Why Did Stalin Take Control of Eastern Europe?
Model Essay
Why did Stalin take control of Eastern Europe?
Plan
Introduction Explain Stalin’s need for internal security in its historical context
Block 1 Discuss Stalin’s tactic for gaining Eastern Europe and the wartime agreements that carved Europe up into ‘spheres of influence’, e.g. Tehran, 1943, Percentages Agreement, 1944.
Discuss how tensions over Poland intensified Stalin’s need to create friendly states in Eastern Europe, i.e. Soviet massacre of Polish officer in the Katyn, Forest, 1940 and Red Army refusal to help Warsaw Uprising, 1944.
Block 2 Discuss Western hypocrisy over British and French appeasement of fascist dictatorships in the 1930s and American support of Greece and Turkey in 1946, as justification for Stalin’s control of Eastern Europe.
Block 3 Discuss the USSR’s claims to northern Iran and the Black Sea straits and the effect it had on Western assumptions/reactions about Soviet intentions, e.g. Truman’s ending of Lend-Lease.
Block 4 Explain how the takeover of Eastern Europe was partly a reaction to American and Allied perceptions of the USSR, e.g. Riga Axiom, policy of Containment etc.
Conclusion Evaluate Stalin’s aims and motivations after the war and weigh up the Soviet threat to the West, e.g. Stalin’s support for communist parties in Western Europe and his attitude towards the Percentages Agreement (Greece), Soviet reaction towards formation of NATO, 1949.
At the end of the war Stalin became convinced that the West was determined to destroy the Soviet Union. Russian diplomats reported at the time that the US monopoly of the atom bomb had thrown ‘the Kremlin leader off balance’ and this resulted in an obsession with security against a surprise attack from the West. This was confirmed by Khrushchev who noted that Stalin had placed anti-aircraft guns around Moscow on a 24 hour alert. Ruthless screening of all returning Soviet POWS seemed to confirm Stalin’s paranoia about Western influences or
Why did Stalin take control of Eastern Europe?
Plan
Introduction Explain Stalin’s need for internal security in its historical context
Block 1 Discuss Stalin’s tactic for gaining Eastern Europe and the wartime agreements that carved Europe up into ‘spheres of influence’, e.g. Tehran, 1943, Percentages Agreement, 1944.
Discuss how tensions over Poland intensified Stalin’s need to create friendly states in Eastern Europe, i.e. Soviet massacre of Polish officer in the Katyn, Forest, 1940 and Red Army refusal to help Warsaw Uprising, 1944.
Block 2 Discuss Western hypocrisy over British and French appeasement of fascist dictatorships in the 1930s and American support of Greece and Turkey in 1946, as justification for Stalin’s control of Eastern Europe.
Block 3 Discuss the USSR’s claims to northern Iran and the Black Sea straits and the effect it had on Western assumptions/reactions about Soviet intentions, e.g. Truman’s ending of Lend-Lease.
Block 4 Explain how the takeover of Eastern Europe was partly a reaction to American and Allied perceptions of the USSR, e.g. Riga Axiom, policy of Containment etc.
Conclusion Evaluate Stalin’s aims and motivations after the war and weigh up the Soviet threat to the West, e.g. Stalin’s support for communist parties in Western Europe and his attitude towards the Percentages Agreement (Greece), Soviet reaction towards formation of NATO, 1949.
At the end of the war Stalin became convinced that the West was determined to destroy the Soviet Union. Russian diplomats reported at the time that the US monopoly of the atom bomb had thrown ‘the Kremlin leader off balance’ and this resulted in an obsession with security against a surprise attack from the West. This was confirmed by Khrushchev who noted that Stalin had placed anti-aircraft guns around Moscow on a 24 hour alert. Ruthless screening of all returning Soviet POWS seemed to confirm Stalin’s paranoia about Western influences or
Bibliography: The Cold War, Bradley Lightbody The Origins of the Cold War, Martin McCauley, Chapters 2 & 3 The USA and the Cold War, Oliver Edwards, Chapter 2 The Cold War, Steve Phillips, p.13-22