Home / Courses / European History / Unit 9

European History Unit 9: Cold War and contemporary Europe (c. 1914–present)

Postwar Europe split into East and West, rebuilt with US aid, integrated economically and was reshaped by communism's fall.

Covers: Cold War origins, postwar recovery, the Iron Curtain, de-Stalinization and revolts, decolonization, the welfare state, European integration, the fall of communism, contemporary challenges

Study guide

After WWII, Europe was divided by the Iron Curtain, a term Churchill used for the line between the Soviet-controlled East and the democratic West. The US launched the Marshall Plan to rebuild Western Europe and contain communism, while the Soviet Union set up communist satellite states and the Comecon economic bloc. Germany was split into West and East, and the Berlin Airlift (1948–1949) defeated a Soviet blockade of West Berlin. NATO (1949) and the Warsaw Pact (1955) were rival military alliances, and the Berlin Wall went up in 1961.

In the Soviet bloc, Khrushchev's de-Stalinization criticized Stalin's crimes, but Soviet forces crushed the Hungarian Revolution (1956) and the Prague Spring (1968). The Brezhnev Doctrine said the USSR would intervene to protect communism. Meanwhile, Western Europe built welfare states with national health care and social insurance, and decolonization ended most overseas empires, as Britain left India and France fought in Algeria and Vietnam.

European integration began with the European Coal and Steel Community (1951), became the European Economic Community (Treaty of Rome, 1957), and grew into the European Union with the Maastricht Treaty (1993), later adopting the euro. In the 1980s, Poland's Solidarity movement led by Lech Wałęsa challenged communism, and Gorbachev's glasnost and perestroika loosened Soviet control. Communist governments fell in 1989, the Berlin Wall came down, Germany reunified in 1990 and the USSR dissolved in 1991. Yugoslavia broke apart in violent wars, including ethnic cleansing in Bosnia. Contemporary Europe faces challenges from immigration, nationalism and populism, Brexit (Britain's 2020 exit from the EU), and Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

Most transitions in 1989 were peaceful and negotiated, such as Poland's Round Table talks and Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution, led by Václav Havel. In Romania, by contrast, dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu was violently overthrown and executed. Hungary's opening of its border with Austria let East Germans flee west, and Czechoslovakia later split peacefully into the Czech Republic and Slovakia (1993). Dictatorships in Portugal and Greece fell in 1974, and Spain became a democracy after Franco's death in 1975. All three later joined the European Community.

The oil shocks of 1973 and 1979 brought stagflation that strained Western welfare states. In Britain, Margaret Thatcher responded by privatizing state industries, reducing union power and promoting free markets. Second-wave feminism, inspired by Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex (1949), pushed for equal pay, reproductive rights and access to the birth control pill. More women entered universities and the workforce.

Key ideas

• The Iron Curtain divided communist Eastern Europe from the democratic West.
• The Marshall Plan rebuilt Western Europe; the USSR controlled satellite states.
• The Soviets crushed revolts in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.
• European integration grew from the Coal and Steel Community into the EU.
• Communism collapsed in 1989–1991, reshaping Europe.

Formulas and rules

Common mistakes

• Thinking de-Stalinization ended Soviet control of Eastern Europe; revolts were still crushed.
• Confusing the EEC (1957) with the EU (1993).

Words to know

Iron Curtain

Churchill's term for the division between communist East and democratic West.

Marshall Plan

US aid program to rebuild Western Europe.

Satellite states

Eastern European countries controlled by the USSR.

Berlin Airlift

1948–1949 Western supply flights to blockaded West Berlin.

Berlin Wall

Barrier dividing East and West Berlin from 1961 to 1989.

De-Stalinization

Khrushchev's policy of criticizing Stalin's rule.

Hungarian Revolution

1956 uprising crushed by Soviet troops.

Prague Spring

1968 Czechoslovak reform movement crushed by the Warsaw Pact.

Brezhnev Doctrine

Soviet policy of intervening to protect communist governments.

Welfare state

A government providing health care, pensions and social insurance.

European Coal and Steel Community

1951 organization that began European integration.

Maastricht Treaty

1993 treaty that created the European Union.

Solidarity

Polish labor movement that challenged communism.

Ethnic cleansing

Forcibly removing an ethnic group from an area.

Brexit

Britain's 2020 withdrawal from the European Union.

Sample practice questions

5 more questions like these, from level 1 to 5, are in the practice set.