The History of~The Soviet Union (Part 4: De-Stalinization, Uprisings & The Cold War)

One of the most complex nations in modern human history; the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics (or **USSR**) has gone from a modest communist regime to one of the most vile opponents of the west (namely the United States) until it fell on Christmas in 1991.

This is part 4 of the history of The Soviet Union. In this is part we will talk about how the new Soviet Premier; Nikita Khruschev tried to "De Stalinize" the Soviet Union, yet supress any kind of oppoisiton in the Soviet Satelite States, and what the Soviet Union did in the early parts of the Cold War, even bringing thr entire world on the brink of Nuclear Armageddon.

## De-Stalinization

Shortly after Stalin's death in 1953, and a short term power vacuum, Nikita Khruschev (one of Stalin's members in the Soviet Government) outsted another member of Stalin's Government; Lavrenty Beria, he becomes the new premier of the Soviet Union. In a 45-Minute speech to the newly created Soviet Politburo, he orders for "De Stalinization" and denounced the paranoid dictator by closing the Siberian gulags, criminalizing his policies based on Stalin's Cult of Personality, pull down any statue of Stalin and even \*somewhat\* being leniant on punishments in speaking out against the one-party communist government.

This is despite Khruschev being a part of Stalin's government, and even taking part of leading some of the executions during The Great Purge during the 1930s. In turn for De-Stalinization, Khruschev also implemented to ciminalize anything that he personally wasn't a fan of, and that included anything that was liked by the west and the United States. Khruschev also saw the military and weapon manufacturing, which included nuclear weapons (which in the Soviet Union began in 1949 after their successful test of a nuke). Khruschev's movement for De-Stalinization also began a "sense of freedom" among the Soviet Union's satellite states, the nations that were under Soviet military occupation after World war 2, which included the eastern part of Germany.

## Uprisings

After World War 2, the Soviet Union under Stalin had set up communist governments in countries such as Poland, Czechoslovoakia, Romania, Albania, and East Germany forming what is called the "Eastern Bloc", Very much like the Communist government in the Soviet Union, they were oppressive. But this changed after the death of Stalin, and Khruschev's De-Stalinization plan, these nations felt the urge to rise up and topple their communist governments in order to search for more democratic policies. But Khruschev wasn't going to let them do it that easily. It began in East Germany in 1953 shortly after Stalin's death as an uprising against the Soviets took place, but the Soviets would come in ans violently supress the uprising. Another uprising happened in Hungary and Poland 3 years later and would suffer the same fate. In 1968, the people in Czechoslovakia (modern-day Czechnia and Slovakia respectively) would also rise up against their Communist government called "Prague Spring" after 8 months of protesting, they were also suppressed. But they will try again at another time.

## The Cold War

The Soviet Union also played a huge role in the Cold War which began after the establishment of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) in 1949 where the west created a propaganda that would shun everything about the Soviet Union, this was more profound when the Soviet Union established the Warsaw Pact in 1955 in response to West Germany's admission into NATO.

### The Berlin Wall

This Cold War was the most painful in the German capital of Berlin as like Germany, the capital city was split amongst the Allies and the Soviets, and on the Eastern side, the city would begin to suffer economically since a lot of its citizens were moveing to th western side of the city for better pay and working conditions, and Stalin didn't like this one bit and told the West to stay out of the eastern side of the city.

In 1961, Khruschev has ordered the building of a boundary around West Berlin that was 96 miles across and 10 feet high with guard towers and even mines, this was the Berlin Wall to keep in the citizens of East Berlin, separating families and friends for over 25 years.

But the worst is yet to come. By the year following the Berlin Wall, both the Soviet Union and the United States would almost come to blows that would KO the entire world.

### Cuban Missile Crisis

Unbeknownst to the Soviet Union, the United States had constructed nuclear missile silos in Turkey, putting American Mukes in dangerous proximity of the cities and other locales in the Soviet Union. When Khruschev got word of this, this is when he decided to set up Soviet Nukes in close proximity to major locales in the USA, in the newly created communist country in Cuba (led by freedom fighter; Fidel Castro) after an agreement with the Cuban dictator. The USA panicked when a U-2 Spy Plane spotted Soviet Nukes in Cuba and the world held its breath, for 2 weeks the USA and the USSR were in a standoff and the US was prepairing for an invasion of Cuba.

But before the US could invade, its President John F. Kennedy talked to Khruschev and agreed that if Khruschev removed his Nukes from Cuba, Kennedy would remove his Nukes from Turkey, and thus the 2 week long breath holding that the entire world did was in relief, and the 2 powers backed down. Nuclear armageddon never happened.

That'll do it for this part. In our next part, we will talk about how the Soviet Union would fall behind its western rivals. Until next time, this is JohnnyOTGS signing out.