The Collapse of Soviet Power in Europe

The collapse of Soviet power in Europe was the result mainly of social and economic change, rather than international pressure. Eastern Europe was one of the most important strongholds of Soviet Union against western world. The communist states in Eastern Europe were considered as a satellite of USSR. However, as a result of the Cold war, in the late 1980s, Soviet power collapsed in Eastern Europe. It is commonly known that, the collapse of Soviet power in Eastern Europe also brought the end of the USSR.

The main purpose of this essay is to examine the reasons of the collapse of Soviet power in Eastern Europe.We will analyze this issue in terms of both, internal and external aspects. We have divided this essay into three parts. In the first part the background information in line with the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe relations will be given. In the second part, we will investigate the reasons of the collapse of the Soviet power in terms of internal affairs.

The most important internal factors, like the illegitimacy of the Communist system, economic challenges, which USSR faced and the reforms of M. Gorbachev will be examined in this part.In the third part the external factors which caused the collapse of Soviet power in Eastern Europe, will be investigated. In the conclusion, the brief information will be given according to the results, which identified in the main part of this essay. From the mid-1940s to the late 1980s Moscow had two goals in line with the Europe.

One of them was to maintain territorial and political advantage, attained in the final stage of World War II. The second one was to secure admission to and influence in, the other part of Europe.However their second purpose about the Europe was challenged by western counties. (Brooks & Wohlforth n. d.

) After the de facto split of the Europe, USSR allocated financial support to the Eastern Europe in order to establish new socialist states in aforementioned region. To do so, Soviet government started to sign bilateral and multilateral contracts by the mid-1950s with the Eastern European states. (Blacker; n. d) The first reason for the collapse of the Soviet power in Europe was the illegitimacy of the domination of the Communist party, even in the beginning.

Lenin came to power as a result of the bloody civil war between those who supported Lenin and who opposed the Soviet regime. The supporters of Lenin, namely Bolsheviks committed any kind of terror in order to win the war. Terror became the symbol of the communist regimes till the collapse of it in 1991. The successor of Lenin, Joseph Stalin followed this rule also.

First of all he blackening the name of his main rival, Trotsky, then he exiled him from Russia. Finally Trotsky was assassinated by one of Stalin’s agent. Eastern Europe was also affected by this attitude of Soviet leaders.The Foreign Minister of Czechoslovakia, Jan Masaryk was killed and the President Eduard Benes was forced to resign by the agents of Stalin, when the latter was trying to establish a communist coup in Czechoslovakia. (Cox, 2009) ‘In course of further development of international revolution there will emerge two centers of world significance: a socialist center, drawing to itself the countries which tend toward socialism, and a capitalist center, drawing to itself the countries that incline toward capitalism. Battle between these two centers for command of world economy will decide fate of capitalism and of communism in entire world.

’(Kennan; 1946 Cited in Stalin)However the great proportion of the people in the Eastern Europe did not support the socialist system. Soviet Union was the center of the Communism, which was based on the ideas of Karl Marx. According to the rules of the communism the private ownership was prohibited, all properties were the belongings of the state, all opposition parties were banned, power was concentrated into the hands of the Communist party. Furthermore Communist government was putting pressure on the press and civil liberties.The people of the USSR, as well as its satellites in Eastern Europe never supported communism really.

After the death of Stalin, Eastern European nations tried to get out of the influence of USSR. The uprisings in Poland and Hungary, in 1956 were the protests against the communist regime. Even if Khrushchev did not use a military force in Hungary, latter could establish its own coup. (Collapse of Soviet Union; 1989-1991). The economic situation in USSR, in the 1980s was one of the most important reasons in line with the collapse of the Soviet power in Eastern Europe.At the beginning of 1980’s Soviet Union became exhausted as a result of arms race and international competition with the West.

The United States was able to profit from its imperialist exploitation of other countries, while the socialist USSR could only lose economically during the Cold War. (Collapse of Soviet Union). The major problems of Soviet economy were the wasteful use of the resources, the lack of innovation, inconvenient labor division, and ineffective use of the resources and low productivity. (Finsterwalder; 1990) GDP of the Soviet Union was affected as a result of these gaps, respectively.From 1981-1985 the country’s GDP got to bottom compared with 1960’s and 1970’s, averaged 1,9% a year.

Decreasing of oil prices from $66 a barrel in 1980 to $20 a barrel in 1986 was a great deficit to the Soviet finance. However the economy was mostly affected by the military expenditures. According to the information of Brooks and Wolforth (n. d) from 1976 till 1988, the military expenses of Soviet Union gradually increased and reached its peak point between 1986-88. In those years the annual military outlays of the USSR were 18% of total expenses of latter.Blacker (n.

d) insists that, if the Soviet government allocated most of its expenses on the industrial, transport and agricultural sectors, like western countries, the collapse of the Soviet power in Eastern Europe would be delayed. Gorbachev factor is also very important in line with the collapse of USSR as well as its power in Eastern Europe. When he came to power, Soviet Union was in the economic crises as mentioned above. Michael Gorbachev started to carry out wide range reforms in order to halt the hard situation, which Soviet Union faced.Ethnic unrest and historical atrocities were the other important problems, which Gorbachev challenged. His major reforms were glasnost, perestroika and democratization.

Michael Gorbachev’s perestroika reforms started in order to revive the Soviet economy. (Lane; 1996) Gorbachev was planning to modernize the Soviet economy system by the implementation of perestroika. His first attempt was to discipline the work force with the slogans calling for ‘intensification and acceleration’. He was also trying to halt the production and sale of alcohol and cut the state spending in military expenditures.By the implementation of democratization Gorbachev was planning to reform not only the Communist Party but the USSR itself.

(Collapse of Soviet Union 1989-1991) His aim was to decrease the power of politburo and give the main authority to the supporters of perestroika. The purpose of the Glasnost focused on the freedom of speech, freedom of assembly as well as the open criticizing. After the implementation of glasnost, the population of Soviet Union and its East European satellites started to criticize the activities of the former Soviet leaders.However these reforms of Gorbachev accelerated the collapse of the Soviet power in Eastern Europe. Especially Glasnost ruined the Soviet system. Thus aforementioned reform revived the nationalist elements.

The nations from Atlantics to Pacific started to demand their independence. Several ethnic clashes started to occur in Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. (Blacker; n. d) The tensions started to emerge in the Eastern Europe part as well as in the Caucasus.

Gorbachev allowed increasing independence to the Eastern bloc states.According to him struggle with the unwilling European population in order to make them living under the Soviet authority would be very dangerous to the future of USSR. So Gorbachev did not interfere to the activities of Eastern European countries. (Gregory; 2008).

As a result the January and February of 1989 witnessed the movements in Eastern Europe. First of all Czechoslovakia and Poland legalized Solidarity, then Hungarian communists agreed to multi-party system. These innovations in aforementioned countries encouraged the people of East Germany. They also demanded perestroika and glasnost.To do so thousands of people flowed to Leipzig in order to carry out demonstrations. Eventually after the resignation of communist leadership of East Germany, the Berlin Wall was destroyed.

(Service; 2002) The influence of the West on the Eastern block was one of other factors, which caused to the collapse of the Soviet power in Eastern Europe. After the World War II, Eastern Europe was a place, which United States and Soviet Union have own plans. As mentioned above that, Russia wanted to establish new communist States there. However United States planned to bring democracy aforementioned region.

This conflict caused Cold War consequently. During the leadership of Stalin, USSR did not have any contact with the western countries, especially United States. When Khrushchev came to power, the relations between United States and USSR started to improve. He visited to United States and attended the meeting of UN General Assembly in 1959 and 1960. Nevertheless these normal relations worsened in line with the building of the Berlin Wall in 1961. The Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962 aggravated the situation between two countries.

However the information about the improving of western capitalism and stagnation of Soviet communism were expanding whole Eastern bloc countries. After Brezhnev took office from Khrushchev, relations between USSR and US started to become much better. Agreement on direct air service between aforementioned countries, signing of first international treaty due to the peaceful exploration of outer space, beginning of the detente accelerated this relationship. Furthermore, according to the agreement between West Germany and Poland, then West Germany and USSR, the parties took the responsibility about the avoiding of use of force.Additionally, the leaders of US and USSR, respectively Nixon and Brezhnev signed the SALT I treaty in order to decrease the production of nuclear weapons.

The involvement of West and East Germany in United Nations after 1973 accelerated the influence of West in Eastern bloc states. (Blacker; n. d) (The collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe) In conclusion, the collapse of the Soviet power in the Eastern Europe, much more depended on the social and economic change in the USSR and its Eastern satellites.Indeed western states imposed pressure on the Soviet Union. However the reforms of Michael Gorbachev destroyed everything, which came from the history.

Especially, as a result of his Glasnost reform, the states of Eastern Europe tried to be independent. The economic problems also worsened the situation in the USSR and its partners in Eastern Europe. Perestroika could not help Gorbachev and his administration. As a result Soviet power in the Eastern Europe collapsed. And this event accelerated the separation of the USSR.