Zusammenfassung der Ressource
How did the USSR
control the
Eastern European
States
- Poland
- Stalin set up provisional
government in June
45 with the
Government in exile
in London
- Could not allow free
elections as Communists
would lose.
- Boycotted by Mikolajczyjk
in hope that it would
force USA and Britain to
intervene
- Why did the
USA and Britain
do nothing?
- Policy of containment did
not include Poland as it was
considered in USSR sphere
of influence.
- Suggestion that officials from
USA and Britain should monitor
elections in Jan 1947 = declined
- Tactics of terror and false
electoral results = Communist
Peasants’ Party in power
- Leader, Gomulka, believed Poland
should not be completely follow
Soviet example, but forced to do
so and Stalin removed him a year
later
- Romania
- Romania’s King Michael
called on Britain and
USA not to recognise
new government
imposed by USSR
- Stalin called on Petru
Goza (Prime Minister)
to appoint 2 x non
Communists to
government...in reality
made little difference
- 1946 Groza
strengthens position
by combining parties
= Communist
Domination
- Nov 1946: went to the Polls
- Could have won
elections without
these tactics?
(80%)
- Feb 1947 ACC
dissolved,
Marshall Aid
refused,
joined the
Cominform
- Dec 1947 King
Michael
forced to
abdicate
- April 1948
Communist
people’s
republic
declared
- Bulgaria
- Stalin wanted to avoid friction if possible
- Dec 1945 forced the
Communists to include
two members of the
opposition, but when
these demanded change
advised them to be
‘smothered’
- Still anxious to mask
the party’s dictatorship:
Sept 1946 urged a
‘Labour Party’ to be set
up for a ‘broader base
and a better mask’
- October 1946 elections:
opposition win over 1/3
of result
- BUT: Truman doctrine
US involvement in
Greece = Bulgaria front
line in defence of
Communism
- Result is that
opposition is
got rid of.
- Bulgarian Communist
Party took creation
of Cominform to
radicalise:
nationalised industry,
collectivisation of
agriculture, 1 party
state
- Yugoslavia
- Unique: won power
independently of Soviet
forces (90% of vote in Nov
1945)
- Tito ambitious: assisted
Greek Communists
attempting to seize power in
Greece, claimed border
territories from Italy e.g.
Trieste
- USSR sympathised
with Tito but not
ready to risk
confrontation
- Paris Peace
Negotiation 1947:
Trieste divided into
two separate parts:
one under
Anglo-American
control, one Yugoslav
- Czeckoslovakia
- Had undergone post-war
revolution = withdrawal
of Soviet troops Dec 1945
- Communists won 38%
of the vote without
any violence or
efforts of the part in
May 1946
- Could have been a
bridge but
Marshall Plan and
creation of
Cominform =
impossible
- Paris Conference, Masaryk: ‘I
went to Moscow as the foreign
minister of an independent
sovereign state, I returned as a
lackey of the Soviet
government’
- Feb 1948:
Communist
Party took
power
- France
- Initially attempted to balance
West – USSR…until 1947
- Behind the scenes, Socialist Party
attempted to draw closer to the
USA?
- March 1946: French
Socialist leader
accepted international
free trade arguments
by USA
- Moscow Conference Mar 1947
turning point: France aligned itself
with British and Americans
Communists expelled Autumn
Stalin called for violent protests
against the Marshall Plan =
Socialists distanced themselves
from USSR and accept pro-US policy
- Hungary
- Nov 1945 elections
free with no
Communist
influence
- Two years later: press still
free and businesses in
private hands and borders
to West still open
- Influence of
Communist
Party still
apparent in
ACC
- Spring 1947: opposition shattered
when arrested by Soviets for
conspiring against the occupation =
increasingly in Soviet sphere
- 8 Dec 1947: friendship
and co-operation with
Yugoslavia and mutual
aid treaty
- March 1948: Communist and socialist
parties merged: Hungarian People’s
Independent Front
- May 1949
elections: only
Independent
Front allowed to
stand
- Italy
- Initial attempts to balance power:
Communists joined coalition
government
- Stalin conceded Italy had
little choice but to support
West as it had been
liberated and occupied by
them
- Dec 1945 new coalition under
de Gasperi won US support
for economic policies
- May 1947:
Communists
dismissed =
cleared the way
for the Marshall
Plan