During theCold War, theIron Curtain was a political metaphor used to describe the political and physical boundary dividingEurope into two separate areas from the end ofWorld War II in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. The term symbolizes the efforts by theSoviet Union (USSR) to block itself and itssatellite states from open contact withthe West, its allies and neutral states. On the east side of the Iron Curtain were the countries that were connected to or influenced by the Soviet Union, while on the west side were the countries that wereNATO members, or connected to/influenced by the United States; ornominally neutral. Separate international economic and military alliances were developed on each side of the Iron Curtain. It later became a term for the physical barriers ofrazor wire,fences,walls,minefields, andwatchtowers that were built up along some of its sections, with theBerlin Wall being the most significant of these.[3]
The use of the term "Iron Curtain" as ametaphor for strict separation goes back at least as far as the early 19th century. It originally referred to fireproof curtains in theaters.[8] The author Alexander Campbell used the term metaphorically in his 1945 bookIt's Your Empire, describing "an iron curtain of silence and censorship [which] has descended since the Japanese conquests of 1942".[9] Its popularity as a Cold War symbol is attributed to its use in a speechWinston Churchill gave on 5 March 1946, inFulton,Missouri, soon after the end ofWorld War II.[8]
Due to the decreased human activity around the physical border during the Cold War, naturalbiotopes were formed here, as theEuropean Green Belt shows today.
Swedish book "Behind Russia's iron curtain" from 1923
In the 19th century, ironsafety curtains were installed on theater stages to slow the spread of fire.
Perhaps the first recorded application of the term "iron curtain" toSoviet Russia was inVasily Rozanov's 1918 polemicThe Apocalypse of Our Time. It is possible that Churchill read it there following the publication of the book's English translation in 1920. The passage runs:
With clanging, creaking, and squeaking, an iron curtain is lowering over Russian History. "The performance is over." The audience got up. "Time to put on your fur coats and go home." We looked around, but the fur coats and homes were missing.[10]
In 1920,Ethel Snowden, in her bookThrough Bolshevik Russia, used the term in reference to the Soviet border.[11][12]
A May 1943 article inSignal, a German propaganda periodical, discussed "the iron curtain that more than ever before separates the world from the Soviet Union".[13]Joseph Goebbels commented inDas Reich, on 25 February 1945, that if Germany should lose the war, "An iron curtain would fall over this enormous territory controlled by the Soviet Union, behind which nations would be slaughtered".[8][14] English-language Nazi propagandistWilliam Joyce used the term in his lastpropaganda broadcast on 30 April 1945, declaring that "the Iron Curtain of Bolshevism has come down across Europe."[15] Germanleading ministerLutz von Krosigk broadcast 2 May 1945: "In the East the iron curtain behind which, unseen by the eyes of the world, the work of destruction goes on, is moving steadily forward".[16]
Churchill's first recorded use of the term "iron curtain" came in a 12 May 1945 telegram he sent to U.S. PresidentHarry S. Truman regarding his concern about Soviet actions, stating "[a]n iron curtain is drawn down upon their front. We do not know what is going on behind".[17][18]
He repeated it in another telegram to Truman on June 4, mentioning "...the descent of an iron curtain between us and everything to the eastward",[19] and in a House of Commons speech on 16 August 1945, stating "it is not impossible that tragedy on a prodigious scale is unfolding itself behind the iron curtain which at the moment divides Europe in twain".[20]
The antagonism between the Soviet Union and the West that came to be described as the "iron curtain" had various origins.
During the summer of 1939, after conducting negotiations both with a British-French group and withNazi Germany regarding potential military and political agreements,[21] the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany signed theGerman–Soviet Commercial Agreement (which provided for the trade of certain German military and civilian equipment in exchange for Soviet raw materials)[22][23] and theMolotov–Ribbentrop Pact (signed in late August 1939), named after the foreign secretaries of the two countries (Vyacheslav Molotov andJoachim von Ribbentrop), which included a secret agreement to split Poland and Eastern Europe between the two states.[24][25]
The Soviets thereafter occupied EasternPoland (September 1939),Latvia (June 1940),Lithuania (1940), northernRomania (Bessarabia andNorthern Bukovina, late June 1940),Estonia (1940) and easternFinland (March 1940). From August 1939, relations between the West and the Soviets deteriorated further when the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany engaged in an extensiveeconomic relationship by which the Soviet Union sent Germany vital oil, rubber, manganese and other materials in exchange for German weapons, manufacturing machinery and technology.[26][27] Nazi–Soviet trade ended in June 1941 when Germany broke the Pact and invaded the Soviet Union inOperation Barbarossa.
In the course of World War II, Stalin determined to acquire a buffer area against Germany, with pro-Soviet states on its border in anEastern bloc. Stalin's aims led to strained relations at theYalta Conference (February 1945) and the subsequentPotsdam Conference (July–August 1945).[28] People in the West expressed opposition to Soviet domination over the buffer states, and the fear grew that the Soviets were building an empire that might be a threat to them and their interests.
Nonetheless, at thePotsdam Conference, the Allies assigned parts of Poland, Finland, Romania, Germany, and the Balkans to Soviet control or influence. In return, Stalin promised the Western Allies that he would allow those territories the right toNational Self-Determination. Despite Soviet cooperation during the war, these concessions left many in the West uneasy. In particular, Churchill feared that the United States might return to its pre-warIsolationism, leaving the exhausted European states unable to resist Soviet demands. (President Franklin D. Roosevelt had announced at Yalta that after the defeat of Germany, U.S. forces would withdraw from Europe within two years.)[29]
The Iron Curtain as described by Churchill at Westminster College. Note that Vienna (center, red regions, third down) lies east of the Curtain, as part of the AustrianSoviet-occupied zone of Austria.
FromStettin in theBaltic toTrieste in theAdriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia; all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Sovietsphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and in some cases increasing measure of control from Moscow.[31]
Much of theWestern public still regarded theSoviet Union as a close ally in the context of the 1945 defeat ofNazi Germany and ofImperial Japan.[citation needed][32]Although not well received at the time, the phraseiron curtain gained popularity as a shorthand reference to the division of Europe as the Cold War progressed. The Iron Curtain served to keep people in, and information out. People throughout the West eventually came to accept and use the metaphor.
Churchill's "Sinews of Peace" address strongly criticized the Soviet Union's exclusive and secretive tension policies along with the Eastern Europe's state form, thePolice Government (German:Polizeistaat).[33]He expressed the western Allied nations' distrust of the Soviet Union after the World War II. In September 1946, US-Soviet cooperation would collapse due to the US disavowal of the Soviet Union's opinion on the German problem in theStuttgart Council, and then followed the announcement by US PresidentHarry S. Truman of a hard line anti-Soviet, anticommunist policy. After that the phraseiron curtain became more widely used as an anti-Soviet term in the West.[34]
Additionally, Churchill mentioned in his speech that regions under the Soviet Union's control were expanding their leverage andPower without any restriction.[35]He asserted that in order to put a brake on this ongoing phenomenon, the commanding force of and strong unity between the UK and the US was necessary.[36]
Stalin took note of Churchill's speech and responded inPravda in mid-March 1946. He accused Churchill of warmongering, and defended Soviet "friendship" with eastern-European states as a necessary safeguard against another invasion. Stalin further accused Churchill of hoping to install right-wing governments in eastern Europe with the goal of agitating those states against the Soviet Union.[37]Andrei Zhdanov, Stalin's chief propagandist, used the term against the West in an August 1946 speech:[38]
Hard as bourgeois politicians and writers may strive to conceal the truth of the achievements of the Soviet order and Soviet culture, hard as they may strive to erect an iron curtain to keep the truth about the Soviet Union from penetrating abroad, hard as they may strive to belittle the genuine growth and scope of Soviet culture, all their efforts are foredoomed to failure.
The majority of European states to the east of the Iron Curtain developed their own international economic and military alliances, such asComecon and theWarsaw Pact.
Fence along the east–west border in Germany (nearWitzenhausen-Heiligenstadt)Sign warning of approach to within one kilometer of the inter-zonal German border, 1986
Most of the states of Europe to the west of the Iron Curtain — with the exception ofneutral Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Austria,Sweden,Finland,Malta andIreland — allied themselves withCanada, theUnited Kingdom and theUnited States withinNATO.Spain was a unique anomaly in that it stayed neutral and non-aligned until 1982, when, following democracy's return, it joined NATO. Economically, theEuropean Community (EC) and theEuropean Free Trade Association represented Western counterparts toCOMECON. Most of the nominally neutral states were economically closer to the United States than they were to theWarsaw Pact.[citation needed]
In January 1947,Harry Truman appointed GeneralGeorge Marshall as Secretary of State, scrapped Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) directive 1067 (which embodied theMorgenthau Plan), and supplanted it with JCS 1779, which decreed that an orderly and prosperous Europe requires the economic contributions of a stable and productive Germany."[49] Officials met with Soviet Foreign MinisterVyacheslav Molotov and others to press for an economically self-sufficient Germany, including a detailed accounting of the industrial plants, goods and infrastructure already removed by the Soviets.[50]
After five and a half weeks of negotiations, Molotov refused the demands and the talks were adjourned.[50] Marshall was particularly discouraged after personally meeting with Stalin, who expressed little interest in a solution to German economic problems.[50] The United States concluded that a solution could not wait any longer.[50] In a 5 June 1947 speech,[51] Marshall announced a comprehensive program of American assistance to all European countries wanting to participate, including the Soviet Union and those of Eastern Europe, called the Marshall Plan.[50]
Stalin opposed the Marshall Plan. He had built up theEastern Bloc protective belt of Soviet-controlled nations on his Western border,[52] and wanted to maintain this buffer zone of states combined with a weakened Germany under Soviet control.[53] Fearing American political, cultural and economic penetration, Stalin eventually forbade Soviet Eastern bloc countries of the newly formedCominform from accepting Marshall Plan aid.[50] InCzechoslovakia, that required a Soviet-backed Czechoslovak coup d'état of 1948,[54] the brutality of which shocked Western powers more than any event so far and set in a motion a brief scare that war would occur and swept away the last vestiges of opposition to the Marshall Plan in the United States Congress.[55]
After the Marshall Plan, the introduction of a new currency to Western Germany to replace the debasedReichsmark and massive electoral losses for communist parties, in June 1948, the Soviet Union cut off surface road access toBerlin, initiating theBerlin Blockade, which cut off all non-Soviet food, water and other supplies for the citizens of the non-Soviet sectors of Berlin.[63] Because Berlin was located within the Soviet-occupied zone of Germany, the only available methods of supplying the city were three limited air corridors.[64] A massive aerial supply campaign was initiated by the United States, Britain, France, and other countries, the success of which caused the Soviets to lift their blockade in May 1949.
Remains of Iron Curtain in former Czechoslovakia at the Czech-German border
One of the conclusions of theYalta Conference was that the western Allies wouldreturn all Soviet citizens who found themselves in their zones to the Soviet Union.[65] This affected the liberated Soviet prisoners of war (branded as traitors), forced laborers, anti-Soviet collaborators with the Germans, and anti-communist refugees.[66]
Migration from east to west of the Iron Curtain, except under limited circumstances, was effectively halted after 1950. Before 1950, over 15 million people (mainly ethnic Germans) emigrated from Soviet-occupied eastern European countries to the west in the five years immediately followingWorld War II.[67] However, restrictions implemented during the Cold War stopped most east–west migration, with only 13.3 million migrations westward between 1950 and 1990.[68] More than 75% of those emigrating from Eastern Bloc countries between 1950 and 1990 did so under bilateral agreements for "ethnic migration."[68]
About 10% were refugees permitted to emigrate under theGeneva Convention of 1951.[68] Most Soviets allowed to leave during this time period were ethnic Jews permitted to emigrate to Israel after a series of embarrassing defections in 1970 caused the Soviets to open very limited ethnic emigrations.[69] The fall of the Iron Curtain was accompanied by a massive rise in European East-West migration.[68]
“Behind me stands a wall that encircles the free sectors of this city, part of a vast system of barriers that divides the entire continent of Europe. From the Baltic, south, those barriers cut across Germany in a gash of barbed wire, concrete, dog runs, and guard towers. Farther south, there may be no visible, no obvious wall. But there remain armed guards and checkpoints all the same – still a restriction on the right to travel, still an instrument to impose upon ordinary men and women the will of a totalitarian state.”
The Iron Curtain took physical shape in the form of border defences between the countries of western and eastern Europe. There were some of the most heavily militarised areas in the world, particularly the so-called "inner German border" – commonly known asdie Grenze in German – between East and West Germany.
Elsewhere along the border between West and East, the defence works resembled those on the intra-German border. During the Cold War, the border zone in Hungary started 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) from the border. Citizens could only enter the area if they lived in the zone or had a passport valid for traveling out. Traffic control points and patrols enforced this regulation.
Those who lived within the 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) border-zone needed special permission to enter the area within 5 kilometres (3.1 mi) of the border. The area was very difficult to approach and heavily fortified. In the 1950s and 1960s, a double barbed-wire fence was installed 50 metres (160 ft) from the border. The space between the two fences was laden withland mines. The minefield was later replaced with an electric signal fence (about 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) from the border) and a barbed wire fence, along with guard towers and a sand strip to track border violations. Regular patrols sought to prevent escape attempts. They included cars and mounted units. Guards and dog patrol units watched the border 24/7 and were authorised to use their weapons to stop escapees. The wire fence nearest the actual border was irregularly displaced from the actual border, which was marked only by stones. Anyone attempting to escape would have to cross up to 400 metres (1,300 ft) before they could cross the actual border. Several escape attempts failed when the escapees were stopped after crossing the outer fence.[clarification needed]
The creation of these highly militarised no-man's lands led tode facto nature reserves and created awildlife corridor across Europe; this helped the spread of several species to new territories. Since the fall of the Iron Curtain, several initiatives are pursuing the creation of aEuropean Green Belt nature preserve area along the Iron Curtain's former route. In fact, along-distance cycling route along the length of the former border called theIron Curtain Trail (ICT) exists as a project of the European Union and other associated nations. The trail is 6,800 km (4,200 mi) long and spans fromFinland toGreece.[70]
The term "Iron Curtain" was only used for the fortified borders in Europe; it was not used for similar borders in Asia between socialist and capitalist states (these were, for a time, dubbed theBamboo Curtain). Theborder between North Korea and South Korea is very comparable to the former inner German border, particularly in its degree of militarisation, but it has never conventionally been considered part of any Iron Curtain.
The Soviet Union built a fence along the entire border towardsNorway andFinland. It is located one or a few kilometres from the border, and has automatic alarms detecting if someone climbs over it.
Historian Juha Pohjonen stated in a 2005 study that people who escaped the USSR to Finland were sent back, based on a policy that was implementedunilaterally byUrho Kekkonen when he took office in 1956.[71]
The Soviets initially attempted to applymare clausum to the Baltic Sea, stopping any ships that were not of countries immediately around the sea. This was never accepted in international law, and was constantly opposed by Western Powers.[72] By 1946, “all islands in the Baltic Sea belonging to the Soviet Union” and 36 village soviets along Estonia’s northern and north-western coast were defined as belonging to the "border belt," a naval boundary surrounding the BalticSSRs.[73]
The People's Republic of Poland was a member of theWarsaw Pact andComecon. It bordered no western countries, but it had many ports to the Baltic Sea. These were heavily guarded by mines and theBorder Guard. The port cities were very open, as Poland was a major trading hub with other nations.[74]
Preserved section of the border betweenEast Germany and West Germany called the "Little Berlin Wall" atMödlareuthFence along the former east–west border in Germany
The inner German border was marked in rural areas by double fences made of steel mesh (expanded metal) with sharp edges, while near urban areas a high concrete barrier similar to the Berlin Wall was built. The installation of the Wall in 1961 brought an end to a decade during which the divided capital of divided Germany was one of the easiest places to move west across the Iron Curtain.[75]
The barrier was always a short distance inside East German territory to avoid any intrusion into Western territory. The actual borderline, marked by posts and signs, was overlooked by numerous watchtowers set behind the barrier. The strip of land on the West German side of the barrier — between the actual borderline and the barrier — was readily accessible but only at considerable personal risk, because it was patrolled by both East and West German border guards.
Several villages, many historic, were destroyed as they lay too close to the border, for exampleErlebach. Shooting incidents were not uncommon, and several hundred civilians and 28 East German border guards were killed between 1948 and 1981, some of which may have been incidents of "friendly fire".
TheHelmstedt–Marienborn border crossing (German:Grenzübergang Helmstedt-Marienborn), namedGrenzübergangsstelle Marienborn (GÜSt) by theGerman Democratic Republic (GDR), was the largest and most important border crossing on the inner German border during thedivision of Germany. Due to its geographical location, allowing for the shortest land route betweenWest Germany andWest Berlin, most transit traffic to and from West Berlin used the Helmstedt-Marienborn crossing. Most travel routes from West Germany toEast Germany andPoland also used this crossing. The border crossing existed from 1945 to 1990 and was situated near the East German village ofMarienborn at the edge of theLappwald. The crossing interrupted theBundesautobahn 2 (A 2) between the junctionsHelmstedt-Ost andOstingersleben.
The Berlin Wall was constructed in 1961 to stop the flow ofEast German workers intoWest Berlin, anexclave of theFederal Republic of Germany. It largely succeeded in this instance, but led to the deaths of 140 people attempting to cross into West Berlin.[76] It was officially described as an "anti-fascist protection rampart" (German:Antifaschistischer Schutzwall), to serve the purpose of protectingEast Berlin and the GDR from "fascist powers" in the West.[77]
In parts ofCzechoslovakia, the border strip became hundreds of meters wide, and an area of increasing restrictions was defined as the border was approached. Only people with the appropriate government permissions were allowed to get close to the border.[78]
The Hungarian outer fence became the first part of the Iron Curtain to be dismantled. After the border fortifications were dismantled, a section was rebuilt for a formal ceremony. On 27 June 1989, theforeign ministers of Austria and Hungary,Alois Mock andGyula Horn, ceremonially cut through the border defences separating their countries.[79]
The number of victims that died at the Romanian border far exceeded the number of victims at the Berlin Wall.[80] As of 2011, the Danube still forms a division within the EU.[81]
The Yugoslav-Bulgarian border[c] became closed in 1948 after theTito–Stalin split. The area around the border was restructured, with land ownership on both sides no longer legal. Loudspeakers were installed for spreading propaganda and insults. The installations were not as impressive as the one on for example the inner-German border, but they resembled the same system.[82] In the GDR, there was a long time rumor that the border of Bulgaria was easier to cross than the inner German border for escaping the East Bloc.[83]
InGreece,[84] a highly militarized area called the "Επιτηρούμενη Ζώνη" ("Surveillance Area") was created by the Greek Army along the Greek-Bulgarian border, subject to significant security-related regulations and restrictions. Inhabitants within this 25 kilometres (16 mi) wide strip of land were forbidden to drive cars, own land bigger than 60 square metres (650 sq ft), and had to travel within the area with a special passport issued by Greek military authorities. Additionally, the Greek state used this area to encapsulate and monitor a non-Greek ethnic minority, thePomaks, a Muslim and Bulgarian-speaking minority which was regarded as hostile to the interests of the Greek state during the Cold War because of its familiarity with their fellowPomaks living on the other side of the Iron Curtain.[85]
The border was dismantled at the end of the 1990s.[86]
Speaking at the Berlin Wall on 12 June 1987, Reagan challenged Gorbachev to go further, saying "General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization, come here to thisgate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate!Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"
In February 1989, the Hungarianpolitburo recommended to the government led byMiklós Németh to dismantle the iron curtain. Nemeth first informedAustrian chancellorFranz Vranitzky. He then received an informal clearance fromGorbachev (who said "there will not be a new1956") on 3 March 1989, on 2 May of the same year the Hungarian government announced and started inRajka (in the locality known as the "city of three borders", on the border with Austria and Czechoslovakia) the destruction of the Iron Curtain. For public relation Hungary reconstructed 200m of the iron curtain so it could be cut during an official ceremony by Hungarian foreign ministerGyula Horn, and Austrian foreign ministerAlois Mock, on 27 June 1989, which had the function of "calling all European peoples still under the yoke of the national-communist regimes to freedom".[89] However, the dismantling of the old Hungarian border facilities did not open the borders, nor did the previous strict controls be removed, and the isolation by the Iron Curtain was still intact over its entire length. Despite dismantling the already technically obsolete fence, the Hungarians wanted to prevent the formation of a green border by increasing the security of the border or to technically solve the security of their western border in a different way. After the demolition of the border facilities, the stripes of the heavily armed Hungarian border guards were tightened and there was still a firing order.[90][91]
The opening of a border gate between Austria and Hungary at thePan-European Picnic on 19 August 1989 then set in motion a chain reaction, at the end of which there was no longer a GDR and the Eastern Bloc had disintegrated. The idea of opening the border at a ceremony came fromOtto von Habsburg and was brought up by him toMiklós Németh, the then Hungarian Prime Minister, who promoted the idea.[98] The Paneuropa Picnic itself developed from a meeting between Ferenc Mészáros of the Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF) and the President of thePaneuropean Union Otto von Habsburg in June 1989. The local organization in Sopron took over theHungarian Democratic Forum, the other contacts were made via Habsburg and the Hungarian Minister of StateImre Pozsgay. Extensive advertising for the planned picnic was made by posters and flyers among the GDR holidaymakers in Hungary. ThePaneuropean Union distributed thousands of brochures inviting them to a picnic near the border at Sopron.[99][100]
The local Sopron organizers knew nothing of possible GDR refugees, but thought of a local party with Austrian and Hungarian participation.[101] More than 600 East Germans attending the "Pan-European Picnic" on the Hungarian border broke through the Iron Curtain and fled into Austria. The refugees went through the iron curtain in three big waves during the picnic under the direction of Walburga Habsburg. Hungarian border guards had threatened to shoot anyone crossing the border, but when the time came, they did not intervene and allowed the people to cross.
It was the largest escape movement from East Germany since the Berlin Wall was built in 1961. The patrons of the picnic, Otto Habsburg and the Hungarian Minister of StateImre Pozsgay, who were not present at the event, saw the planned event as an opportunity to testMikhail Gorbachev's reaction to an opening of the border on the Iron Curtain.[102] In particular, it was examined whether Moscow would give the Soviet troops stationed in Hungary the command to intervene.[103] After the pan-European picnic,Erich Honecker dictated the Daily Mirror of 19 August 1989: "Habsburg distributed leaflets far into Poland, on which the East German holidaymakers were invited to a picnic. When they came to the picnic, they were given gifts, food and Deutsche Mark, and then they were persuaded to come to the West". But with the mass exodus at the Pan-European Picnic, the subsequent hesitant behavior of the Socialist Unity Party of East Germany and the non-intervention of the Soviet Union broke the dams. Thus the bracket of the Eastern Bloc was broken. Now tens of thousands of the media-informed East Germans made their way to Hungary, which was no longer ready to keep its borders completely closed or to oblige its border troops to use force of arms. The leadership of the GDR in East Berlin did not dare to completely lock the borders of their own country.[104][105]
In a historic session from 16 to 20 October, theHungarian parliament adopted legislation providing for multi-party parliamentary elections and a direct presidential election.[106]
The legislation transformed Hungary from aPeople's Republic into theRepublic, guaranteed human and civil rights, and created an institutional structure that ensured separation of powers among the judicial, legislative, and executive branches of government. In November 1989, following mass protests inEast Germany and the relaxing of border restrictions in Czechoslovakia, tens of thousands ofEast Berliners flooded checkpoints along theBerlin Wall, crossing intoWest Berlin.[106]
In theSocialist Republic of Romania, on 22 December 1989, the Romanian military sided with protesters and turned on Communist rulerNicolae Ceaușescu, who was executed after a brief trial three days later.[109] In thePeople's Socialist Republic of Albania, a new package of regulations went into effect on 3 July 1990 entitling all Albanians over the age of 16 to own a passport for foreign travel. Meanwhile, hundreds of Albanian citizens gathered around foreign embassies to seek political asylum and flee the country.
The Berlin Wall officially remained guarded after 9 November 1989, although the inter-German border had become effectively meaningless. The official dismantling of the Wall by the East German military did not begin until June 1990. On 1 July 1990, the day East Germany adopted theWest German currency, all border-controls ceased and West German ChancellorHelmut Kohl convinced Gorbachev to drop Soviet objections to a reunited Germany within NATO in return for substantial German economic aid to the Soviet Union.
Otto von Habsburg, who played a leading role in opening the Iron Curtain
Erich Honecker
East German border guards look through a hole in the Berlin Wall in 1990
Memorial inBudapest reads: "Iron Curtain 1949–1989"
There is an Iron Curtain monument in the southern part of the Czech Republic at approximately48°52′32″N15°52′29″E / 48.8755°N 15.87477°E /48.8755; 15.87477 (Iron Curtain monument). A few hundred meters of the original fence, and one of the guard towers, has remained installed. There are interpretive signs in Czech and English that explain the history and significance of the Iron Curtain. This is the only surviving part of the fence in the Czech Republic, though several guard towers and bunkers can still be seen. Some of these are part of the Communist Era defences, some are from the never-usedCzechoslovak border fortifications in defence againstAdolf Hitler, and some towers were, or have become, hunting platforms.
Another monument is located inFertőrákos, Hungary, at the site of thePan-European Picnic. On the eastern hill of the stone quarry stands a metal sculpture byGabriela von Habsburg. It is a column made of metal and barbed wire with the date of the Pan-European Picnic and the names of participants. On the ribbon under the board is the Latin text:In necessariis unitas – in dubiis libertas – in omnibus caritas ("Unity in unavoidable matters – freedom in doubtful matters – love in all things"). The memorial symbolises the Iron Curtain and recalls forever the memories of the border breakthrough in 1989.
There are several open-air museums in parts of the former inner German border, as for example in Berlin and inMödlareuth, a village that has been divided for several hundred years. The memory of the division is being kept alive in many places along theGrenze.
Throughout the Cold War the term "curtain" would become a common euphemism for boundaries – physical or ideological – between socialist and capitalist states.
An analogue of the Iron Curtain, theBamboo Curtain, surrounded the People's Republic of China. As the standoff between the West and the countries of the Iron and Bamboo curtains eased with the end of the Cold War, the term fell out of any but historical usage.
The phrase "Grass Curtain" was used by South Sudanese during theFirst Sudanese Civil War to describe the oppression that hid political violence in Southern Sudan from wider attention.[112]
The phrase "Tofu Curtain" has been used to describe socioeconomic divides between more affluent, college educatedgreen liberals and their working class neighbors. The term proliferates a county line inWestern Massachusetts, a street inMelbourne, Australia, and other borders around the globe with usage recorded as early as 1984.[113][114][115]
The phraseSteel Curtain was used to describe the defense of thePittsburgh Steelers, an American Football team based inPittsburgh, PA, in the 1970s. The city of Pittsburgh has long ties with the industrial steel industry.[116]
^Sorin Antohi andVladimir Tismăneanu, "Independence Reborn and the Demons of the Velvet Revolution" inBetween Past and Future: The Revolutions of 1989 and Their Aftermath, Central European University Press.ISBN963-9116-71-8.p.85.
^Debate on the address, vol. 413, Hansard, House of Commons, 16 August 1945, column 84,archived from the original on 26 March 2022, retrieved20 May 2009
^Alperovitz, Gar (1985) [1965],Atomic Diplomacy: Hiroshima and Potsdam: The Use of the Atomic Bomb and the American Confrontation with Soviet Power, Penguin,ISBN978-0-14-008337-8
^Antony BeevorBerlin: The building of the Berlin Wall, p. 80
^For public opinion in the United States, compare:Young, John W.; Kent, John (2020) [2003]. "Tensions in the Grand Alliance and Growing Confrontation, 1945–7".International Relations Since 1945: a global history (3 ed.). Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 44.ISBN9780198807612. Retrieved22 February 2023.The President appeared ready to embark on a more confrontational approach as public opinion became less willing to trust the Soviets. It was in early 1946 that a crisis in Iran was to provide a basis for a confrontation [...].
^Churchill, Winston."Sinews of Peace, 1946". National Churchill Museum. Retrieved22 February 2023.In these States, control is enforced upon the common people by various kinds of all-embracing police governments, to a degree which is overwhelming and contrary to every principle of democracy.
^"철의 장막: 지식백과" (in Korean). Terms.naver.com. Retrieved16 September 2015.
^Compare:Churchill, Winston."Sinews of Peace, 1946". National Churchill Museum. Retrieved22 February 2023.I do not believe that Soviet Russia desires war. What they desire is the fruits of war and the indefinite expansion of their power and doctrines.
^"철의 장막: 지식백과" (in Korean). Terms.naver.com. Retrieved16 September 2015.
^Granville, Johanna,The First Domino: International Decision Making during the Hungarian Crisis of 1956, Texas A&M University Press, 2004.ISBN1-58544-298-4
^E. Szafarz, "The Legal Framework for Political Cooperation in Europe" inThe Changing Political Structure of Europe: Aspects of International Law, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers.ISBN0-7923-1379-8.p.221.
^Andreas Rödder:Deutschland einig Vaterland – Die Geschichte der Wiedervereinigung (2009), p 72.
^Miklós Németh in Interview with Peter Bognar,Grenzöffnung 1989: "Es gab keinen Protest aus Moskau" (German - Border opening in 1989: There was no protest from Moscow), in: Die Presse 18 August 2014.
^Padraic Kenney (2002),A Carnival of Revolution: Central Europe 1989, Princeton University Press, pp. p.2,ISBN0-691-05028-7
^Miklós Németh in Interview, Austrian TV - ORF "Report", 25 June 2019.
^Hilde Szabo:Die Berliner Mauer begann im Burgenland zu bröckeln (The Berlin Wall began to crumble in Burgenland - German), in Wiener Zeitung 16 August 1999; Otmar Lahodynsky:Paneuropäisches Picknick: Die Generalprobe für den Mauerfall (Pan-European picnic: the dress rehearsal for the fall of the Berlin Wall - German), in:Profil 9 August 2014.
^Ludwig Greven "Und dann ging das Tor auf", in Die Zeit, 19 August 2014.
^Otmar Lahodynsky "Eiserner Vorhang: Picknick an der Grenze" (Iron curtain: picnic at the border - German), in Profil 13 June 2019.
^Thomas Roser:DDR-Massenflucht: Ein Picknick hebt die Welt aus den Angeln (German - Mass exodus of the GDR: A picnic clears the world) in: Die Presse 16 August 2018.
^"Der 19. August 1989 war ein Test für Gorbatschows" (German - 19 August 1989 was a test for Gorbachev), in: FAZ 19 August 2009.
^Michael Frank: Paneuropäisches Picknick – Mit dem Picknickkorb in die Freiheit (German: Pan-European picnic - With the picnic basket to freedom), in: Süddeutsche Zeitung 17 May 2010.
^Andreas Rödder, Deutschland einig Vaterland – Die Geschichte der Wiedervereinigung (2009).
^Toensmeier, Eric; Bates, Jonathan (2013).Paradise Lot: Two Plant Geeks, One-Tenth of an Acre, and the Making of an Edible Garden Oasis in the City. White River Junction, Vt.: Chelsea Green Publishing. p. 24.ISBN9781603583992.
^Dávila, Arlene; Rivero, Yeidy M. (2014).Contemporary Latina/o Media: Production, Circulation, Politics. New York: New York University Press.ISBN9781479848119.
^Campeau, Lisa (2010–2011)."Remembering the Tofu Curtain"(PDF).The Alumni Cooperator. Inter-Cooperative Council. p. 19. Archived fromthe original(PDF) on 3 March 2017. Retrieved2 March 2017.
Ericson, Edward E. (1999).Feeding the German eagle: Soviet economic aid to Nazi Germany, 1933-1941. Westport, Conn:Praeger Paperback.ISBN978-0-275-96337-8.
Grenville, J. A. S. (2005).A history of the world from the 20th to the 21st century. London:Routledge.ISBN978-0-415-28954-2.
Shirer, William L. (1990).The rise and fall of the Third Reich: a history of Nazi Germany. A Touchstone book. New York:Simon & Schuster.ISBN978-0-671-72868-7.
Die Narbe Deutschland – A 16-hour-long experimental single shot documentary showing the former Iron Curtain running through Germany in its entirety from above, 2008–2014
[303] "On This Day: Berlin Wall falls"; [304] "Untangling 5 myths about the Berlin Wall". Chicago Tribune. 31 October 2014. Retrieved 1 November 2014; [305] "In Photos: 25 years ago today the Berlin Wall Fell". TheJournal.i.e. 9 November 2014.
_-_preserved_part_of_Iron_curtain.JPG)
