Consolidation of the Rival Blocs 1948-1955

Question 1

What was the USA keen on in term of blocs?

Answer 1

• Western European integration
• A strong anti-Communist bloc
• Would accept German partition

Question 2

What was the USSR’s opinion on blocs?

Answer 2

Wanted to avoid them so that a strong capitalist group wouldn’t form and so that Germany would move towards Communism

Question 3

What happened after the London Conference of Foreign Ministers in 1947?

Answer 3

After the failure of agreement, Britain, France, the USA and Benelux countries agreed to a West German state

Question 4

What was France persuaded to agree to a West German state with?

Answer 4

The Occupation Statute, which gave France, Britain and the USA powers over West Germany, and that there would be troops positioned to prevent a rise of power

Question 5

When was the Deutschmark introduced?

Answer 5

20th June 1948

Question 6

How was the Deutschmark introduced?

Answer 6

It was brought into the Western powers’ zones without consultation with the USSR

Question 7

What did the USSR create in response to the Deutschmark?

Answer 7

They created the Ostmark

Question 8

What did the USSR do in order to pressure the West to stop the creation of the new West German state?

Answer 8

They blockaded West Berlin

Question 9

What was the response to the Berlin blockade?

Answer 9

The West started an airlift of supplies through three allowed corridors

Question 10

When was the Berlin Blockade called off by Stalin?

Answer 10

May 1949

Question 11

Why did Stalin have to call off the Berlin Blockade?

Answer 11

The Airlift had been so successful and a counter-blockade of supplies to the East was damaging the Soviet zone economy

Question 12

When and where was the Federal Republic of Germany set up?

Answer 12

In the West in summer 1949

Question 13

Who became the new chancellor of the FRG?

Answer 13

Adenauer

Question 14

When did Stalin agree to set up an East German state?

Answer 14

12th October

Question 15

Why did Stalin agree to set up an East German state?

Answer 15

There were poor showings in West German elections by the Communists

Question 16

What was the East German state called?

Answer 16

The German Democratic Republic

Question 17

Who was the leader of the (sham democracy) GDR?

Answer 17

Ulbricht

Question 18

Was there a physical barrier between East and West Berlin?

Answer 18

No

Question 19

When was the takeover of Communists in Czechoslovakia?

Answer 19

1948

Question 20

What did the takeover of Communists in Czechoslovakia and Berlin Blockade in 1948 persuade the US to do?

Answer 20

Set up a military alliance

Question 21

What did the US set up in terms of a military alliance?

Answer 21

NATO

Question 22

When was NATO set up?

Answer 22

4th April 1949

Question 23

What concerned the French about NATO?

Answer 23

It had vague wording

Question 24

What did the USSR do in September 1949?

Answer 24

Exploded its first atomic bomb and built up other arms

Question 25

When did the Korean War start?

Answer 25

1950s

Question 26

What did the Korean War do?

Answer 26

Sped up western European moves for integration as they feared a Communist world takeover

Question 27

What was West Germany seen as?

Answer 27

A vital country in the defence of Europe

Question 28

A plan was created to create what to pacify French fears about West Germany?

Answer 28

A supranational European Defence Community; the plan was unpopular

Question 29

What did Charles Spofford do in terms of the EDC?

Answer 29

He created a compromise whereby small units from each NATO country would form a larger force.

Question 30

What was NATO split over?

Answer 30

Fears of US use of the A-Bomb in the Korean War and French concerns over German rearmament in the early 1950s

Question 31

What happened to Marshall spending?

Answer 31

The USA created a Hydrogen Bomb and diverted Marshall spending to rearmament in Western Europe

Question 32

What did the diversion of Marshall spending create?

Answer 32

Political and economic problems in Europe

Question 33

What did the OEEC organise?

Answer 33

For the creation of ‘guns and butter’ to improve economies in Europe

Question 34

How did Stalin react to western rearmament?

Answer 34

By the World Peace Movement for disarmament, and a note to Adanaeur in 1952 offering German unification to exploit divisions

Question 35

Why was the European Coal and Steel Community created?

Answer 35

To interlock the industrial economies of Western Europe, make them stronger and counter the Soviet threat.

Question 36

Why did Britain refuse to join the ECSC?

Answer 36

From fear they would lose control of industry

Question 37

Why did Stalin create COMECON?

Answer 37

To integrate Eastern economies and satellite state armies

Question 38

Why were Tito and Yugoslavia expelled from Cominform?

Answer 38

Due to disagreements with Stalin; as a result it moved towards the West

Question 39

What did Tito's break from Stalin cause?

Answer 39

A propaganda offensive by the West in eastern Europe to try and cause further rifts

Question 40

When did Stalin die?

Answer 40

1953

Question 41

Who was Stalin replaced by?

Answer 41

A collective leadership; they offered détente

Question 42

When was President Eisenhower elected?

Answer 42

1953, with strong anti-Communist rhetoric- | Eisenhower would only improve relations with elections in the East

Question 43

When was there was an uprising in the GDR?

Answer 43

1953

Question 44

Why was there an uprising in the GDR?

Answer 44

Against Ulbricht’s unreasonable demands on workers

Question 45

What did the uprising in the GDR end in?

Answer 45

Soviet tanks putting it down, even though the USSR had tried to get Ulbricht to relax his policies; the situation was not interfered with by the West but it was taken as an opportunity to use propaganda

Question 46

When did the FRG join NATO?

Answer 46

May 1955, with Britain promising to keep troops in Germany and Adanauer promising to restrict troop levels to pacify France

Question 47

Why was the Warsaw Pact signed?

Answer 47

To act as a counterbalance to NATO now that the FRG had joined; it was signed between the USSR and Eastern European states (inc. the GDR)

Question 48

What was the result of a thaw in relations in the 1950s?

Answer 48

A summit between the Potsdam powers in Geneva in 1955, where an agreement of Austrian independence was made, but other issues such as Germany and arms control were deadlocked

Question 49

When had Adenauer visited the USSR?

Answer 49

September 1955

Question 50

Why did Adenauer visit the USSR?

Answer 50

To secure POW releases for the last Germans in Soviet camps, but relations between the FRG and USSR broke because he refused to accept the existence of the GDR under the Hallstein Doctrine