953

Since the state owned the factories in
question, the protest and strikes were
political as well as economic
East Germany 1953

The demonstrators went on to demand a
withdrawal of Soviet troops and free
elections
East Germany 1953

The Soviets intervened with tanks and
troops (Vadney 192-194)
Fundamental Problem

I am unaware of any Communist
economy that was / is not plagued by
Low worker productivity
 High worker absenteeism


“We pretend to work, and you pretend to
pay us”
Fundamental Problem

These problems cannot be solved within
a Communist system, since to attempt to
do so would mean to negotiate with the
workers.
Fundamental Problem
In a Communist system, the Party is
synonymous with the workers!
 Of course, in this system the concept of
“Proletarian Worker” is more of a
metaphysical concept that an empirical
one

Fundamental Problem
The Party can recognize no source of
authority or truth other than itself.
 Negotiation, much less compromise, with
the actual workers is therefore not to be
tolerated.

Fundamental Problem

In my view, this is the most fundamental
reason for the collapse of the Communist
Empire:
Fundamental Problem

The system is profoundly flawed, but
cannot be reformed without destroying
itself.
Fundamental Problem

This is a purely economic analysis,
without taking into consideration the
moral dimensions of these governments.
Fundamental Problem

A Communist government is, by
definition, a criminal organization.
Poland 1956

The crisis began with a strike of
locomotive workers protesting wage cuts
Poland 1956

Khrushchev and Molotov flew to Warsaw
unannounced, while Soviet troops were
put on high alert
Poland 1956

Wladislaw Gomulka and the Polish
Central Committee however said they
would resist force with force
Poland 1956

Gomulka however, convinced the
Russians that he would preserve
bureaucratic control of Poland and that
Poland would remain a loyal Warsaw
Pact power
Poland 1956

Gomulka did not wish to create a new
order

Since Soviet hegemony was the crucial
issue for the Russians all along, they
accepted the situation
Poland 1956

Gomulka wins home rule, an end to
collectivization, and autonomy for the
Catholic Church (Malia 322)
Poland 1956

Wladislaw Gomulka, who had been
imprisoned as a Titoist, becomes head of
the Polish Party (Vadney 194-5)
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

Unrest in Hungary in 1953 (related to
Stalin’s death and the unrest in
Germany) led the Soviets to insist on the
release of moderate Communist Imre
Nagy
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

The crisis in Hungary actually began
before the crisis in Poland.
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

Hundreds of thousands of Hungarians
turned out for a state funeral for victims
of the purges of the late 1940's.
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

When the Polish crisis came, Hungarian
students rallied to support Poland in the
face of threatened Soviet military
intervention.
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

Soviet tanks moved into place, the
Central Committee declared martial law,
and restored Nagy to prime minister.
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

At about this time, the students became
uneasy with their advanced position
(they were, within this system, among
the elite.) They are replaced by the
workers, who become the center of
resistance (in this system, they are the
exploited)
The Hungarian Revolt 1956
Nagy’s appointment helped calm things
a bit, but he was not in charge.
 The workers established
Revolutionary Councils–a force
independent of both the state and the
Communist Party

The Hungarian Revolt 1956

“On 30 October Nagy went on national
radio and announced ‘the abrogation of
the one-party system and the
formation of a government based on
the democratic co-operation among
the coalition parties of 1945'.
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

“He also announced the beginning of
talks with the USSR ‘about the
withdrawal of Soviet troops from
Hungary’.” (Vadney 199)
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

This coalition included the communists,
social democrats, peasants and farmers’
parties and the revolutionary councils
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

The Soviets withdrew troops and sent
negotiators. They also prepared a strike
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

“Nagy served notice that he intended
to withdraw Hungary from the Warsaw
Pact and declare neutrality.” (Vadney
200)
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

The Russians attacked on September 4
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

The resistance is brutally crushed.
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

Perhaps 65,000 Hungarians were killed
and 175,000 driven into exile. The
number of Hungarians transported to the
USSR in sealed trains is unknown.
200,000 fled to the West
The Hungarian Revolt 1956

Nagy was executed
Lessons from Hungary
The revolt forced the USSR into making
a choice between giving a genuine level
of autonomy within their empire, or
maintaining iron control by naked forces.
 Fearing a lack of absolute control,
they choose naked force

Lessons from Hungary
The US by contrast provided far more
scope to its allies.
 Most of our allies entered our orbit at
their own request, and the US never
exercised complete control.

Lessons from Hungary

Many issues, when looked at closely,
demonstrate European diplomats
providing ideas and initiatives.
Lessons from Hungary

By the 1990's of course, we have helped
build a power center that is at least
potentially the equal of the US
The legitimacy of the Soviet Empire

“But in neither case [Poland and
Hungary] had a genuinely viable order
been created, since the survival of both
regimes depended on a degree of
submission to the Soviets and to the
local Party that deprived them of national
legitimacy.
The legitimacy of the Soviet Empire

“Under Stalin the Soviet empire in
Eastern Europe had been fragile
because it rested on a level of coercion
and centralized control that could not be
maintained indefinitely, as the ‘October
Revolutions’ of 1956 demonstrated.
The legitimacy of the Soviet Empire

“After these explosions and the
recognition of ‘different roads to
socialism,’ the East European empire
remained fragile because it now
depended on the willing collaboration of
the local populations;
The legitimacy of the Soviet Empire

“yet they accorded this only because
they feared Moscow’s reprisals if they
did not–a situation that could last only
so long as Moscow retained the
capacity to compel collaboration.”
[emphasis added] Malia 323
The Decade of the Sixties

The 1960's did not bring an end to
troubles within the Soviet Empire.
The Decade of the Sixties
Declining rates of economic growth in
Eastern Europe led to calls for some kind
of reform.
 The usual formula was to provide some
kind of decentralization of decision
making.

The Decade of the Sixties

Since low worker productivity and poor
quality of products were among the
significant problems facing the economy,
the reformers somehow had to induce
workers to work harder and / or better.
In a society where jobs were guaranteed
and social services were free, that was
not easy. (Vadney 402)
The Decade of the Sixties

Middle level managers and academic
economists supported reform, political
appointees and the Party bureaucracy
opposed reform, since it would either
increase or decrease their authority
(respectively). (402)
The Decade of the Sixties

The reformers remained committed to
the primacy of the control of the
Communist Party. They do not
understand that the system itself is rotten
and cannot be reformed
Prague Spring 1968

The initiative began at the top as the
result of negative growth in 1962-3
Prague Spring 1968

In 1966, Antonin Novotny instituted
some decentralization and profit
accountability.

Increased emphasis was to be given to
consumer goods (Vadney 403)
Prague Spring 1968

Continued poor performance led to
student demonstrations in 1967
Prague Spring 1968

Alexander Dubcek replaced Novotny as
Party Chairman

Although seen as a reformer, Dubcek
was also a loyal Party man
Prague Spring 1968

“Action Plan” of April 1968 allowed a
much greater degree of debate and
discussion within the society
Prague Spring 1968
A ‘separate road to socialism”
 Slogan Socialism With a Human Face
(Malia 391)


I personally find this slogan to be absolutely
hilarious
Prague Spring 1968

“The program thus combined an
industrial NEP with a form of anarchosyndicalism, as well as cultural
pluralism.” (Malia 391)
Prague Spring 1968

The “Two Thousand Words” was
published in June 1968

A manifesto written by intellectuals calling
for greater democratic reforms and pledging
support for the government in the event of
Russian intervention. (Vadney 404)
Prague Spring 1968

Other Warsaw Pact governments viewed
all this with apprehension, since
Communist Party control seemed
threatened
Prague Spring 1968

Demonstrators in Poland called for a
“Polish Dubcek” (Vadney 404)

Warsaw Pact leaders fear that Prague
Spring will spread
Prague Spring 1968

The Warsaw Letter

Condemned the reforms in Czechoslovakia
and signed by the other Warsaw Pact
countries except Romania.
Prague Spring 1968

Romania itself is instructive.
Nicolae Ceausescu was pursuing an
independent economic foreign policy, but
maintained an iron grip on internal dissent.
 Since Party control was never in question,
the Soviets tolerated his deviation on other
matters. (Vadney 404, cf. also Malia 395)

Prague Spring 1968

Dubcek replied with protestations of
loyalty to the Warsaw Pact, but also
asserted Czechoslovakia’s right to act
without outside interference
Prague Spring 1968

Dubcek must act carefully however,
since Warsaw Pact forces were on
maneuvers in Czechoslovakia
Prague Spring 1968

Bratislava Declaration of August 3
appeared to have cleared up the matter.

Dubcek welcomed as official visitors
both Ceausescu and Tito
Prague Spring 1968

On August 20, 1968, 500,000 Warsaw
Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia

The Czech Communist Party ordered the
army and people not to resist
Prague Spring 1968

“In effect the Russians and their allies
occupied Czechoslovakia in order to
preserve the undiluted hegemony of the
communist party. . . .
Prague Spring 1968

“ [The end of the Czech experiment]
defined the limits of national autonomy in
no uncertain terms and confirmed that
one-party rule, not democracy, was the
test of orthodoxy’ (Vadney 405)
Prague Spring 1968

The Soviets proclaimed the Brezhnev
Doctrine, “whereby the Russians
proclaimed that they might intervene
fraternally to protect their allies from the
threat of counter-revolution.” (Vadney
406)
Solidarity 1980

Prague Spring did not cause the root
problems to go away
Solidarity 1980

“. . . the success of reform still depended
upon the co-operation of the working
class. Labour, not management, would
have to make the greatest personal
sacrifices in order to raise productivity.
Solidarity 1980

These might entail lower wages to
achieve higher profits, which then could
be used for new investment and growth.
Sacrifice usually entailed sterner work
norms, such as the speed-up and lower
piece rates.
Solidarity 1980

It also might mean a reduction of state
subsidies for food and other necessities.
Subsidies strained the budget in most
Eastern Bloc countries, but consumers
had come to regard them as a right.
Solidarity 1980

Reducing them would have the effect of
increasing prices and thus eroding the
standard of living.” (Vadney 406)
Solidarity 1980

Shipbuilding in Gdansk (formerly Danzig)
was an important source of foreign
exchange, and was thus of great
concern for the government.
Solidarity 1980

Student demonstrations broke out in
Warsaw in March 1968, and were
brutally repressed by Gomulka.
Solidarity 1980

But in 1970, Gomulka announced major
price increases on food. Over half the
family budget of most families already
went towards food. (Vadney 407)
Solidarity 1980

The result was a wave of strikes with
hundreds being killed and thousands
injured
Solidarity 1980

Workers’ Committees began to organize,
and as they turned attention toward
economic issues, they also addressed
issues of the government itself. (Vadney
408)
Solidarity 1980

Gomulka was replaced by Edward
Gierek in December
Solidarity 1980

The tumult continued and in 1971,
Gierek was forced to roll back the price
increases.
Solidarity 1980

“Working class action had brought down
the Gomulka government and forced
Gierek to make concessions, but it had
not resulted in a new structure of
authority.” (Vadney 408)
Solidarity 1980

Malia notes that by this point, the
intellectuals, the workers, the Church
and 70% of the peasants had “morally
defected” from the regime. (397)
Solidarity 1980

Relative prosperity 1970-75
Resulted from strong prices for coal, and
easy credit from Western banks.
 Most increases in income went to increased
food consumption
 Poland had to import food and fodder
(Vadney 409)

Solidarity 1980

The Western recession of 1973-4 shut
off the cheap loans and the cost of debt
servicing went up.
Solidarity 1980

Austerity in 1976

Gierek announced price increases (the
cost of living went up 16%) (Vadney 409)
Solidarity 1980

Strikes began, and a group of dissident
intellectuals formed defending the
workers against government reprisal.
Solidarity 1980

“It represented precisely the kind of
alliance of workers and other classes
which the government had successfully
prevented up to this point.” (Vadney 409)
Solidarity 1980

The Catholic Church also acted to
defend the workers
Solidarity 1980

The cost of servicing Poland’s foreign
debt grew so burdensome that Gierek
decreed a new round of price increases
in 1980
Solidarity 1980
Solidarity
 Strikes began in the Gdansk shipyards
and then spread.
 The Church held mass at the gates of
the shipyards

Solidarity 1980

Lech Walesa emerged as the
spokesman for the union movement as a
whole
Solidarity 1980

The Gdansk Accords August 31, 1980

The government “recognized the workers’
right to form independent unions, the right to
strike, better working conditions,
Solidarity 1980

The Gdansk Accords August 31, 1980

. . . no work on Saturdays, permission for
the church to broadcast Masses on the
radio, less censorship and an easing of
political controls of other kinds.” (Vadney
411)
Solidarity 1980

Solidarity saw itself as a “self-limiting
revolution” and demanded a
“Finlandization” of Poland (Soviet control
over the military and foreign policy but
civil society in control over domestic
affairs) (Malia 398)
Solidarity 1980
The Soviet Reaction
 The Soviets recognized the seriousness
of the economic crisis, and were
reluctant to use military force since it
would certainly be bloody, not to
mention that they already had a war
on their hands in Afghanistan.
[emphasis added]

Solidarity 1980

Solidarity, for its part, had a reason to
cooperate with the Polish government
now that it had achieved recognition in
order to avoid Soviet intervention
Solidarity 1980
Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski became prime
minister of Poland.
 The economic crisis deepened in 1981

Solidarity 1980

Jaruzelski agreed with Walesa to create
a Front of National Accord, but gave
only one of seven seats to Solidarity.
Solidarity 1980

“The general was not about to allow an
independent union to assume any real
power . . . . Any other outcome would
have been revolutionary, and would have
threatened the leading role of the
communist party. No doubt it also would
have invited Russian intervention.”
(Vadney 414)
Solidarity 1980

But Solidarity wanted more, and called
for a national day of protest and a vote
on Jaruzelski, the communist party, free
elections and military relations with the
Soviet Union (Vadney 414)
Solidarity 1980
Jaruzelski declared martial law and
disbanded Solidarity.
 But by attacking Solidarity, Jaruzelski
lost any chance of solving the underlying
economic crisis

Reform Communism in the Eastern
Bloc is a failure.

“The economies of Eastern Europe,
moreover, were stagnating almost as
badly as the economy of the Soviet
Union, and all were far behind the
increasingly prosperous (West)
European Community.
Reform Communism in the Eastern
Bloc is a failure.

“Finally, despite the repression, the
entire region was softening up, whether
through regime policy in Hungary and
Poland or via the reach of West German
and Austrian television in East Germany
and Czechoslovakia.
Reform Communism in the Eastern
Bloc is a failure.

“After almost four decades of socialism,
there was no longer any illusion among
the local populations that the system
offered them a genuine future.
Reform Communism in the Eastern
Bloc is a failure.

“They knew they were simply captive
nations, and the system lived essentially
off the capital of fear accumulated since
1945. But with Solidarity, even this fear
had begun to ebb.
Reform Communism in the Eastern
Bloc is a failure.

“It was now an open question whether
Moscow would have the capacity to
intervene the next time an effort at
Reform Communism spun out of
control.” (Malia 400-1)
Collapse of the Soviet Union
By 1980, the USSR was run by a
gerontocracy
 Leonid Brezhnev died in 1980
 His successor, Yuri Andropov, died in
1984.
 His successor, Konstantin Chernenko,
died in 1985

Collapse of the Soviet Union

Mikhail Gorbachev was the first
university trained leader of the USSR
since Stalin, and the first not to have
experienced World War II
Collapse of the Soviet Union

“. . . Politically, the Soviet Union
remained an authoritarian, one-party
state and that economically it was
focused on producing military hardware
rather than housing, transport, food,
consumer goods and health care.
Collapse of the Soviet Union

“ ‘We can’t go on living like this’, Mikhail
Gorbachev is reported to have said on
the eve of his succession.” (Rogers and
Thomas 210)
Gorbachev’s Key Ideas
Perestroika [restructuring]: “aimed at
restructuring the economy”
 Glasnost [open ness]: “was the principal
that every area of the regime should ber
open to public scrutiny.”

Gorbachev

Gorbachev was a true believer in that he
believed that Communism could be
reformed and still remain Communism.
Gorbachev

(By the way, he is living on Miami Beach
today)
Gorbachev

Gorbachev understood that military
spending had to be cut
Gorbachev

He also understood that there could be
no winner in a nuclear war, and that
steps should be taken to make that less
possible.
Gorbachev

The disaster at Chernobyl highlighted the
threat of nuclear power.

The plant at Chernobyl was designed to
produce weapons grade plutonium as a by
product of the process
The Reagan Victory School

President Ronald Reagan had in the
meantime rejected détente and was
pressing the Soviets with his very
expensive SDI (Star Wars) initiative.
The Reagan Victory School

Star Wars proposed to provide a
workable ABM system


This would undermine the MAD concept
Development of Star Wars would chiefly
be in fields where the Soviets were
hopelessly behind the US and the West
The Reagan Victory School
(One of the great physicists of the
twentieth century, Freeman Dyson,
taught at Princeton in the years I was
there.
 Dyson did not think Star Wars was
technically possible, just hideously
expensive)

The Reagan Victory School

The strongest argument that Star Wars
helped end the Cold War is that the
prospective cost was much more than
the USSR could afford to bear.
The Reagan Victory School

“As former Pentagon officials like Casper
Weinberger and Richard Perle . . . And
other proponents of the Reagan victory
school have argued, a combination of
military and ideological pressures gave
the Soviets little choice but to abandon
expansionism abroad and repression at
home.
The Reagan Victory School

“In their view, the Reagan military build
up foreclosed Soviet military options
while pushing the Soviet economy to the
breaking point.
The Reagan Victory School

“Reagon partisans stress that his
dramatic Star Wars initiative put the
Soviets on notice that the next phase of
the arms race would be waged in areas
where the West held a decisive
advantage.” (Rogers and Thomas 212)
The Reagan Victory School

Other historians, such as Michael
MacGwire, credit Reagan’s “character
and willingness to engage with
Gorbachev” (Rogers and Thomas 212)
The Reagan Victory School

Historian R.J. MacMahon writes: “To his
great credit, Reagan proved willing first
to moderate, and then to abandon,
deeply help personal convictions about
the malignant nature of Communism,
thereby permitting a genuine
rapprochement to occur.” (qtd in Rogers
and Thomas 212)
The Reagan Victory School

I actually agree with the latter
assessment. Only a solid gold “Cold
Warrior” could have negotiated with the
Soviets in the way that Reagan did, in
the same way only a Nixon could have
gone to China.
The Reagan Victory School

Any Democratic President attempting the
same thing would have been torn apart
domestically
Another View

My own view is that the Reagan Victory
School gives far too much credit to
Communism as a system . . . .
Another View
On economic grounds, Communism
could not compete with the West.
 The Soviet economy was falling
seriously behind the West by the 1960s,
when Khrushchev introduced deStalinization

Another View

The Brezhnev Years were a continuation
of economic stagnation coupled with
very heavy spending—on arms build
ups, on financing revolution abroad, on
propping up failing regimes, on military
adventure in Afghanistan
Another View

Gorbachev inherited a nation
That was falling behind in technological
output
 Industrial output was declining
 Food was being imported from the US
 Worker productivity was very low,
absenteeism very high, alcoholism very high

Another View
My own view is that Gorbachev had little
choice but to attempt both internal reform
and foreign policy rapprochement
 My own view is that Reagan’s policies
accelerated the process, but was not
causal to the process.

Another View

My own view is that Communism
collapsed under the weight of its own
failures, economically, politically and
socially
Raymond Garthoff

“The West did not, as is widely believed,
win the Cold War through geopolitical
containment and military deterrence.
Nor was the Cold War won by the
Reagan military build up and the Reagan
Doctrine . . . .
Raymond Garthoff

“Instead, victory for the West came when
a new generation of Soviet leaders
realized how badly their system at home
and their policies abroad had failed.
Raymond Garthoff

What containment did was to
successfully stalemate Moscow’s
attempts to advance Soviet hegemony.
Over four decades it performed the
historic function of holding Soviet power
in check until the internal seeds of
destruction within the Soviet Union and
its empire could mature.
Raymond Garthoff

“At this point, it was Gorbachev who
brought the Cold War to an end.” [qtd in
Rogers and Thomas 213]
Soviet cut back to Warsaw Pact
December 198, Gorbachev announced a
cut to Warsaw Pact forces of half a
million men.
 “It is obvious that force and the threat of
force cannot be and should not be an
instrument of foreign policy. . . . Freedom
of choice is . . . A universal principle and
it should know no exceptions.” (Rogers
and Thomas 214

Hungary dismantles fence to
Austria
Hungary dismantled the barbed wire
fence on its border with Austria.
 Thousands of Hungarians and East
Germans cross over into Austria to stay

Poland
Solidarity is legalized as a result of
Gorbachev’ reforms
 Solidarity won the free elections in 1989
by a huge margin

East Germany

Erich Honecker, leader of the DDR,
presided over one of the cruelist East
European regimes


The dreaded Stasi pervaded everyone’s life.
The degree of its surveillance over ordinary
people proved to be a profound shock
Honecker was hated
East Germany

Thousands of East Germans crossed
into Hungary on “holiday” and then
crossed over into Austria
East Germany
Mass demonstrations led to the
deposition of Honecker and the naming
of Egon Krenz as leader of the DDR.
 Gorbachev made it clear that he would
not intervene.

East Germany

Krenz announced the end of travel and
emigration restrictions
East Germany

Thousands of East Berliners descended
on the checkpoints through the Berlin
Wall
East Germany

Within 24 hours, that obscene pustule
across the face of Europe, the Berlin
Wall, was being dismantled by the
people themselves
I cannot describe the powerful emotions I
felt as I watched tapes.
 I never believed that I would ever see that
Wall go down in my lifetime.

East Germany

Free elections in 1990 led to the
reunification of Germany as the Federal
Republic of Germany (the Communist
DDR ceased to exist and merged with
the Western BRD)
Hungary
Reformers within the Hungarian
Communist Party sacked the hard-liners
and installed Matyos Szuros
 Szuros declared the Third Hungarian
Republic and held free elections in 1990

The Velvet Revolution
Mass demonstrations calling for reform
in Czechoslovakia forced the
government to hold free elections
 The dissident playwright, Vaclav Havel,
was elected President in 1989

Romania

Nicolae Ceasescu had led perhaps the
most repressive regime in all of Eastern
Europe

Considering East Germany, that is saying a
lot!
Romania
The army killed 71 demonstrators in the
city of Timisoara
 When Ceasescu and his wife appeared
in Bucharest one week later,
demonstrations broke out.


The army refused to act
Romania

Ceasescu and his wife tried to flee, but
were caught, given a drum head court
martial, and shot on Christmas Day 1989
Disintegration of the USSR

Long suppressed nationalism now began
tearing the USSR apart
Disintegration of the USSR

In 1991, the following states declared
their independence
Estonia
 Latvia
 Lithuania
 Belarus
 Ukraine
 Moldova

Disintegration of the USSR

They are joined by
Georgia
 Armenia
 Azerbaijan

Disintegration of the USSR

They are joined by
Kazakhstan
 Uzbekistan
 Turkmenistan
 Tajikistan
 Uzbekistan
 Kyrgyzstan
