The alignment of forces in the international arena. The alignment of forces in the international arena after the Crimea. c) Formation of the world system of socialism
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The alignment of forces on international arena after the first world war. Peace Plans: Wilson's 14 Points
wilson program trade principle
By the end of the war, a new alignment of forces in the world was determined, which reflected significant changes. The power of world rank - Germany - was defeated, its political status changed, the question of a peace treaty was urgent. As a result of the October Revolution in Russia, 1/6 of the territory of the earth fell away from the general world system. Western powers sought to bring it back into the world system through military intervention.
The United States entered the international arena as an active contender for world domination. The war enriched the United States of America unheard of, turning it into one of the most important creditors of the world: it lent to the countries of Europe about 10 billion dollars, of which about 6.5 billion dollars were private American investments. The US ruling circles sought to use their position as a world creditor and their military might by dictating their will at the forthcoming peace conference in Paris. Therefore, the interests of the United States clashed with the aspirations of England and France.
One of the first contentious issues On the eve of the conference, the question was how to link the debts of the Entente powers to the United States of America with the reparations that were supposed to be collected from Germany, as well as with the general settlement of international debts.
The attitude of the allies towards the principle of "freedom of the seas" proclaimed by the United States and the question of the superiority of the fleets was contradictory. Great Britain sought to maintain maritime dominion and expand the colonial empire. It retained the status of a great power after the war, although it was relegated to the background by the United States, becoming their debtor. England suffered considerable losses in the war, which affected industrial production. In the Middle East, England controlled a significant part of the "legacy" of the Turkish empire, she got the German colonies in Africa and Oceania. British diplomacy at the peace conference sought to secure the position of the winner in the war, to counteract the growing claims of France in Europe, and, relying on an alliance with Japan, to prevent US hegemony in the world.
The position of France remained strong. Despite the fact that she suffered significant material damage and human losses more than others, her positions were strengthened militarily. The French land army of two million was the largest in Europe. France strove for the maximum economic and military weakening of Germany in order to assert its hegemony on the continent.
New states that emerged on the political map of post-war Europe - Poland, Czechoslovakia, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Yugoslavia), as well as Romania were supposed to form a chain of France's allies on the eastern borders of Germany, replace the former ally - Russia, become a "cordon sanitaire" between Germany and Russia.
Italy hoped to increase its territory by adding a number of lands of Austria-Hungary, as well as colonies in Africa, and Japan - to strengthen its economic and military potential at the expense of German island colonies in the Pacific Ocean.
Settlement of interstate relations on the basis of peace treaties of 1919-1922. created conditions for political and economic stabilization in the world. In Europe, the Versailles system legalized the formation of independent nation states. Their number increased due to the collapse of Austria-Hungary and Turkey, the reduction of the territory of Germany. Among them are Czechoslovakia, Austria, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (since 1929 Yugoslavia), Poland, also the Romanian Kingdom, which expanded its territory (it included Northern Bukovina, Bessarabia and Southern Dobruja), significantly reduced in size Bulgaria and Hungary. In the north-east of Europe, Finland and the Baltic republics appeared - Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia.
A significant expansion of the circle of new active participants in European politics was one of its important factors. But the new state-political map of Europe did not always coincide with the ethno-national map: the German people were divided by the borders of several states; in multinational Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia national question was used for political purposes, became the basis for the growth of separatism and territorial claims, and aggravated interstate relations.
Two weakened but potentially influential powers, Soviet Russia and Germany, were in fact placed on harsh terms as the winners - the leading Entente countries outside the Versailles international system. In the interwar period, two main issues arose - Russian and German, requiring a joint solution by the international community.
"14 points" by W. Wilson.
Soviet Russia, after the October Revolution of 1917, negotiated with Germany and its allies on the conclusion of a separate peace. The Entente countries, seeking to prevent the conclusion of a separate peace, developed their own plan for ending the war.
The program of US President W. Wilson was of great importance. On January 8, 1918, in a message to Congress, he outlined a program with peace conditions and the principles of the post-war world order, which went down in history under the name "14 points". W. Wilson's program formed the basis of peace treaties, the essence of which was the democratic reorganization of the world.
This program included the following principles:
1) open peace negotiations and treaties, thereby non-recognition of all secret treaties and agreements;
2) the principle of freedom of the seas;
3) the principle of free trade - the elimination of customs barriers;
4) the establishment of guarantees to ensure the reduction of armaments;
5) impartial settlement of colonial issues;
6) the liberation by Germany of all Russian territories occupied by it, giving Russia the opportunity to determine its national policy and join the community of free nations;
7) liberation and restoration of Belgium;
8) the return to France of the territories occupied by Germany, including Alsace and Lorraine;
9) fixing Italy's borders;
10) granting autonomy to the peoples of Austria-Hungary;
11) the liberation by Germany of the occupied territories of Romania, Serbia and Montenegro; giving Serbia access to the sea;
12) the independent existence of the Turkish and the autonomy of the national parts of the Ottoman Empire, and the opening of the Black Sea straits;
13) creation of an independent Poland;
14) the creation of "a general union of nations (League of Nations) in order to provide mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity - equally to large and small states."
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60-80s it is a period of "confrontational stability".
"Long Peace" - until the 80s and from the 80s - "New HV": this is how Amer. historians. But without one period, one cannot understand the other.
HV continued, but in a relaxed version. Classic cold war - refusal to negotiate. Softened version - both sides go to negotiations:
1. It was possible to reach important agreements between the 2 systems at this particular time. The 1970s is a period of "détente". These include the limitation of strategic arms and issues of European security. We even agreed to develop economic ties between East and West. After the Caribbean crisis, there were no head-on clashes between 2 powers, but there were regional clashes.
2. But the Cold War continued. Firstly, the ideological war continued, periodically there were tensions in relations. In 1983, Reagan called the USSR an "evil empire." The ideological conflict remained. Secondly, the arms race remained and continued. The peak of spending on armaments was 1987. Third. There were no head-on collisions, and the political and military struggle switched to the third world. Regional conflicts continued to be seen in the conflict between capitalism and socialism.
And the last example of confrontation is the limited role of the UN. Veto. The USSR imposed it when, in its opinion, the outcome is possible in favor of the West. And vice versa.
From 1946 to 1990, only 2 states were called peace breakers - aggressors. These are the DPRK (resolution No. 82) and Argentina (the Falklands crisis of 1982). Non-military sanctions were applied only twice: against Southern Rhodesia and South Africa, and that's it! Although over these 45 years they counted 80 wars and more than 300 military conflicts.
Distribution of forces.
The balance of power between the 2 systems is in 1st place here.
This refers to the balance of power in the sphere of 1) economics, 2) social, 3) military, 4) political.
1) Economy.
It is impossible to characterize unambiguously. Major advantages of socialism at the beginning of the period and a serious lag behind the West at the end of this period.
3 periods. 2 of them are short - a period of stagnation, reflected in the balance of power. For the first time in the competition of 2 systems in growth rates, capitalism began to overtake socialism.
1951-1980 1981-85 1986-90
GDP and OECD Growth Rates
7 4 2.5 (Socialist countries)
4 3 3.5 (OECD)
The share of socialist countries in world GDP.
A loss of 2% in the 80s is very serious - this is stagnation.
The level of labor productivity in the industry in the socialist countries.
1938 - did not exceed 10%
The West not only equalized the indicators, but also began to surpass socialism.
Agriculture.
Labor productivity in agriculture in the USSR was 20% of that of the United States. Grain purchases began: in 1965 - for 2.3 billion rubles, in 1985 - for 23 billion rubles.
The USSR in 1980 had 4 times more tractors than the USA. And grain production - 200 (USSR) and 300 (USA) million tons.
In economy sphere the main point is qualitative growth. The West has entered the era of post-industrial society. The USSR continued to develop at the stage of an industrial society. The USSR could not respond to the qualitative growth. Wrong econ. strategy since Khrushchev. Gorbachev tried to equalize. "Acceleration" and "Perestroika", for which he is loved in the West. These 2 things contradict each other. "Acceleration" - due to heavy industry, and "Perestroika" - due to intensification.
The most serious challenge for the West was in the field of science-intensive products, in the field of using the results of scientific and technological revolution. And this was not just a lag.
1980s. The growth of knowledge-intensive industries.
Zap. Europe - 5% per year, USA - 7% per year, Japan - 14%. USSR - 0.4%
Computer Engineering.
USA per year - 28-30%
USSR - 1.3%.
Software.
USA per year - 35%
USSR - 1.8%
The transition to a post-industrial society - attention is paid not to the quantity, but to the quality of products.
Percentage of marriage in the late 80s.
England - 8%
Japan - 1.2%
USSR - one witty economist suggested: 16% of products received a quality mark. The rest - in the West would be considered a marriage.
This is the main area where the lag manifested itself.
Socialism and capitalism were in the 80s at different stages of development. Socialism was at the industrial stage, and capitalism entered the post-industrial stage. Socialism proved its advantages in the era of extensive development, and capitalism - in the era of intensive development.
Who is to blame - the social system itself, which turned out to be flawed, or watered. course, wrong strategy?
Both, but mostly the latter. Indirect evidence: 1) in a number the latest technologies(military sphere and space) it was not the USSR that lagged behind. Every year, the USSR launched hundreds of satellites and rockets, and the USA - about 20. 2) There were attempts to modernize socialism since the 60s (Kosygin's reforms were curtailed). The political elite of the USSR understood that it was necessary to modernize the USSR, but failed, and to a greater extent because of the watered. guides.
2) Social sphere.
Socialism has always been proud of this sphere and has been ahead of capitalism. Socialism was proud of the fact that the care of a person was legalized. The Stalinist constitution was the most democratic - for the first time in history, economics were drawn up. human rights, free medical care, free education. There has been no unemployment in the USSR since 1930.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the West began to catch up and even surpass socialism. And this is extremely important, because this is the power of example. Human welfare is the slogan in both countries. It was at this time that the concept of “quality of life” was developed at the UN, which included hundreds of indicators.
social structure by the 80s.
The social structure of society was the same as it was in the 50s in the West. The main productive force is the same - the factory proletariat. In the West, the decisive force is the middle class. It was not in the USSR. Blue-collar workers - the factory proletariat - in the West there were less than 20% of them, in the USA - less than 15%. main role in the social development was played by white-collar workers - persons employed in the service sector. And their social the position was much higher than that of factory workers.
social spending.
In the 50s, the USSR was proud that they were 2-3 times higher than those of the West. And then the state share. spending on social needs remained unchanged - 15-16%. In the 80s in the West - about 30%.
national income.
In the USSR, during these years, the salary was in ND - 37%. That is, 37% of the country's national income went to salaries. In the West - 65% - salary, and 35% - profit. Who will rise to the revolution for the sake of 35%. But for the sake of 63% - still think.
In 1987-88, the average salary in the United States was $1,700; in the USSR, the average salary was 201 rubles, with benefits - 287 rubles. And the dollar was approximately equal to the ruble.
Average duration life.
The USSR - 69 years, Japan - 78. According to this indicator, the USSR ranked 51st, now it is even worse. Russia - 65, Japan - 62.5.
Medical care.
In the USSR, free in many ways was better than paid now.
1987 – Soviet press trumpeted to the whole world that 122 heart surgeries had been done. In the US that year, 140,000.
Education.
In the 80s, Soviet universities had the latest equipment for 1,200 rubles per student, and Moscow State University - 12,000. If you take all Western universities, then they have an average of $ 80,000.
In terms of the number of students and graduate students per capita in the 50-60s, the USSR ranked 3rd in the world, in the 80s - 50s
3) Military sphere.
It was in this sphere that the USSR achieved its greatest success. All R. In the 1980s, it reached parity. This means that the lag in some classes of weapons was compensated by the fact that there was an advantage in other classes of weapons.
The balance of power changed 27 times, in 23 cases the USSR had to catch up, in 1 there was equality, and in 3 cases the USSR initially had an advantage.
3 cases - 1. First portable bomb. 2. The first ICBM. 3. The first missile defense system.
Eisenhower recognized the ratio of nuclear forces 1 to 12. Kennedy recognized 1 to 5. And Nixon - 1 to 1.
In some, non-nuclear areas, we had an advantage.
By the beginning of the 80s, the USSR had 301 gas turbine ships, and in the West - only 2 (1 in England, 1 in Japan). When in 1971 the Rep. Bangladesh, the 7th American fleet was sent there to the coast of India (always a little, it is sent). The path of the 7th fleet was 1.5 times shorter, but Admiral Sysoev and the squadron sailed there earlier. The Americans were forced to signal "Glad to welcome the Soviet fleet." Sysoev replied: "I am glad to welcome the American fleet away from the shores of free India."
4 categories of nuclear weapons carriers: tactical (560 km), operational-tactical (560-1000 km), medium-range (1000-5000), strategic (from 5500 - the distance from Moscow to Washington).
The USA surpassed the USSR in the medium and shorter range class, they wrote for a long time. In 1987, the INF Treaty was signed. All missiles were reduced according to it: the USA - 859, the USSR - 1852.
Strategic. The triad of carriers - ICBMs, SLBMs (Bal. rocket on submarines), TB (heavy bombers). By the end of the 80s, 2494 from the USSR, 2260 from the USA.
For nuclear weapons. USA - 16,000 and USSR - 10,000 (by the end of the 80s). During this period, the United States overtook the USSR on RBCh (missile with multiple warheads): USA - 1351, USSR - 1272.
Navy. The US boasted about this. Aircraft carriers - 15 to 2, destroyers and cruisers with nuclear weapons 110 to 80, submarines with nuclear weapons 75 - the USA, 265 - the USSR.
The balance of forces of the ATS and NATO. Combat divisions 107 and 101, tanks 52,000 to 22,000, artillery 46,500 to 13,700.
parity results.
1) The USSR in the 70-80s demonstrated a huge military potential.
2) The achievement of parity contributed to the strengthening of international stability.
3) There is no doubt that the achievement of parity has become the material basis for the policy of detente.
4) The significance of achieving parity is the depletion of the forces of the USSR, the undermining of foreign policy resources. Kennan turned out to be right in his time when by the arms race he meant, first of all, the exhaustion of the USSR. He was still alive, lived 102 years.
Funds for parity were withdrawn from the civilian economy, the social sphere, and education. In addition, unequal trade with socialist countries + support for countries of social orientation + war in Afghanistan.
In 2/2 of the 80s, US spending on weapons was 300 billion, and the entire ND was 550-600 billion rubles. It was necessary to spend the same amount, and what was left for other areas.
In this sense, the achievement of parity led to a weakening of the positions of the socialist camp.
4) Political sphere.
The development of all other spheres depended on it.
General character. In the West, politics turned out to be wiser - it corresponded to objective conditions.
1. Development of foreign policy concepts.
John F Kennedy's team in the 60s - the concept of "flexible response". For the first time, the equal vulnerability of the USSR and the USA was recognized.
What is the Doctrine of Rejection? This is the doctrine of unlimited escalation, the active use of even nuclear weapons.
Instead of unlimited escalation, then they began to talk about controlled escalation. Those. this application various methods impact on socialism. There was no talk of any love cooperation even within the framework of the doctrine of flexible response, the struggle against socialism continued.
Robert McNamara, Kennedy's secretary of defense, proposed guerrilla warfare.
Lyndon Johnson has already talked about bridging tactics. This is an ideological penetration into the East. Through cultural organizations, radio programs like the BBC and the Voice of America. Did you listen? Listened. The USSR and the socialist countries lagged behind here. There is nothing wrong with jazz. If Medvedev communicates with Pink Floyd, then it is clear what he did earlier.
But here we are talking about a wise change in US policy - a differentiated approach to socialist countries. The United States provided serious financial assistance on the eve of 1956 - Hungary, 1968 - Czechoslovakia, 70s - Poland. And they achieved the goal - the erosion of ideological foundations.
A little later, in the 1970s, a foundation was created to support democracy in Eastern Europe, and then in the USSR. He spent $ 30 billion a year, providing assistance, incl. and personnel, the opposition of Eastern European countries.
But at the same time, the confrontation continued. It was transferred to another plane, the plane of economic and technical competition, in the sphere of ideology and economics. Here the US could win.
On the other hand, active economic pressure on the USSR. Jackson-Wennig Amendment (1974): do not grant "most favored nation treatment" to those countries that violate human rights, primarily the right to travel abroad (for example, the rights of Jews). This "non-provision" hit me hard. Now it is sometimes suspended, but for Russia it has not been canceled. Although it has long been canceled for Ukraine, Georgia, but not for the Russian Federation.
Unexpectedly for polit. elites of the USSR, the USA moved to tougher policy in Rel. THE USSR. "The Doctrine of Neo-Globalism (Reagan Doctrine)": "The United States renounces self-restraint in foreign policy and will give an immediate rebuff to the spread of communism anywhere in the world." In our literature, this concept was portrayed as a return to the times of the classical 19th century: direct military pressure, an arms race. Phraseology - yes, but this new challenge from the US was thrown by the USSR in the new conditions: Reagan counted on 1) the weakness of the USSR civil economy 2) on the erosion of the ideological foundations of the Eastern European countries. The Americans felt that it was possible to switch again to leverage.
The Americans are right: the USSR at that time switched to a defensive strategy. The turn of the 70-80s: the USSR abandoned the concept of self-destruction of capitalism: 1) in fact, capitalism became different, it was a mixed society. Therefore, the Stalinist-Leninist formulations did not work 2) Capitalism began to overtake socialism 3) The leaders of a number of Western communist parties took the position of "Eurosocialism" and did not agree with the course of the USSR. "New Thinking" (1986, 27th Party Congress), and announced this to the world in 1988 at the UN Congress. And he wrote a book with the immodest title "New political thinking for our country and for the whole world":
1 thesis, for this he was praised in the West and in our country - "the priority of universal human interests and values over class ones." There is nothing wrong here, Gorbachev wrote it off from the West. From the point of view of the Defense Ministry, this was a transition to defensive tactics - this is the thesis of "de-ideologization" (this is what the West has been striving for since the 60s). Even at the XX Congress there were 3 principles: watered. dialogue, economy cooperation and uncompromising ideological struggle. And Gorbachev left only the first 2 theses for peaceful coexistence. In the West, this theory was called "the ideological disarmament of the USSR."
Hence other theses as a practical direction in external. half of the USSR - 2. normalization of relations with the United States, 3. concessions on the German issue, 4. "restructuring relations with socialist countries, subject to the implementation of Gorbachev's reforms there." 5. Recognition of human rights.
The significance of these reforms: 1) New watered. thinking really contributed to the détente of the MO. 2) It really contributed to the collapse of the social system, and then the collapse of the USSR. Indirect evidence - in 1999 in Turkey at the American University, he said: "the main goal of his whole life was the destruction of communism." It is amazing. This is clear evidence in favor of a change in the balance of power in favor of capitalism.
2. Intra-system relations - centrifugal or centripetal tendencies.
This is extremely important, also an indicator of the collapse of socialism.
West - the same tendencies, but intensified: 1) the predominance of centripetal forces over centrifugal, both in economic and political relations. Development of transnational corporations, European integration. The predominance was reflected in the history of NATO.
During this period, he faced serious difficulties, but this union not only survived, but also strengthened its position.
1) In 1962, a very heated discussion in the West about the creation of a multilateral nuclear force (Kim Rask, US Secretary of State, outlined at a meeting of the NATO Council): in practice, it could mean that the FRG was gaining access to the nuclear button; Britain and France handed over their nuclear forces to the Americans. It was a crisis. For De Gaulle, this was completely unacceptable (in 1960 they detonated a bomb). Macmillan met with Kennedy (they agree to the proposal, but the British nuclear forces can come under the control of Parliament when it sees fit). In the same 1966, De Gaulle announced his withdrawal from NATO. But this was not the end of NATO, as our literature wrote - France, having left the military organization, did not leave the political one. De Gaulle supported Kennedy during the Caribbean crisis, and on a number of other issues.
2) Not accepting the proposal on multilateral nuclear forces, all other proposals were accepted. Early 80s - about the deployment of 572 Pershing-2 cruise missiles in Western Europe. There was a "problem of 6 minutes" - a rocket launched from the USSR to the USA flies for half an hour. And these rockets - 6 minutes. Those. it was no longer easy to prepare for their destruction, despite the missile defense.
NATO is expanding. By the time of the collapse of the USSR - 19 countries; 5th NATO enlargement (2009) - 28 countries.
1966 - the formation of the World Anti-Communist League. And there was no corresponding socialist organization. And it was a serious League, 98 countries of the world participated, newspapers and radio were printed.
1967 - Creation of the OECD (organization of economic cooperation and development). All developed countries are included - 24 (19 Western European, USA, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand). They do not write about it, but meetings and sessions were held annually: a unified policy in the field of ek-ki was discussed, 10-year plans were adopted. After the oil shock of 1973, a unified energy program was adopted: to limit the consumption of oil and gas and to develop the development of new energy sources.
1973 - the Trilateral Commission was created with the money of Rockefeller and the owner of Fiat Agnelli: 3 centers of power (USA, Japan, Western Europe): first director - Zbigniew Brzezinski. It is an informal body for the training of senior leaders. They recruited and trained young people, many politicians came out of there. The scheme worked great. Chirac, for example, went through the commission. People listened to lectures, although you won't turn out to be Shiraks. Conducted seminars. There was, of course, the Institute of Marxism-Leninism, but this is a religious organization. There was no purposeful body for the training of managers in the socialist camp.
Since 1975, meetings of the "7" - the leading Western powers and Japan - have been held annually. Population - 12%, share in world GDP - 52%.
1989 - adoption at the meeting of the Political Declaration: on the need to support reforms in the Eastern European socialist countries; about assistance to Hungary and Poland; about writing off debts to countries of the 3rd world, about strengthening the dollar.
The most striking indicator of centripetal forces is Western European integration. several stages.
Stage 1 (1951-1957) - preparatory. Prologue - 1951 - the creation of the European Coal and Steel Association according to the plan of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of France Schuman. Since 1953, the ECSC has been functioning, it is the basis of the common market.
Stage 2 (1957-1968). March 25, 1957 - Treaty of Rome, 6 countries. In fact, this year marks the formation of the European Economic Community (EEC). Soviet political scientists and the press laughed. Goals of the organization: a) creation of a common market - a single trade space, a single trade area of 6 countries. To do this, we need to reduce and reduce customs duties to 0 for 12 years. It provided for a unified economic policy for 12 countries. In fact, the decision was revolutionary, such associations have never existed in the world.
Stage 3 (since the end of the 60s): unification of the UES, ECSC, Euratom. The EU appeared (without the "e") and one body. They announced that a single trade zone and a common tariff have been introduced. The main thing is that in 12 years they planned to create and created.
Then the EU began to expand. In the 1960s, Great Britain really wanted to join. De Gaulle did not let him in (England would enter, but while maintaining special relations in the British Commonwealth of Nations +, she was categorically against the creation of a single political union with the leader - France). The United States asked very much for England. This annoyed De Gaulle, so he called England in the EU a "Trojan horse." In 1973, De Gaulle resigned - England was accepted, along with it - Denmark, Ireland, Norway (but the referendum was refused).
In the 1970s there was a debate, what should be the community as a political body? There were 2 points of view. And this conflict was bright and visible in the 1970s. There were supporters of the federation, ie. the allocation of supranational bodies that would govern the entire community, regardless of national bodies. France and the small countries were especially active in this, because in a federation the small countries would play a more active role.
Two other powerful powers - the Federal Republic of Germany and Great Britain - were in favor of a confederation, for the unification of independent states. The main governing bodies would remain national.
The debate went on for about 10 years, even more. But it is important that in the 1970s working bodies were created - Council of Ministers(min ek-ki and MFA); Commission of the European Communities(expert assessments, control over contracts, over the council of ministers); European Parliament.
An even more serious role is played by the European Community Conference, which still exists today. There were representatives of each country according to the principle of competence. Well, there was no such thing in the socialist camp. But no more than 2 people from each country. These people controlled the implementation of decisions.
European Parliament. Until 1979 there were no direct party elections, just each country delegated a certain number of deputies.
1972 - At the Paris meeting of the leaders of the European Community, Georges Pompidou, President of France, proposed measures to transform the EEC into a political union.
1974 on the initiative of France, the European Council was created. It replaced regular or irregular summits by becoming a regular body that included heads of state and government. In fact, it did not depend on the decisions of national governments, it was, as it were, above the EU, but at the same time it was a key instrument in determining its policy.
1976 - discussion of the report of the Belgian Prime Minister Tindemans (1966 was instructed to develop ideas for further development). He supported the idea of transforming the European Union into the European Community. He proposed to form a 4th component (there were 3 bodies) of the union - European political cooperation - that is, to deal not only with the economy, but also develop a common foreign policy. That would be the first step towards political unification in the EU.
At the same time, the integration processes continued. 1970s - 1/2 of the 1980s - in fact, not just a single market, but a single economic space was created.
4 stage of integration (1985-1992)
1985 - The Single European Act is adopted in Luxembourg. The main results of the economic development of the European community were summed up.
1) The “4th Pillar” was legalized – European political cooperation: the European Council, which was not previously a permanent body, was legalized. 2) Strengthened the powers of all central, supranational bodies - the Council of Ministers, the Commission of the European Communities and the European Parliament. They were elected on party lists. 3) The next steps were outlined - the formation of the European Union (scheduled for 1992), coordination in the monetary sphere.
1990 in Schengen (a castle in Luxembourg) an agreement was signed. We opened borders for each other (6 countries initially). It was an important ideological and psychological moment.
1992 in Maastricht (Netherlands) the formation of the European Union was announced. Those. All plans and programs were carried out and completed on time. It was discussed in 10 years to create a new European currency (2002 - created).
These are all proofs of the predominance of centripetal forces.
By the end of the 1980s, world capitalism came as a single entity. This strengthened the position of the West in its competition/struggle with the East.
Socialism.
Centrifugal countries prevailed over centripetal countries. Despite fraternal assistance, a planned economy and a planned solution of all issues.
Common reasons:
1) Forgetting by the Soviet elite that the socialist camp included countries of the same type (“people's democracy”), but far from the same. There were various national interests and traditions.
2) In the unification of these countries, the main method was the method of planting a model from the USSR (Stalinist, neo-Stalinist, Gorbachev).
3) Policy inconsistency. Gorbachev offered what he initially denied: reforms, decentralization, capitalist elements. And especially when he announced the unprofitability of maintaining a zone of influence in Eastern Europe.
4) Influence of the West.
A. Direct: differentiation of relationships, economic assistance. Not just forceful pressure on the entire camp, but work with each individual country. Americans in the 1960s began to support the demand of Albania, a communist hermit, to create an ethnically pure Kosovo. The United States supported Enver Hoxha without even having diplomatic relations with Albania.
b. Indirect: the power of example - in the 1950s the USSR had a positive power of example, since the 60s it has become largely negative due to lagging behind the West, except for military power).
The processes were gradual.
Economy.
There were also successes in the development of centripetal forces.
For the first time, such a form of economic cooperation as the coordination of national economic plans began to prevail. Previously, everyone adopted five-year plans, but did not coordinate them, and everyone, following the example of the USSR, tried to develop industries for which there were no conditions, and no need either. And then they began to listen to each other. The center of gravity of economic cooperation was shifted from the sphere of trade to the sphere of production. Another indicator is the creation of joint ventures. Mir energy system, Druzhba oil pipeline, Soyuz gas pipeline. The main goal is in the field of economics. ties - the creation of socialist economic integration. The goal is correct, but it didn't happen. And this is evidence of the predominance of centrifugal forces over centripetal:
1) Economy integration was built on the basis of extensive development. The program on scientific and technological progress was adopted only in 1985, on the eve of the collapse of the social system (in Europe - since 1957 => it was too late).
2) Economy. cooperation was based primarily on the economy. help from the USSR. 600 enterprises were built free of charge in Europe, 800 in Asia and Cuba. In addition, energy resources are actually free. What did it lead to? Well, the USSR was relatively loved, but its forces were depleted.
By the end of the 1980s, it became obvious, although theoretically it could not be, that socialist integration lags behind capitalist. Within the framework of the CMEA, it was not possible to achieve elementary things - a single trade zone, duty-free space. And in the West, this was more difficult to achieve, because. private property and interests. So it was not possible to implement the program of scientific and technological progress. The socialist countries began to abandon the division of labor proposed by the CMEA bodies. Ceausescu was offered to supply potatoes and vegetables, he replied that he was not going to turn Romania into a garden of the socialist camp.
Political sphere.
Successes in the development of centripetal forces amounted to strengthening the positions of the Political Consultative Committee of the Warsaw Pact. A number of changes in organizational structure PKK - in 1969 a committee of defense ministers was created, in 1972 a committee of ministers of foreign affairs. Major initiatives, such as the creation of a European security system, were initiated by the PKK.
But here, too, there are centrifugal forces.
Soviet-Chinese relations are the most striking example.
They escalated in the 2/2 50s - early. 60s. And at this stage, it is conditionally possible to distinguish 3 periods: 1960, 1970, 1980s.
2 main areas of controversy:
1) The field of ideology and theory.
Several contentious issues. The main ones are the ways of building socialism, the attitude towards the cult of personality, the problem of exporting the revolution.
Ways of building socialism.
In the USSR, in the CIS - reforms. China called it all revisionism and a departure from Marxism-Leninism. And in China, the economy has also changed. well. Before that, there was a "great leap". In the 60s: "the final victory of socialism is possible in 5-10 generations or even after a longer period." We switched to the evolutionary path, but by administrative and economic methods.
attitude towards the cult of personality.
In the 60s in all socialist. countries - the cult of personality.
Since 1956 (XX Congress): exposure of the cult. This was welcomed in Eastern European countries.
In China, after the death of Mao, they came up with the formula "3 and 7". 3 Mao mistakes, 7 correct decisions. Those. they approached very wisely and carefully.
In China, the 22nd Congress was called revisionist, and for the first time a delegation was not sent to the 23rd Congress at all.
2) The sphere of interstate relationships.
Foreign policy concepts were different.
In the USSR they spoke loudly and often about peaceful coexistence. And indeed there was a series of initiatives.
In China: the creation of a unified anti-imperialist. front. Received distribution. 3 worlds theory. 1 - two superpowers with a hegemonic policy, 2 - medium and underdeveloped countries. 3 - the "third world" is the main revolutionary force that China should lead, i.e. fight for the establishment of socialism with the help of national liberation movements (NOD).
"Theory of 3 A": Asia, Africa, Latin America - it was supposed to be led by China.
The approach to a possible nuclear war was different. In China, it was called "paper tiger". Therefore, all the initiatives of the USSR are the fight against the paper tiger. In China, it was argued that in the aftermath of a nuclear war, not human beings would die, but decaying capitalism.
Those. there was a significant difference in foreign policy. concepts.
In 1959 Khrushchev proposed the creation of a "nuclear-free zone" in the Far East. I did not want to compete with China, because feared that China would be drawn into a nuclear war. The Chinese called it betrayal.
During the Caribbean Crisis, the Chinese criticized the USSR. The deployment of missiles was called adventurism, and the removal of missiles was called capitulation.
In the same 1962, Chinese troops crossed the McMahon border with India, invaded 100 km. the USSR proposed peace settlement. China called it a departure from the principles of internationalism. Formally, they were right, because. 1950 - Treaty of Friendship and Mutual Assistance.
In the 60s, China began to actively lay claim to Soviet territories. Moreover, now it was done by high officials. It was said that tsarist Russia and the USSR snatched 1.7 million square meters from China. km. The most controversial territories were along the Ussuri and Amur rivers. Motivation - the border, if it runs along the rivers, according to international law, should pass in the middle of the main fairway. Along the Ussuri-Amur, it was carried out from tsarist times to Chinese coast. Formally, China was right, but this is the seizure of 600 islands!
It came to military clashes 1969 - Fr. Damansky (31 border guards), Fr. Gordinsky.
Relations with China reached their peak during the Cultural Revolution. Newspaper headlines - "The Soviet Union - our mortal enemy."
Relations changed in the 1970s. You can call them confrontational stability.
In China, 2 major eg. ext. gender: 1) normalization of relations with the West and 2) the struggle for the "third world" (to lead the NOD). Both directions were carried out with the subtext of "struggle against hegemonism"
1) Have been successful. By the end of the 70s, somewhere around 78% of trade was with the West, and not with the socialist countries. In 1971, China took its seat in the UN Security Council. Since that time, the main clashes in the Security Council took place between the USSR and China.
In 1978, China signed an agreement on peace and friendship with Japan. Specialist. article - "joint struggle against hegemonism."
January 1, 1979 - The United States establishes relations with China. In the same year, China annulled the 1950 treaty with the USSR.
2) The struggle for the "third world" led to a clash with Vietnam over Cambodia. China supported the Khmer Rouge. 1979 - "the first inter-socialist war". In the PRC, Vietnam was called a regional hegemon in the service of a global hegemon. The war went on for only 1 month, Vietnam won, defeated 3 Chinese regiments (70 thousand people).
The changes are related to internal changes in the PRC.
December 1978- The 3rd Plenum of the 11th CPC Central Committee was held. On it, the Chinese Communists abandoned the policy of "cultural revolution" and advocated reforms. Deng Xiaoping's reforms: the development of a planned commodity economy, the use of market regulators, decentralization of the management of eq-ki, open external economy. policy. One country, two systems. Unprecedented reforms. Created 4 special economy. zone, 14 ports opened. The results are unique. 80s annual GDP growth - 10.5%, in special. GDP zones increased by 45 times! In the USSR, these reforms were called revisionism, before Gorbachev they were called that. Gorbachev began to pursue a similar course, but with a delay of 10 years and big mistakes.
China was ready to normalize relations with the USSR, but "there are 3 obstacles": 1. cessation of assistance to Vietnam. 2. Reduction or withdrawal of Soviet troops from the territories that adjoined the borders of China (primarily Mongolia). 3. Conclusion of owls. troops from Afghanistan.
The United States stood in solidarity with these "3 obstacles".
Only in 1989-1990 was it possible to normalize relations. Causes:
1. Two countries tried to conduct more or less similar courses.
2. By 1989, the USSR actually fulfilled those “3 obstacles”: they were withdrawn from Afghanistan, most of the islands on the Ussuri and Amur were transferred to China, and an agreement was signed on the normalization of relations.
The Soviet press and historians then and now write about the "tremendous success." But the concessions were unilateral on the part of the USSR + normalization occurred when the social system collapsed and on the eve of the collapse of the USSR itself.
Relations between the Eastern European socialist countries.
Albania took a special position.
Enver Hoxha began to oppose Albania to the entire socialist camp: 1) criticism of the cult of personality in the USSR, 2) normalization of relations between the USSR and Yugoslavia.
Albania had a slogan: "ethnically pure Kosovo" (actually Albanian Kosovo) + the idea of "Great Albania".
1961 - breakup of Albania's relations with the USSR, 1969 - exit from the Department of Internal Affairs. After Mao's death, Albania broke off relations with the PRC. Hoxha writes a book "Reflections on China". In it, he divides all countries into 3 camps: imperialism, social-imperialism, national-imperialism. Camp 4, a truly socialist one, was occupied by Albania.
Romania began to occupy a special position at the turn of 60-70.
In 1972, Ceausescu, unexpectedly for Moscow, declared Romania a "developing country." She was immediately included in the IMF, IBRD, and investments started. Romania was the only socialist country that did not break off relations with Israel during the next Arab-Israeli war of 1973.
Czechoslovakia 1968.
One of the most striking presence of centrifugal forces was the events in Czechoslovakia, the Prague Spring of 1968. Briefly, the background is as follows. In the mid-1960s, reforms began to be carried out in both the USSR and Eastern Europe to change the face of socialism. They were most active in Hungary, Poland and Czechoslovakia. In Czechoslovakia, they went further than Moscow demanded. Novotny resigned from the post of first secretary of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, representatives of the "young generation" headed by Alexander Dubcek came to power. He was 47, really. The slogans of the renewal of socialism have turned into a slogan of changing the state system. In August 1968, ATS troops were introduced into Czechoslovakia, mainly the USSR. The GDR and some others also actively participated.
In the USSR, this was called proletarian internationalism. In the West, the concept of the Brezhnev Doctrine arose - the doctrine of limited sovereignty. The small socialist countries of Europe had to show independence only to a limited extent. Our propagandists - what would the United States do if one of Western European countries opposed their policies?
In short, 1968 played a special role in the development of socialism.
First, the conservative forces defeated the "liberal" forces. Then liberals could modernize socialism.
The source of all troubles were called economic reforms. And it was a terrible historical miscalculation. Economic reforms were cited as the source of the ferment that began in Czechoslovakia, and this is the foreign policy reason that they were curtailed. As historical practice has shown, it was then that reforms had to be carried out in order for socialism to survive, and they were curtailed. Thirdly, the events shook the world of socialism, because the contradictions were not removed, they went deeper. The desire to modernize socialism remained, to a lesser extent in the USSR, to a greater extent in small European countries.
And finally, Poland in the early 1980s, centrifugal forces. Reforms were also carried out in Poland, actively in the late 1960s - 1/1 of the 1970s. Poles, that's why they are Poles, unlike Czechoslovakia and Hungary, they began to take a lot of loans, not only from the USSR, but also from international Western organizations. When the recession began in the mid-1970s, a debt crisis and food problems began in Poland. The center was KOS-KO - "Committee social protection and the Committee of Protection ("?")". They wanted to change the social systems. In 1980, a meeting of the participants of the strike movement and the Polish government took place in Gdansk. It was unique: the government recognized the right to strike and to free trade unions, it itself called the strike movement opposition to socialism. The strikers recognized the leading role of the PUWP and the international obligations of Poland, including within the framework of the Warsaw Pact After that, the movement "Solidarity" took shape, and somewhere in a year its number exceeded 8 million people - the majority of the economically active population of Poland. This is seven times more than members of the Polish United Workers' Party. Lech Walesa was already nominated among the leaders then. A simple man, an electrician, 7 children. His fate reflected what kind of assistance the West provided to opposition movements, how wise his policy was. In 2 years he received 52 honorary titles , Ph.D. from Harvard. Although he read only one book in his life. He received the Nobel Peace Prize, it is not clear for what. Financial assistance from the USA and their friends.
In 1981 in Gdansk "Solidarity" adopted the "Program". There were interesting points, in Moscow they did not know how to react to them, shock.
The first point is the creation of a new socio-economic order, which would include a planned economy, self-government and a market mechanism.
The second point is the provision of freedom for enterprises in their activities in the domestic and foreign markets.
The third point is the complete freedom of the private sector, small and medium businesses.
The fourth point is a multi-party system, political pluralism. But this scared Moscow. Who dealt with this period, the Soviet press raged that it was complete revisionism, a return to capitalism. Six years have passed, and the slogans of perestroika were practically the same. The fact that Solidarity sought to destroy the social system was openly declared in 1981-83 by its leaders. Lech Walesa said that "we are quite aware that we are destroying the system." His right-hand man, Jacek Kure, has declared that our main goal is to hasten the agony of the empire. Certainly not the US, not China. In 1981, the new president of Poland, General Jaruzelski, introduced martial law in 1983, a certain compromise was - with this introduction he prevented another introduction - of the police forces.
On the example of Poland, it is clear what role non-economic factors played.
In Poland, the religious factor played an important role. In 1978, Karol Wojtyla was elected as the new Pope under the name of John Paul II. He paid his first visit to Poland. The second time he came in 1983. The Western and our press wrote about what dad was talking about. On the occasion of the 600th anniversary of the Czestochowa Icon Mother of God, miraculous, etc., the pope announced on the Polish radio about the need political pluralism, about the beatification of three Poles, two of whom participated in the 1863 uprising against Russia. Place of Poland - between West and East, Papa said. He finished the sermon with the words - do not be afraid of Siberia. In Poland it had a huge impact. So indirectly, cunningly and wisely, he influenced domestic politics. In Poland, 98% of the adult population are Catholics.
By the mid-1980s, the situation inside the socialist camp was extremely unstable. By the beginning of the 1990s, centrifugal forces really prevailed over centripetal ones.
There are also subjective factors: Gorbachev's "new thinking".
In 1986 he wrote a memo to the Politburo on some issues of cooperation with the socialist countries. It was printed by the Soviet press, and then by Western newspapers. Gorbachev spoke frankly about the shortcomings, about the backwardness of integration, about the presence of centrifugal forces. The leadership of the USSR recognized it as unprofitable to maintain a zone of influence in Eastern Europe and maintain communist regimes there. It was a serious mistake. "Either you reform or we don't cooperate with you."
In the West, his attitude to the socialist countries was called the doctrine of non-intervention.
In Helsinki, Gorbachev was asked that the population hated Honecker's rule. Gorbachev said that we would not interfere in the internal affairs of the socialist countries.
It's all the same that Reagan would have abandoned Latin America as a zone of special US influence.
Gorbachev stated at the American University in Turkey that the goal of his life was the destruction of communism. This is a unique hypocrisy, in essence. M.S. He was General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU. On the occasion of his 80th birthday, the modern leadership presented him with the highest order of the Russian Federation.
Now the media are calling Yeltsin, Chernomyrdin and Gaidar great figures, and Chubais was awarded shortly after the Sayano-Shushenskaya hydroelectric power station .... no, not the Iron Cross with oak leaves, but the Order of Merit for the Fatherland. At the turn of 1989-90, after the velvet revolutions, it became obvious that the Cold War was won by the West. Then came the collapse of the USSR.
History of the Ukrainian SSR in ten volumes. Volume Nine Team of Authors
1. NEW POSITION OF FORCES ON THE INTERNATIONAL ARENA. THE STRUGGLE OF THE USSR FOR A JUST POST-WAR ORGANIZATION OF THE WORLD
1. NEW POSITION OF FORCES ON THE INTERNATIONAL ARENA. THE STRUGGLE OF THE USSR FOR A JUST POST-WAR ORGANIZATION OF THE WORLD
The most destructive of all wars experienced by mankind is the second World War, covering more than four-fifths of the world's population, had a huge impact on the fate of dozens of countries and hundreds of millions of people from different states. That is why the victorious conclusion of this war and the liberation of mankind from the threat of fascist enslavement, in which the Soviet Union played a decisive role, aroused in all peoples a feeling of deep gratitude to the Soviet people for their great liberation mission, unprecedented heroism and selflessness.
The peoples of other countries also contributed to the defeat of German fascism and Japanese militarism. Partisan actions and popular uprisings in Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Romania, the liberation struggle of the peoples of Yugoslavia and Albania, the resistance movement in France, Italy and other countries merged with the heroic struggle of the Soviet people. The countries of the anti-Hitler coalition - the USA and Britain - also contributed to the defeat of fascism and militarism. However, the decisive role in the victorious conclusion of the war was played by the heroism and courage of the Soviet people. Of the 13 million 600 thousand killed, wounded and captured by the Nazis, the Wehrmacht lost 10 million on the Soviet-German front.
With their unparalleled heroism, the Soviet people saved world civilization and many countries from catastrophe.
In this connection, one cannot fail to recall that in the days of the victorious conclusion of the Second World War, no one could deny the decisive role of the USSR in this war. Even British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, who never had sympathy for the Soviet Union, was forced to admit in February 1945 that the Red Army's victories “won the boundless admiration of its allies and sealed the fate of German militarism. Future generations will consider themselves indebted to the Red Army as unconditionally as we, who happened to be witnesses of these magnificent feats. Similar were the confessions of other heads of state of the anti-Hitler coalition.
The victory won by the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War was the second, after the Great October Revolution, an epoch-making event in world history, which had a tremendous revolutionary impact on all future world development. IN deadly fight With imperialism, socialism as a social system showed high vitality and proved its undeniable superiority over capitalism.
Meeting with Soviet people - soldiers and workers, feeling their humanism, deep internationalism and boundless devotion to the ideas of peace and socialism, the working people of other countries were imbued with sympathy for the country of socialism and for socialism as social order. It was this moral victory of the Soviet Union that was the main result of the Second World War, which made the process of increasing its international prestige irreversible. If before the Great Patriotic War the USSR had diplomatic relations with 26 states, then at the end of the war - with 52 countries. Not a single significant event in world history could be decided in the future without the participation of the Soviet Union.
The most important political consequences of the Second World War. The victory of the USSR in the Great Patriotic War, the liberation mission of the Red Army, the complete defeat of fascist Germany and militarist Japan irrevocably undermined the forces of world imperialist reaction. Under such conditions, a revolutionary situation began to take shape in the countries of Central and South-Eastern Europe. The ruling bourgeois elite of these countries betrayed the national interests of the peoples, becoming a servant of the fascist aggressors, and among the broad masses of the people there was a sharp turn to the left. The Communist and Workers' Parties were able to correctly evaluate and take into account favorable internal and external factors, led the struggle of the workers and all the working masses for social and national liberation and led them along the path of people's democratic and socialist revolutions. As a result of these revolutions, Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia fell away from the capitalist system in Europe in the mid-1940s. The defeat of German fascism enabled the communists of Germany to lead the working people of the eastern part of the country, liberated by the Red Army, along a democratic path of development and in 1949 form the German Democratic Republic. The communist parties, as the most devoted and consistent defenders of the national and social interests of the masses, were able to rally the working people and all the progressive forces of their countries into united popular fronts and, relying on them, carried out deep revolutionary-democratic transformations already in the first post-war years. In the course of these transformations, the old state apparatus was broken and replaced by a new, people's democratic one, financial and industrial monopolies belonging to the Nazis and their accomplices were liquidated, large enterprises, banks, transport were nationalized, and agrarian reforms were carried out.
Depending on the specific alignment of class and political forces, historical traditions and other factors, all these revolutionary transformations in each country had their own specific features and characteristics, but confirmed their main and main content. general patterns transition from capitalism to socialism.
The revolutionary-democratic reorganization took place in a fierce struggle against the overthrown forces of the old system, supported by international imperialism. True to its internationalist duty, the Soviet Union rendered every possible fraternal assistance and support to the young people's democratic states, strictly adhering to the principles of non-interference in their internal affairs. By the end of the 1940s, a number of European states - Albania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and the German Democratic Republic - took the path of building socialism.
In the course of the defeat of Japanese militarism and the expulsion of the Japanese invaders, people's democratic revolutions unfolded in Vietnam and Korea. On the Asian continent, along with the Mongolian People's Republic, the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea were formed, however, soon subjected to imperialist aggression. The defeat of the Red Army together with the Mongolian People's Revolutionary Army of the Kwantung Army and the liberation of Manchuria from the Japanese invaders also created favorable conditions for the deployment of the revolutionary struggle in China, which culminated in the formation in 1949 of the Chinese People's Republic.
Thus, by the end of the 40s, along with the USSR and the Mongolian People's Republic, 11 more new peoples were formed in Europe and Asia. democratic states who took the path of building socialism. A group of states with a population of more than 700 million people fell away from the capitalist system. Socialism has become a world system that has become the most influential force in world development. Capitalism proved powerless to prevent this process.
The formation of the world socialist system was the main political consequence of the Second World War.
Another important consequence of the victory of the Soviet Union was the enormous positive changes that took place in the world communist and workers' movement. During the war years, the communist parties of the capitalist countries led the struggle of the peoples against fascism, for freedom and national independence, for democracy and social progress, thereby immeasurably raising their prestige among the masses and strengthening ties with them. Despite the enormous sacrifices made in the fight against fascism, the number of communists on the entire planet in 1945 increased by 5 times compared to 1939 and amounted to 20 million people. Only in the countries of Western Europe in 1946, compared with the pre-war period, the number of communists increased from 1.7 million to 5 million people.
The communist parties of Germany, Italy, France, Belgium, Denmark, Norway, Iran, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Japan, Cuba, Colombia and other countries have achieved an exit from the underground and launched legal activities.
Legislative elections 1945–1946 showed the increased authority of the communists in many countries. More than 5 million votes were received by the French Communists in the elections to the Constituent Assembly, a fifth of the voters voted for the Communists in Italy.
In 13 capitalist countries (France, Italy, Belgium, Denmark, Austria, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Luxembourg, Chile, Cuba, Iran, Indonesia) in the first post-war years, the Communists joined the coalition governments.
In some of them, they managed to carry out a number of democratic reforms. The working people of a number of capitalist countries, through an active political struggle under the leadership of the Communists, achieved important social reforms and the nationalization of certain branches of industry. There was a shift to the left of the masses as a whole, increased political activity, the role and organization of the working class on a national and international scale.
In September-October 1945, in Paris, representatives of 67 million workers from 56 countries organized in trade unions created the World Federation of Trade Unions (WFTU), a progressive organization of the world trade union movement, which acted as an important organizing force in the struggle for the democratic rights of workers, their vital vital interests. A number of other international democratic organizations are being created: the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY) (October - November 1945, London), the International Democratic Women's Federation (IDFJ) (December 1945, Paris), which united the efforts of boys, girls, women in the struggle for democratic rights and freedoms.
An important act in rallying the communist and workers' parties of European countries on a common anti-imperialist and democratic platform was the creation in September 1947 in Warsaw at the Meeting of representatives of the communist parties of nine countries (USSR, Poland, Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Italy and France) The Information Bureau of the Communist Parties with its printed organ - the newspaper "For a Lasting Peace, for People's Democracy". The creation of these and other international organizations and bodies contributed to the intensification of the struggle for the cause of peace and socialism, the exchange of experience in the work of the Communist Parties, the collective development of the strategy and tactics of the world communist movement by them, the establishment of the unity of the working class and all democratic forces on an international and national scale.
The third important political consequence of the Second World War was the activation of the national liberation movement, which led to the disintegration of the colonial system of imperialism. Expanding in the early post-war years, primarily in the countries of the South - East Asia, Near and Middle East, the national liberation movement soon covered other regions. Already in the 40s, in addition to China, Vietnam and North Korea, the peoples of Syria, Lebanon, India, Burma, Ceylon, Indonesia and other countries won national independence. The prophetic words of V. I. Lenin came true about the inevitable awakening of the colonial peoples of the East, after which there will come "a period of participation of all the peoples of the East in deciding the fate of the whole world, so as not to be only an object of enrichment."
The national liberation movement merged with the revolutionary struggle of the working class and became an increasingly important part of the world revolutionary process. Young independent states were actively involved in world politics, playing a progressive role in international life. Of particular importance in this regard was the policy of non-alignment proclaimed by the government of India, headed by Jawaharlal Nehru, which was based on an anti-imperialist orientation. The second prophetic prediction of V. I. Lenin came true that “in the coming decisive battles of the world revolution, the movement of the majority of the population the globe, originally aimed at national liberation, will turn against capitalism and imperialism, and perhaps play a much greater revolutionary role than we expect." The further development of the world revolutionary process fully confirmed these Leninist thoughts.
Cardinal changes have also taken place in the camp of imperialism itself. Before the Second World War, six imperialist powers - the USA, Britain, France, Germany, Japan, Italy - occupied a dominant position in the world and represented the main might of world imperialism. During the war, the last three were defeated and reduced to the rank of minor states. England and France were also weakened militarily, economically and politically and became dependent on the United States. Thus, the public debt of England during the war years increased by more than 3 times, and the volume of goods exported by her decreased by more than 3 times. The role of French capital in the world market was reduced to a minimum. The share of France in the exports of the capitalist countries in 1945 was less than 1%.
Of the six major imperialist powers, only the United States emerged from the war stronger. Not a single bomb fell on the territory of this state, and the net profits of the American monopolies in the military industry for 5 years amounted to 117 billion dollars.
Swollen from permanent militarization during the war years, the American military monopolies did not want to reduce their production even in peacetime, pushing the country onto the path of an arms race and aggressive military adventures. Possessing a temporary monopoly on atomic weapons, the United States launched the so-called atomic diplomacy, calculated to blackmail and intimidate other countries and peoples, embarked on the path of creating military bases along the borders of the USSR and the countries of people's democracy, knocking together aggressive blocs and unrestrained striving for world domination.
Even at the end of the war, the ruling imperialist circles of the United States took a course of deliberate and conscious disruption of general agreements with the USSR and unleashing US-Soviet conflicts. According to one of the US military leaders, General A. Arnold, expressed in the spring of 1945, the United States began to consider Russia its main enemy and therefore believed that they needed bases around the world located so that any object of the USSR could be attacked from them. The Truman government that replaced the Roosevelt government began to put these ideas into practice and took an openly anti-Soviet course. On August 6 and 9, 1945, without any military necessity, atomic bombing the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, whose main goal, according to Secretary of State Byrnes, was to "make Russia more accommodating in Europe." The speech proclaimed by the British Prime Minister Churchill on March 5, 1946 in Fulton in the presence of Truman, which abounded in open attacks against the Soviet Union, served, in essence, as the beginning of the Anglo-American military political bloc directed against the USSR in other forces of peace, democracy and socialism, the beginning of the Cold War policy against them.
Under these conditions, the Soviet Union, relying on the friendship and support of the countries of people's democracy and other young independent states, pursued a policy of a just post-war world order, the elimination of new hotbeds of war, peaceful coexistence and mutually beneficial international cooperation with all countries.
The struggle of the USSR for a just post-war world order. Back in the years of the Second World War, the Soviet Union took concrete measures to prevent wars by creating an effective international organization for this purpose. With the most active participation of the USSR, already in October 1943, at the Moscow Conference of the Foreign Ministers of the USSR, the USA and practical steps to create such an organization. The declaration jointly adopted at this conference not only emphasized the importance of cooperation between these powers to ensure the defeat of the fascist aggressors, but also recognized “the need to establish in the shortest possible time a universal International Organization for the maintenance of international peace and security, whose members can be all such states - large and small." Thus, the principle of the sovereign equality of states, regardless of their social system, was proclaimed in the matter of upholding and maintaining peace.
The Tehran Conference of the leaders of the three powers, held in late November - early December 1943, confirmed the intentions of these states "to work together both in time of war and in the subsequent peacetime" and thus approved the idea of creating an international organization to maintain post-war world and security of peoples. At a conference in Dumbarton - Oaks (near Washington) in August - October 1944 and Yalta Conference the leaders of the three allied powers in February 1945, thanks to the persistent position of the representatives of the USSR, the main fundamental issues on the creation of an international organization called the United Nations were positively resolved. Of great importance, in particular, was the achievement of an agreement in principle by the leaders of the three allied powers - the USSR, the USA and England - at a conference in Crimea on the inclusion of the Ukrainian and Byelorussian SSRs among the founding countries of the UN in recognition of the outstanding contribution of the Ukrainian and Belarusian peoples to the victory over the common enemy - German fascism.
The conference in San Francisco, which opened on April 25, 1945, adopted the UN Charter, signed by 51 founding states of this organization, including the USSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the BSSR, as well as Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Poland, China and others. Based on the support of these and other democratic states, using the UN and other diplomatic ways, the Soviet Union resolutely sought to establish a truly just post-war world order. Strictly following the previously agreed decisions at the Yalta, Potsdam and other conferences, the USSR attached top priority to a fair alignment of political forces in Europe, where the first and second world wars had been unleashed for three decades. In this, as in other questions, the Soviet Union had to overcome the fierce resistance of the imperialist forces and their desire to prevent the democratic development of a number of European states at all costs.
D. Z. Manuilsky, on behalf of the Ukrainian SSR, signs the UN Charter, June 1945
The sharp struggle of two opposing political courses: the USSR and the people's democratic states - on the one hand, the Western states - on the other, unfolded around the conclusion of peace treaties with the former allies of Nazi Germany - Italy, Romania, Hungary, Finland and Bulgaria. In accordance with the decision of the Potsdam Conference of the Three Powers, the preparation of peace treaties was entrusted to a body specially created for this purpose - the Council of Foreign Ministers (CMFA) of the states that signed the terms of surrender with these countries.
At the sessions of the Council of Foreign Ministers held from September 1945 to the end of 1946 in London, Moscow, Paris and New York, as well as at the Paris Peace Conference (July - October 1946), the Soviet Union resolutely and persistently defended the interests of the people - the democratic states of Europe, defended them from attempts by Western states to interfere in their internal affairs, steadily pursued a policy of ensuring lasting peace in Europe, striving to maintain cooperation on the basis of the principles of peaceful coexistence with the states participating in the anti-Hitler coalition. The Ukrainian SSR, as one of the founders of the UN, also made a worthy contribution to this struggle.
Members of the delegation of the Ukrainian SSR in the meeting room of the Paris Peace Conference in 1946: first row (from left to right) N. N. Petrovsky, V. A. Tarasenko, A. K. Kasimenko
Numerous meetings of the Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs, held to develop draft peace treaties with Germany's former allies, clearly revealed the desire of representatives of the United States and Britain to use the preparation of peace treaties to interfere in the internal affairs of Bulgaria, Romania and other countries that have embarked on a democratic path of development, to restore them former capitalist regimes. At the very first meetings, the US delegation made slanderous attacks on the democratic governments of Bulgaria and Romania and refused to discuss peace treaties with these countries until governments "that can be recognized by the United States" are established in them. Having met with a resolute rebuff from the USSR and other democratic forces, the representatives of the United States and Britain subsequently tried to impose demands, if not replacement, then the reorganization of governments in these countries that they liked, insisted on the creation of some kind of “inspection commissions” or a “European international court”, allegedly for monitoring the fulfillment of the terms of peace treaties, put forward other untenable demands and claims.
The main struggle between the two opposing courses flared up at the Paris Peace Conference that opened on July 29, 1946, convened to consider and adopt peace treaties with Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Italy and Finland, that is, to decide on the merits of issues related to the fate of peace in Europe. Along with the delegations of the USSR and the BSSR, the delegation of the Ukrainian SSR, headed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, a prominent state and politician D. Z. Manuilsky. These delegations persistently sought that the conclusion of peace treaties with Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Italy and Finland would contribute to the democratic development of these countries in accordance with the will of their peoples, eradicate forever in them the possibility of the revival of Nazi ideology and orders, and resolve all disputed territorial issues in such a way. so that a lasting and lasting peace in Europe can be consolidated. They strongly condemned the desire of the Western states to impose on the Eastern European states such territorial solutions that would revive the atmosphere of conflict and tension in the area.
In a number of speeches at the conference, D. Z. Manuilsky and other members of the Ukrainian delegation, relying on historical facts, revealed the complete inconsistency of the claims of the then reactionary Greek government to a significant part of the Bulgarian and Albanian territories. “By what right,” said D.Z. Manuilsky, “the Greek delegation makes claims to the original Bulgarian land, where there are only 150-200 people of Greek nationality per 300 thousand people.” If we talk about changing the Bulgarian-Greek border, then the only correct thing, the head of the Ukrainian SSR delegation emphasized, would be the return of Bulgaria to Western Thrace with access to Aegean Sea, illegally seized from her in 1919 under the Neuilly Peace Treaty. Thanks to the firm position of the Soviet delegations and representatives of a number of other democratic states, the territorial claims of Greece to Bulgaria and Albania were rejected. In a telegram addressed to D. Z. Manuilsky on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Soviet Ukraine, Deputy Chairman of the Council of Ministers and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the PRB comrade. V. Kolarov conveyed heartfelt greetings to the Ukrainian people and expressed his ardent wish that the fraternal friendship of the peoples of both countries, which was so clearly manifested at the Paris Peace Conference, “where, - as he emphasized, - the representatives of Ukraine so resolutely and brilliantly defended the just cause of the Bulgarian people."
An acute struggle at the Paris Peace Conference flared up and over the definition of the Italian - Yugoslav border. The Soviet Union defended the demand of Yugoslavia to correct the injustice committed after the First World War and return to Yugoslavia the entire Julian Krajina, with the city of Trieste, liberated from the fascist invaders by the Yugoslav People's Liberation Army. Western states insisted on the division of this territory between Italy and Yugoslavia. The Ukrainian delegation firmly defended the interests of Yugoslavia. At that time, the government of the Ukrainian SSR received numerous telegrams and letters from the population of various settlements and regions of the Julian Krayna (Monfalkome, Panzanor, Arisa, etc.) with requests to support their desire and primordial aspirations to unite with their Motherland - Yugoslavia. “Such a heroic people as the Ukrainians, who suffered so much in the struggle against fascism,” they wrote, “cannot fail to understand the struggle that our people are waging today, who want our right to belong to Yugoslavia to be recognized.”
Fulfilling the will of their people, the delegates of the Ukrainian SSR resolutely defended the legitimate demands of the Slavic population of the Julian Extreme. Speaking at a conference on this issue, D.Z. Manuilsky angrily condemned the position of the Western states seeking the dismemberment of the Julian Krajina, and supported the compromise proposal of the Yugoslav delegation to establish the free port of Trieste with a small territory.
Just as resolutely, the Ukrainian SSR delegation, together with other Soviet and people's democratic delegations, defended the just provisions of the peace treaties on reparations and other economic issues. Thanks to this joint activities democratic forces led by the Soviet Union managed to conclude generally fair peace treaties with Germany's former allies. For the first time in history, a situation arose when a great victorious country persistently sought fair decisions in relation to the defeated countries, guided by humane feelings and concern for the peaceful future of Europe.
All participants in the Paris Peace Conference, including the USSR, the Ukrainian SSR and the BSSR, on February 10, 1947, concluded peace treaties in Paris with Italy, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria and Finland, which became valid on September 15, 1947, after their ratification on August 29 1947 by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, which extended the effect of this act to the Ukrainian SSR and the BSSR. In the signed peace treaties with these countries, certain unjust territorial decisions of the Versailles system were corrected, in particular, the new borders of the USSR were fixed, taking into account national interests the respective states. These treaties did not infringe on the political and economic independence and national dignity of the defeated states, did not hinder their peaceful development. The important political provisions contained in them on the complete and final elimination of fascism in these countries, on ensuring human rights and fundamental democratic freedoms for all their citizens, etc., opened up new opportunities for further progressive development and strengthening of the international positions of these countries.
Together with the delegation of the USSR and other Danube countries, the delegation of the Ukrainian SSR carried out significant work at the Danube Conference in 1948, where the question of the rights of navigation on the river was considered. A fair solution to the Danube problem was of great political and economic importance for all the Danubian countries.
The imperialist forces, led by the USA, tried at all costs to preserve the unjust regime of navigation on the Danube established by the treaties of the Versailles system, according to which the USA, England and France, not being Danube countries, would exercise control over the river and use it to interfere in internal affairs. countries adjacent to it. Even at the Paris Peace Conference, when discussing the Hungarian question, D. Z. Manuilsky, decisively exposing these plans of the USA and England, declared that for the small Danube countries such a regime would be tantamount to suicide, because it would mean that “the owners on the Danube would not be the Danubian countries, but those who live on the Hudson and the Thames.
The head of the Ukrainian delegation at the Danube Conference A. M. Baranovsky, together with the delegates of the USSR and other Danubian countries, firmly stated that their states would not allow any diktat and outside interference in resolving issues of navigation on the river. Acting as a united front, the Danube countries rejected the outdated convention of 1921, which allowed the imperialist countries - the USA, Britain and France - to actually control navigation on the Danube, and adopted a new one, which renewed the sovereign rights of the countries adjacent to it to the regime of navigation on the river. This convention, together with other Danubian countries, was signed by the delegations of the USSR and the Ukrainian SSR.
One of the central issues in the post-war years was also the question of a just democratic solution to the German problem. Fulfilling the will of the peace-loving peoples, fixed in the decisions of the Potsdam Conference, the Soviet Union persistently sought to eradicate fascism in Germany and create conditions for the development of the country as a single democratic peace-loving state. The entire public of Ukraine ardently supported this policy of the Soviet Union, demanding the complete destruction of fascism and all the conditions for its revival. “The fascist plague will threaten humanity until then,” the fiery internationalist writer Yaroslav Galan warned in the days of the Nuremberg trials, “until the centers of fascism are eliminated, every last one.”
At the same time, the Soviet people were never guided by a sense of revenge. They sought to conclude a just peace treaty with Germany, turning it into a single peace-loving state. However, the Western powers renounced their allied obligations and headed for the split of Germany and the revival of militarism in it, creating in September 1949 a separate state of the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG). Under such conditions, the democratic forces of East Germany on October 7, 1949, proclaimed the creation of the German Democratic Republic, which took the path of building socialism. The family of socialist states grew and grew stronger.
The formation of new, socialist international relations and the participation of the Ukrainian SSR in them. The defeat of fascism and militarism in the Second World War and the accomplishment of the great liberation mission by the Red Army, which created favorable conditions for the victory of people's democratic and socialist revolutions in a number of European and Asian countries, also opened up wide opportunities for establishing and developing completely new international relations between countries and peoples, based on the Leninist principles of socialist internationalism.
From the first days of the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution, the young Soviet state, through the mouth of its leader V. I. Lenin, proclaimed the main principles of its foreign policy to be the desire for peace and friendship with all peoples and the achievement of a voluntary and honest union of peoples based on their complete mutual trust. The Soviet government pursued this course consistently and steadily at all stages of the development of our state. But the conditions of the capitalist encirclement and the policy of the imperialist ruling circles greatly hampered and limited the possibility of its implementation. The victory of people's democratic revolutions in a number of European and Asian countries created new, favorable conditions for putting into practice the Leninist principles of relations between countries and peoples.
The establishment and development of qualitatively new international relations between countries that have embarked on the path of building socialism is an essential component and one of the regularities in the formation of the world socialist community as a new social phenomenon in world history.
Even during the Great Patriotic War and in the first post-war years, the CPSU and the Soviet government took a number of steps to lay a solid foundation for new relations with the young people's democratic states. Given that from the first days of their existence, their most important vital task was to overcome foreign political isolation, as well as to strengthen sovereignty and international positions, the Soviet Union was the first of the great powers to establish diplomatic relations with the new democratic governments of Poland without any preconditions (January 4, 1945), Yugoslavia (April 11, 1945), Romania (August 6, 1945), Bulgaria (August 14, 1945), Hungary (September 25, 1945), Albania (November 10, 1945). This act was an important political support for the young people's democracies. It also opened up new opportunities for expanding trade and economic ties and was accompanied by the provision of the economic, technical and other assistance they needed. In 1945, the USSR also concluded the first trade agreements with Bulgaria, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and other countries, which marked the beginning of new foreign economic relations with them.
especially importance had the signing of treaties of friendship, cooperation and mutual assistance between the USSR and other people's democratic countries, as well as between them. The first treaties of friendship, cooperation and mutual assistance were signed by the Soviet Union during the war years: with Czechoslovakia on December 12, 1943, Yugoslavia on April 11, 1945 and Poland on April 21, 1945.
A number of trade agreements were signed with other states, and later - treaties of friendship, cooperation and mutual assistance: with Romania - February 4, 1948, Hungary - February 18, 1948, Bulgaria - March 18, 1948, as well as an agreement with Albania April 10, 1949 In 1947–1949 and treaties of friendship, cooperation and mutual assistance were signed between the European countries of people's democracy themselves. By the end of the 1940s, they had concluded 35 different bilateral allied treaties among themselves. Thus, a whole system of contractual relations was created between the USSR and these countries, which legally fixed the new relations between the countries of socialism and played important role in defending the gains of socialism and in its successful development. The most important feature of these treaties was their conclusion on a fundamentally different basis than the treaties that existed before that between the capitalist countries. Characteristic features of the new agreements were complete equality of the parties, mutual respect for independence and sovereignty, fraternal mutual assistance and cooperation. They provided for close military-political cooperation and mutual assistance in defending the gains of socialism, joint struggle against a repetition of aggression by Germany and Japan or by states that had allied with them. The main goal of the treaties is fraternal mutual assistance in building socialism through the development of all-round cooperation in the economic, political, cultural and other fields.
The Ukrainian SSR, which borders directly on a number of European people's democratic states, has taken an active part in establishing and developing friendly relations with them, and in particular in resolving all border and other issues on a good neighborly basis.
Thus, in the spirit of complete mutual understanding and sincere friendship, the questions of the mutual exchange of population between Soviet Ukraine and Poland were resolved. After the liberation of Poland from the fascist occupation, many Ukrainians, Belarusians and Lithuanians living on its territory, and Poles living in the USSR, began to express a desire to resettle to their homeland. In accordance with the agreement concluded on September 9, 1944 in Lublin between the governments of the Ukrainian SSR and Poland, which granted the right of voluntary mutual resettlement of citizens, from October 1944 to August 1946, 482,880 people left the territory of Poland for Ukraine, and from the territory of Ukraine to Poland - 810415 people.
Thus, about 1 million 300 thousand people of Ukrainian and Polish nationalities were able to use the right granted to them to return to their homeland and join in the creative work of their people to build a new life. Such a fair solution of the problem became possible only after the establishment of people's power in Poland and on the basis of new relations between the two neighboring countries.
A similar decision was made by the Ukrainian SSR and Czechoslovakia. After the liberation of Transcarpathian Ukraine in October 1944, a nationwide movement for reunification with Soviet Ukraine began in the villages and cities of Transcarpathia. In accordance with the will of the population of Transcarpathia, on June 29, 1945, the Soviet-Czechoslovak Treaty was signed in Moscow on the withdrawal of Transcarpathian Ukraine from Czechoslovakia and its reunification with its homeland - the Ukrainian SSR. This act completed the reunification of all Ukrainian lands in a single Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Meeting the request of the government of Czechoslovakia, on July 10, 1946, the Soviet government signed an agreement that granted the right to opt for Czechoslovak citizenship and resettlement in Czechoslovakia to Soviet citizens of Czech and Slovak nationalities living in the territory of the former Volyn province, and the right to opt for Soviet citizenship and resettlement in the USSR Czechoslovak citizens of Ukrainian, Russian and Belarusian nationalities.
In accordance with this agreement, 33,077 people moved from the USSR to Czechoslovakia, and 8,556 people moved from Czechoslovakia to the USSR. Both sides have done everything necessary to ensure that this humane action takes place in an organized manner, with strict observance of the principles of voluntariness and in the spirit of sincere friendship and good neighborliness. In a similar way, on a voluntary basis and in accordance with the principles of new fraternal relations, other issues related to the mutual return of various material and cultural values of Soviet Ukraine and its neighboring people's democratic states - Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania were resolved.
The working people of the Ukrainian SSR followed with great attention all the processes of revolutionary transformations in the fraternal neighboring countries, generously shared with them their experience in building a new life, provided them with all possible assistance and support. Mutual exchanges of parliamentary and government delegations, as well as delegations of industrialists, cultural and public figures, etc., were of particular importance.
Already in 1946-1947. Deputies of the National Assembly of the Czechoslovak Republic and the National Assembly of Bulgaria visited Ukraine to get acquainted with the experience of the work of the highest state bodies of the Ukrainian SSR. The stay of the leaders of Poland and Czechoslovakia in these years in Ukraine, as well as a visit to Ukraine in 1948 by a government delegation of Hungary, also contributed to the strengthening of fraternal friendship and cooperation.
In order to study the experience of collective farm construction, Polish, Czechoslovak, Bulgarian, Romanian peasants and agricultural specialists repeatedly came to the Ukrainian SSR. Only during February - July 1949, three delegations of Polish peasants, totaling about 600 people, visited the republic. They visited a large number of collective farms, state farms, MTS, industrial enterprises and scientific institutions Kyiv, Cherkasy, Kharkov, Poltava, Sumy, Dnepropetrovsk, Vinnitsa, Zhytomyr, Chernihiv and other regions, where they got acquainted in detail with the organization of production, the life and life of agricultural workers. In June - July of the same year, a delegation of peasants of the Romanian People's Republic got acquainted with the experience of agricultural production in Kiev, Kharkov, Poltava and Kirovograd regions, and in November - in five regions of Ukraine, a delegation of peasants of Czechoslovakia studied the experience of field workers. In turn, Ukrainian masters of agricultural production F. I. Dubkovetsky, E. S. Hobta, M. Kh. Savchenko and others traveled to fraternal countries, where they shared their experience and innovative achievements.
Despite the great difficulties and hardships associated with huge losses and destruction during the war, the Soviet Union, true to its international policy, provided very significant assistance to the young people's democratic states in the restoration and development of the economy and in the implementation of all processes to create a new society. The Ukrainian SSR also made a worthy contribution to this fraternal assistance.
So, in January 1945, immediately after the liberation of the capital of Poland, the government of the Ukrainian SSR handed over a significant amount of food to the starving residents of Warsaw, sent specialists and equipment to revive the destroyed city.
An authoritative commission of Soviet experts arrived in the capital of Poland. The USSR sent to the fraternal country 500 prefabricated houses, 500 cars, a large number of various building materials and equipment, equipment for factories and plants. A new Warsaw rose from the ruins and ashes. And many sons of Ukraine took part in its revival. “The history of mankind does not know such a fact of cordial responsiveness and disinterested friendship,” the mayor of Warsaw said on this occasion, “which the Soviet people show towards the fraternal Polish people. Pasha brothers - Ukrainians, Belarusians, Lithuanians, who themselves suffered so much from the Nazi barbarians, were the first to lend us a helping hand in order to heal the wounds inflicted on us by the Nazi executioners as soon as possible.
The working people of Ukraine rendered similar fraternal assistance to the peoples of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Rumania and other countries. Having concluded the first trade agreements with Bulgaria and Hungary in 1945, the Soviet Union immediately began supplying them with the necessary goods, materials, fuel, raw materials, machinery and equipment. In just seven months of this year, 30 thousand tons of ferrous and non-ferrous metals, about 10 thousand tons of oil products, about 10 thousand tons of cotton, more than 20 thousand agricultural machines and many other equipment and materials were imported into Bulgaria. As the newspaper Rabotnichesko Delo wrote at the time, this was "of decisive importance for the salvation of our national economy from the catastrophe that threatened it." A special role was played for Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Romania, Hungary by the supply of Soviet goods, raw materials and materials in the dry years of 1946-1947, when the population of these countries experienced serious difficulties associated with crop failure. Since 1948, the USSR began to import machinery and equipment there, which contributed to the successful construction of the material and technical base of socialism in these countries.
Of great importance for the young people's democratic countries was the systematic assistance of the USSR in the training of specialists, which began in 1946, as well as other forms of scientific and scientific-technical cooperation, exchange of experience in cultural construction, in which Ukraine also took an active part. .
Thus, in the second half of the 1940s, thanks to the wise internationalist policy of the CPSU and the Soviet state, new, socialist international relations took shape, in which not only state bodies, but also the broad masses of working people take an active part. The formation of new, socialist international relations is an inseparable and most important component of the process of formation and development of the world socialist system. The all-round cooperation of the USSR with the people's democratic states grew and developed as socialist transformations were carried out in them, the restoration and further development of the national economy, the emergence of new branches of production and new processes in social life.
The successes achieved in the development of the national economy of the people's democratic states in the 1940s and the accumulated experience of bilateral ties and cooperation dictated to them the necessity and expediency of switching to multilateral cooperation. In January 1949, an economic meeting of representatives of Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania, the USSR and Czechoslovakia was held in Moscow, at which the question of organizing broader economic cooperation between them on a multilateral basis was discussed. The meeting decided to create a common economic body - the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance - on the principles of equal representation of the countries participating in it. The main goals of the CMEA were proclaimed the exchange of economic experience, the provision of technical assistance to each other, mutual assistance in raw materials, materials, machines, equipment, etc.
At the same time, the CMEA declared open organization, which can also be joined by other countries that share its principles and wish to cooperate with the states that are members of it.
On own experience The countries that have embarked on the path of building socialism have become convinced that solidarity, unity of action, cooperation and mutual assistance multiply their forces, increase the effectiveness of the foreign policy actions of each of them and contribute to the growth of their economic and political might, their joint influence on the world revolutionary process.
In the struggle for international cooperation and the social progress of peoples. As the international prestige of the USSR grew and people's power was consolidated in a number of countries in Europe and Asia in the post-war years, on the one hand, and the position of imperialism in the world as a whole weakened, on the other, the imperialist circles of the United States and other Western states increasingly strengthened the course of the so-called " Cold War" against the USSR and the young people's democratic states. This course was most clearly manifested in the notorious "Truman Doctrine" and the "Marshall Plan" proclaimed by official US circles in 1947.
The "Truman Doctrine", set out in the message of the US President to Congress on March 12, 1947, provided for the provision of "aid" of 400 million dollars to Greece and Turkey, allegedly to protect them from "aggression", declared the fight against communism as a line of US state policy. A frank goal was put forward - to counteract revolutionary changes in the world in every possible way, to support reactionary regimes, military dictatorships as bastions of anti-communism, to put together military blocs around the USSR and young people's democratic states.
The second program of "dollar diplomacy", outlined on June 5, 1947 by the US Secretary of State
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From the book "For Stalin!" Great Victory Strategist author Sukhodeev Vladimir VasilievichThe geopolitical situation in Europe and in the world after the First World War has undergone significant changes. The world balance system of the post-war period was disturbed by two factors: the Treaty of Versailles, which placed Germany in the most humiliating conditions, and the 1917 revolution in Russia. Both factors will become the source of new social upheavals and the Second World War: the first because such humiliation of the whole nation could not but push it towards revanchist sentiments; the second - because of the policy of the Bolsheviks, who led Russia to international isolation (due to refusal to pay the debts of the tsarist government and a separate exit from the war) and proclaimed a course towards a world proletarian revolution.
The Treaty of Versailles put Germany in an extremely difficult position, in fact, in international isolation. This was facilitated by both the policy of the victorious powers, which placed it in an unequal position in the European community, and the policy of Soviet Russia, which was in a similar position and therefore became, as it were, a “natural ally” of Germany, which took advantage of the situation and, blackmailing the victorious countries with the possibility of folding the German -Soviet Union, forced them to make certain concessions. Another reason for France, England, and the United States to want Germany's economic revival was that the impoverished country that Germany had become simply could not pay the huge reparations imposed on it.
France found itself in the most difficult situation: having lost its natural continental ally - Russia, it received in the neighborhood a potentially more dangerous enemy than before the war - Germany. In addition, the French were worried about the Soviet-German rapprochement. During the 20-30s. France will try to rectify the situation by creating a system of alliances with the "small" countries of Europe (Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Romania). All this - together with the position of England, which had more moderate views on the position of Germany (caused by the reluctance on the part of Great Britain of French predominance on the continent) - made it very difficult to achieve the main goal of French foreign policy - to preserve the situation in Europe in the form in which it was formed after world war.
The only country that benefited from the war was the United States of America, which went from a European debtor to a major creditor. Two directions have emerged in American foreign policy: the traditional, isolationist, and the new, internationalist. Supporters of the first insisted on the rejection of "automatic" participation in European affairs and extreme caution in accepting international obligations. Supporters of the second spoke of the "historic mission" of the United States, calling it the world's first free country and a stronghold of democracy, whose mission is to bring the light of the liberal idea to all countries and peoples. The struggle of these directions ended with the victory of the internationalists. As a result, the interwar world turned out to be arranged in such a way that practically not a single serious problem of European politics could be solved without American participation. The United States continued to invest in Europe in peacetime, which, combined with the policy of protectionism in relation to European goods, which closed their access to the US domestic market, also adversely affected the European situation.
Naturally, the United States could not but offer its own version of the solution of the German question. Such a plan was the Dawes reparations plan, which was supposed to ensure that Germany continued to pay reparations (and simultaneously open the German market to America as much as possible). His most important task was to stabilize the German mark by providing Germany with a loan of 200 million dollars (of which more than half was owed to American banks). This plan established the size of payments to Germany and the control of the Allies over the German state budget, finances and railways. In 1929, due to the slow recovery of the German economy, this plan was revised. The new plan (the Young Plan) provided for some reduction in the size of annual payments and the elimination of foreign control bodies. The adoption of the Young Plan had one distant but very important consequence: it was during its approval that an agreement was reached on the withdrawal of allied troops from the Rhineland. This happened in the summer of 1930 and allowed Hitler to bring German troops there in March 1936.
The First World War brought Japan into the ranks of active players in the world political arena, which became a powerful dominant in Asia and the Pacific. Decades behind the Western countries in terms of technology, it needed colonies where it could export its products without fear of competition from Western goods. A clash of interests with the United States and Great Britain led to the rupture of the Anglo-Japanese alliance in 1921; As for the United States, Japan has never ceased to be a potential enemy for them. All this led to a rapprochement between Japan and Germany, which resulted in their alliance in World War II.
The entire 1920s were marked by the problem of the allies' debts to each other and the reparation payments they were to receive from Germany. The United States was the main creditor, while France, Italy, Belgium and the United Kingdom were the main debtors. And when the US demanded the return of debts, the allies offered to fully or partially write off their debt, arguing that the provision of loans was the American contribution to the victory over Germany. And although the United States understood the certain validity of such statements, such a solution to the problem did not suit them in any way. Negotiations on this issue lasted four years (from 1922 to 1926) and ended with an agreement providing for the return of $ 2.6 billion, that is, a little more than a quarter of the amount originally requested.
As for the problem of reparations, there were serious contradictions between the allies, and, above all, in the issue of the dependence of inter-allied debts on the payment of German reparations: France considered them to be rigidly interconnected and assumed to pay its debts from what it would receive from Germany, and the United States and Britain regarded German reparations as a separate issue. Moreover, Great Britain considered it more important that the ruin of an already heavily war-torn Germany with the help of reparations hinders the recovery of European industry as a whole and reduces international trade flows. However, France categorically insisted on receiving reparations. Such a tough position of France can be explained by the fact that, in comparison with Great Britain and the USA, it suffered much more from Germany - if only because military operations were directly conducted on its territory.
Numerous attempts to reach a compromise on this issue did not lead to success, and on December 26, 1922, the reparation commission, by three votes to one, stated the fact that Germany had not fulfilled its reparation obligations and, as a result, declared default on Germany, which (under the Treaty of Versailles) gave France the right to occupy the Rhine zone and Ruhr. Meanwhile in Germany were growing social inequality and unemployment. Anti-Versailles moods were superimposed on the usual social tension in such conditions: the Germans accused the great powers of intending to completely ruin the country with reparations. The détente of the situation was also not helped by the desire of the communists to subordinate these anti-government and anti-foreign sentiments to themselves and direct them into a revolutionary channel. All this was accompanied by an increase in anti-Semitism, partly provoked by the influx of wealthy Jewish emigrants from Poland into Germany (where, under the Piłsudski regime, anti-Semitism became almost public policy). Since this emigration coincided with the worsening economic situation in Germany, the newcomers were blamed for this.
The occupation of the Rhineland escalated the situation to the limit, which resulted in armed uprisings and demonstrations by both left and right forces, which, however, were poorly prepared and suppressed. As a result, a state of emergency was introduced in the country. Great Britain and the United States blamed France for the aggravation of the situation in Germany and put it before the threat of isolation by signing agreements with Germany at the end of 1923 on granting loans to it. From now on, in its confrontation with France, Germany could firmly count on the help of London and Washington.
The upheavals caused by the consequences of the First World War subsided by 1924. At this time, important changes began to occur in the world related to the change in the role and place of the social democratic movement in the socio-political life of states. This was manifested by the "entry into power" of the social democratic parties, or included in a number of coalition governments, or even formed them on their own, and the strengthening of the influence of the ideas of reformism in the ranks of social democracy. Both of these points were both a consequence and a reason for the fact that the theory and practice of the social democratic parties increasingly acquired a reformist orientation with an emphasis on the gradual peaceful transformation of capitalist society into a socialist one. The leaders of social democracy considered their main task to be participation in the work of the parliamentary system and the restructuring of the capitalist economy through "equal business cooperation" between workers and entrepreneurs, as well as through the adoption of social legislation.
Representatives of the communist parties absolutized the tendencies of the acute crisis of capitalism, on the basis of which they demanded an immediate armed and uncompromising struggle for power. Most of these parties, united in the Communist International (Comintern), were under the strong influence of the CPSU (b), which was the reason for such a position.
The change in the role of social democracy in the political life of European states was evidence of the growing crisis of traditional forms of statehood in the post-war development of Europe. However, if in countries with established traditions of bourgeois democracy this process proceeded quite peacefully, then in countries where democratic traditions had not yet taken root, the liberal-reformist path of changing the political structure of society turned out to be extremely difficult, or even impossible. Here, the place of social democracy was often taken by reactionary mass movements, which eventually led to the elimination of bourgeois democracy and the establishment of totalitarian dictatorships of various kinds (fascism) or other, more traditional forms of authoritarian dictatorial regimes.
In general, it can be said that in the 1920s two trends emerged in the political development of states: the liberal-reformist (based on the further development of parliamentary democracy, the implementation of reforms and the involvement of higher authorities the authorities of the leaders of the socialist or social democratic parties); totalitarian, associated with the establishment of fascist and other dictatorial regimes.
The Second World War led to fundamental changes in the world and international relations. Fascist Germany and Italy, militarist Japan were defeated, war criminals were punished, and an international organization, the United Nations, was created. All this demonstrated the relative unity of the victorious powers. The great powers reduced their armed forces: the USA from 12 to 1.6 million people, the USSR - from 11.4 to 2.5 million people.
The war led to drastic changes on the world map. First of all, the United States has grown enormously in economic, military and political terms. This country owned the vast majority of world industrial production and gold and foreign exchange reserves. The United States had a first-class army, turned into the leader of the Western world. Germany and Japan were defeated and left the ranks of the leading countries, others European countries were weakened by the war.
The military and political influence of the USSR increased significantly. However, his international position It was paradoxical: the country that won at the cost of heavy losses was ruined, but, despite this, it had the legal right to claim a prominent role in the life of the world community. The economic ruin was offset by military and political advantages. The USSR derived political benefits, in particular, thanks to the vast territory of the countries of South-Eastern Europe under its control. He had the largest army in the world, but at the same time, in the field of military technology, he was far ahead of the United States and Great Britain.
On the whole, the position of the USSR has changed: it has emerged from international isolation and has become a recognized great power. The number of countries with which the USSR had diplomatic relations increased from 26 to 52 compared to the pre-war period. It became one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, along with the USA, Britain, France and China. The Great Powers recognized the right of the USSR to part East Prussia, South Sakhalin, its dominant position in China and North Korea. The Yalta and Potsdam agreements recognized the interests of the USSR in Eastern Europe.
However, with the disappearance of the fascist threat, more and more contradictions began to appear between the former allies. The clash of their geopolitical interests soon led to the collapse of the coalition and the creation of hostile blocs. Allied relations persisted until about 1947. However, already in 1945. serious contradictions were revealed, primarily in the struggle for the division of influence in Europe. Against the backdrop of heightened disagreements, Churchill ordered Field Marshal Montgomery to collect german weapons to arm the prisoners in case the Russians continue their offensive to the West.
The highest military and intelligence agencies of the United States dramatically changed their assessment of the military potential of the USSR and began to develop plans for a future war. In the directive of the Joint Military Planning Committee of December 14, 1945. No. 432/D outlined a plan for the bombardment of the main industrial centers of the USSR. In particular, 196 atomic bombs were supposed to be dropped on 20 Soviet cities. At the same time, the former allies referred to the refusal of the USSR to fulfill the Yalta and Potsdam agreements, to the threat from the Red Army, located in the center of Europe. Churchill 5 March 1946 in the city of Fulton (USA) in the presence of President Truman for the first time openly accused the USSR of having fenced off Eastern Europe " iron curtain”, called for organizing pressure on Russia in order to obtain from it both foreign policy concessions and changes in domestic policy. It was a call for an open and tough confrontation with the Soviet Union. A year later, Truman officially announced US commitments in Europe to curb Soviet expansion and led the West's fight against the Soviet Union.
Indeed, there is evidence from V.M. Molotov that Stalin deliberately refused to fulfill some of the allied obligations of the USSR. Stalin decided to use the victory in the war to realize the age-old Russian dream - the capture of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles. The USSR demanded that Turkey transfer the provinces of Kare and Ardagan to it, and allow it to build a naval base near the straits. Danger loomed over Greece, where Civil War and communist partisans tried to seize power. With American support, the Greek government crushed the communist uprising, and Turkey rejected the Soviet demands.
The main attention of the Soviet leadership was focused on putting together a socialist bloc in Europe. The creation of a socialist camp was considered the main achievement after the October Revolution. Using the insufficient firmness of the positions of the West, Stalin sought to establish his influence primarily in Eastern Europe. In these countries, communist parties were supported, and the leaders of the opposition were eliminated (often physically). Therefore, the Eastern European countries were dependent on the USSR, under its control they pursued their foreign and domestic policies (with the exception of Yugoslavia). In them in 1945 - 1947. existed coalition governments, then they were forcibly replaced by the communist government. Only the leader of Yugoslavia, I.B. Tito, behaved differently. At one time he led the struggle of the Yugoslav people against the fascist occupation, created powerful armed forces, without refusing to fight and from Soviet assistance. Being popular, Tito himself sought to reign supreme in the Balkans and did not want to submit to Stalin's dictatorship. Moreover, he began to build socialism of a non-Soviet model: his socialism was based not on total state ownership (as was the case in the USSR), but on the self-management of enterprises. Stalin achieved the unanimous condemnation of Tito by the communist countries and parties as a revisionist, "agent of imperialism" in 1949. severed diplomatic and trade relations with Yugoslavia, forcing his allies to do the same. But he could not remove Tito, although he boasted to his comrades-in-arms: if you move your little finger, Tito will not be. It was one of the few episodes in Stalin's career when he was defeated by failing to take revenge on the successful Yugoslav leader.
The Soviet-Yugoslav conflict had the consequence that the myth of the monolithic unity of communist ranks and ideas collapsed. In an attempt to prevent the emergence of new heresies and continuing to promote the Soviet model of socialism, Stalin organized high-profile political trials of prominent party and government officials in the satellite countries. Such leaders as V. Gomulka in Poland, L. Raik and J. Kadar in Hungary, T. Kostov in Bulgaria, J. Klementis and R. Slansky in Czechoslovakia, A. Tauker in Romania. The purpose of the purges was to eliminate those who allowed the slightest hesitation, replacing them with those who unconditionally supported the policy of the USSR. The establishment of socialist orders cost these countries dearly: more than 120 thousand people were repressed in East Germany (1945-1950), in Poland (1944-1948) - about 300 thousand, Czechoslovakia (1948-1954) - about 150 thousand
The formation of the Soviet bloc went in parallel with the intensification of confrontation with the West. The turning point was 1947, when the Soviet leadership refused to participate in the Marshall Plan and forced other Eastern European countries to do the same. USA in June 1947. put forward a plan to help European states in the amount of 13 billion dollars, the vast majority free of charge. The Marshall Plan formally extended to the USSR and was at first favorably received by the Soviet leaders, who expected to receive assistance on the terms of lend-lease. However, it soon became clear that the Americans were insisting on the creation of supranational bodies that would identify the resources of countries and determine their needs. This did not suit the USSR, and it refused to participate in the Marshall Plan and did not allow its satellites to accept it. Western European states accepted him with gratitude. American assistance gave a powerful impetus to the almost crisis-free post-war development of the economy of Western Europe.
To tighten control over his allies, Stalin in (September 1947 established the Information Bureau of the Communist and Workers' Parties - Cominform (he dissolved the Comintern in 1943, hoping that this would contribute to the opening of a second front). The Cominform included Eastern European Communist Parties and from Western - Italian and French.In 1949, the socialist countries formed the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA) as an alternative to the Marshall Plan.However, the closeness, lack of a real market, free flow of capital did not allow the CMEA countries to achieve economic proximity and integration, as was the case in the West.
The formed socialist bloc of countries led by the USSR was opposed by the union of the countries of Western Europe and North America led by the United States, which, with the creation in 1949. NATO has finally taken shape. The tough confrontation between the West and the East contributed to the "correction" of the domestic policy of the leading powers. In 1947 under the influence of the US ruling circles, the communists were removed from the governments of Italy and France. In the United States itself, a test of the loyalty of civil servants began, lists of "subversive organizations" were drawn up, whose members were expelled from work. Communists and people of leftist views were especially persecuted. In June 1947 The US Congress approved the Taft-Hartley Act, which restricted strike and trade union movements.
The confrontation took on more and more dangerous outlines, and in the late 40s, Germany turned out to be the main arena of struggle. The United States began to send economic assistance to the zones of occupation of Western countries, seeking to create a democratic and friendly state in them. Stalin tried to thwart this plan, fearing a resurgence of German power. He exploited the vulnerability of West Berlin, which was inside the Soviet zone of occupation. On June 24, 1948, following the introduction of the West German currency in the western sectors of the city, Soviet troops cut the roads leading to West Berlin. For a whole year, the United States and Great Britain supplied the city by air bridge, until Stalin lifted the blockade. By and large, the blockade only damaged Soviet interests: it contributed to the re-election for a second term of Truman, who showed firmness towards the USSR, the victory of the democratic parties in the elections in West Germany and West Berlin and the proclamation in these territories in September 1949. the Federal Republic of Germany, the formation of the NATO military bloc. In response to the formation of the Federal Republic of Germany, the USSR responded by creating in October 1949. German Democratic Republic in its zone of occupation. So Germany was divided into two states.
The division of Europe ended in the West. It became obvious that Stalin's attempts to further expand his sphere of influence here were repulsed. Now the center of confrontation has moved to Asia. In 1949 the Chinese Revolution won, even earlier the communist regime had established itself in North Korea. At the end of the 1940s, world socialism covered more than 1/4 of the entire earth's land mass and 1/3 of the world's population. Based on this circumstance, and also taking into account the presence of the communist movement in the countries of the West, the leaders of the Soviet bloc and China, apparently, were inclined to the opinion that it was possible to change the balance of power that had developed in the world in their favor. In February 1950, the leaders of the USSR and China signed an agreement on mutual assistance for a period of 30 years.
Further, Stalin organized an international adventure on a large scale on the Korean Peninsula. He played a decisive role in initiating the Korean War (1950-1953) in which more than a million people died on both sides. The war began with an attack by North Korea on South Korea. Despite this, communist propaganda claimed otherwise. However, the UN Security Council unmistakably stated "an armed attack on the Republic of Korea by North Korean troops." According to his decision, US troops and 15 other states intervened in the conflict under the UN flag.
Stalin did not want the Americans to convict him of preparing for war, but wanted only the Chinese to openly participate in the Korean War for the time being. He confirmed his readiness to arm 60 Chinese infantry divisions. Stalin gave the order to form a special corps to cover China and the North Koreans. In total, during the war in Korea, 15 Soviet aviation and several anti-aircraft artillery divisions received combat practice. There was a strict order: not a single adviser or pilot should be captured. On Soviet aircraft, the identification marks were Chinese, the pilots wore Chinese or Korean uniforms. Soviet pilots and anti-aircraft gunners shot down 1309 American aircraft. About 300 died Soviet pilots and advisers.
In the last years of life Special attention Stalin was attracted by the area of the Bering Strait and Alaska. It was here that the active deployment of the armed forces of the USSR began. Since the beginning of the 50s, airfields and military bases have been created. In the spring of 1952 Stalin decided to urgently form 100 divisions of front-line jet bombers. Preparations for a new world war were unfolding in the immediate vicinity of the US borders. In the event of war, America was threatened with massive air strikes and invasion by ground forces. Humanity as a whole was on the verge of a third world war with monstrous consequences. Fortunately, Stalin's plans were not destined to come true, and his successors had a different vision in solving the problem of war and peace.
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