Warsaw PactWest Germany became a member of NATO and militarized. The Soviets saw this as a direct threat and responded with the Warsaw Pact. It was made in Warsaw, a large city in Poland. This pact ensured all of the Soviet Union's eastern European satellite countries would defend one another in the event of a war. The Soviet Union, Albania, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, and East Germany were all a part of the Warsaw Pact. The meeting was dominated by the Soviet Union due to the large amount of power it possesses compared to the other countries involved. Albania was the first to be removed from the Warsaw Pact because it's government was branching off from Marxist ideas. Non-communist governments began to emerge within the Warsaw Pact effectively putting it to an end in 1991.
Impact: This pact instilled fear in NATO and the Western Powers. War would surely result in World War III and the use of nuclear missiles, which would have disastrous consequences. NATO worked on propaganda that made the Warsaw Pact look like a war-seeking monster. By now, all of the countries that were a part of the Warsaw Pact have now joined NATO with the exception of Russia. Luckily NATO did not have to go against the Warsaw Pact due to the policy of brinkmanship. |
Brinkmanship
"Brinkmanship is pushing a situation to the point of disaster without quite going over the edge. Brinkmanship is mainly a political policy" http://www.vocabulary.com/dictionary/brinkmanship Brinkmanship is the political policy used by U.S. president Harry Truman to keep the United States out of a war against the Soviet Union. He was elected for sporting this policy. A notable example of the policy of brinkmanship is the Cuban Missile Crisis where war was very close to breaking out but not quite. The impact of the policy of brinkmanship is that it kept the United States out of a war with the Soviet Union. It is a very risky policy however because the situation gets out of hand just a little bit, war breaks out. |