post-Stalin thaw

Cards (12)

  • Changes in the Eastern Bloc between 1953 to 1956:
    • Khrushchev’s rise and dununciation of Stalin
    • his acceptance that there were ‘many roads to socialism’
    • better Soviet relations with the West and Yugoslavia
  • Berlin Rising: (June 1953)
    • new economic policygreater emphasis on consumer goods
    • Walter Ulbricht (German communist) raised workers’ production quotes without increased paydemonstrations provoked
    • 400k workers protested for free elections, general strike and lifting of quotas
    • government responded with force, arresting and executing protest eader
    • demonstrated the unpopularity of traditional communist policy and that control was based on force
  • Poland: (1956)
    • Boleslaw Beirut’s death (Stalinist Polish communist leader) → increasing calls for liberation in February 1956
    • large demonstrations turned into anti-government protests (June 1956)
    • demands for Polish nationalist and Wladyslaw Gomulka (moderate communist) to be given power
    • Khrushchev tried to force Gomulka to back down but relented
    • certain economic reforms permitted as long as they remained committed to the Warsaw Pact
    • Khrushchev forced to compromise with demands of Polish communists
    • Mao Zedon (Chinese communist leader) publically supported the Polish reformers
  • Hungary: (1956) 1/2
    • Imre Nagy, anti-Stalinist communist became premier (July 1956)
    • protestors called for multi-party democracy, free press, Hungary’s withdrawal from Warsaw Pact (October 1956)
    • Nagy agreed to the demandsUSSR viewed this as an act of open revolt
  • Hungary: (1956) 2/2
    • Red Army tanks entered Budapest to reassert Soviet control (4 November 1956)
    • ‘nationalist’ Janos Kadar became premier (11 November 1956)
    • Kadar’s government imposed one-party control, arresting 35k protestors and executing 300 leaders of the uprising
    • Hungarian protestors assumed that they would receive US military assistance but they refused to suppress the Red Army
  • Eisenhower and Dulles take charge:
    • Eisenhower attacked Truman for being ‘soft’ on communism and rejected containment as ‘futile and immoral’
    • ‘New Look’ policy which emphasised hard-line Cold War diplomacy
  • Impact of the Hungarian rising on the West:
    • US took in 25k Hungarian refugees
    • growing scepticism about USSR’s new mood of ‘accommodation’
    • direct Western involvement in Hungary would trigger a nuclear war
  • Why did Eisenhower want better relations with the USSR?
    • his military background made him strongly aware of the dangers of a nuclear conflict that could ‘destroy civilisation’
    • concerned that military spending was too high which could impinge on US living standards
    • better relations with the USSR → nuclear war less likely → US military spending reduced
    • U-2 spy planes’ intelligance showed USSR was behind in the arms race
  • Key features of the ‘New Look’ policy: 1/2
    • massive retaliation - greater use of nuclear threats and less reliance on conventional weapons
    • brinkmanship - warned China if Korean War would not end it would use nuclear weapons (1953) and issued nuclear threats when Chinese communists shelled nationalist-held islands (1954)
  • Key features of the ‘New Look’ policy: 2/2
    • increased use of covert operations - ensured pro-western Iranian to become the Shah (1953) and development of U-2 spy planes
    • Domino Theory (1954) - if Vietnam became communist, surrounding countries would too → SEATO formed
    • Eisenhower Doctrine (1957) - halted communist penetration and oil supplies falling to hostile hands in Middle East
  • ‘Geneva spirit’ and conference diplomacy: (1954 to 1961)
    • Stalin’s death and end of Korean War → renewal of superpower conference diplomacy
    • assisted by Khrushchev’s pusuit of peaceful co-existence and Eisenhower’s belief in face-to-face meetings
    • improved US-Soviet relations but failed to tackle importnt issues (Germany’s future and arms race)
  • Geneva Conference: (April to July 1954)
    • first indication of success of superpower diplomacy
    • USA, USSR, Britain and France discussed Korea and Indochina
    • ceasefire declared and French troops to be withdrawn
    • Laos and Cambodia established as indepedent states
    • Vietnam temporarily divided into communist north → to be reunited through free elections by 1956