Primary Sources
Browse Items: Soviet Union
Two Lenins (profile)
These busts of Lenin (Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov), the first leader of the Soviet Union, are but two samples of thousands of different versions of Lenin's likeness. Both are copies of the same plaster bust, approximately two feet in height. Across the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and other states led by Communist parties, busts, statues, reliefs, and other likenesses of Lenin were ubiquitous….
Do You Know This Woman?
Throughout the Cold War both sides regularly sent agents across the border, both to gather information that might be useful and to test the ability of the guardians of the border to catch agents of the other side. The images shown here are from copies made by border guards in East Berlin during the final years before the fall of the Berlin Wall. Although the names and biographical data in these….
Two Lenins
These busts of Lenin (Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov), the first leader of the Soviet Union, are but two samples of thousands of different versions of Lenin's likeness. Both are copies of the same plaster bust, approximately two feet in height. Across the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe, and other states led by Communist parties, busts, statues, reliefs, and other likenesses of Lenin were ubiquitous….
The Power of the Powerless
Vaclav Havel wrote this work in 1979. The essay begins the intellectual attacks that Havel, the future President of a democratic Czechoslovakia, made against the Communist regime controlling his country. Rather than rely solely on political arguments, Havel argues here that, in fact, cultivating an individual "sphere of truth" will ultimately destroy the totalitarian communist government. ….
301
A poster distributed by the Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ), a liberal political party founded in 1988 in opposition to the Communist Party in power in Hungary. This poster alludes to the martyrs of the 1956 Soviet invasion to put down the Hungarian revolution. Imre Nagy and his associates who had promoted a "New Course" for socialism were buried in plot "301" of a Budapest cemetary, and….
It Must Not Happen Again (2)
One of a set of posters reflecting glasnost-era exposès of the crimes of the Stalin era - including collectivization, purges, and the gulag. The quotation from Pravda (5 April 1988) reads: "The guilt of Stalin, as well as the guilt of those around him, toward the party and people for the mass purges [and] lawlessness [they] committed is huge and unforgivable."
[description….
It Must Not Happen Again (1)
One of a set of posters reflecting glasnost-era exposès of the crimes of the Stalin era - including collectivization, purges, and the gulag. The quotation from Pravda (5 April 1988) reads: "The guilt of Stalin, as well as the guilt of those around him, toward the party and people for the mass purges [and] lawlessness [they] committed is huge and unforgivable."
[description….
For Them We Have Already "Voted"
March 1989 election poster for the nationalist "Sajudis" movement in Lithuania, wryly alluding to the Soviet leaders pictured here - Stalin, Molotov, Khrushchev, and Brezhnev - whose rule had been imposed on the Baltic countries since World War II and ratified through sham elections.
[description as stated in the guide for Goodbye, Comrade: An Exhibition of Images from the….
Comrades - It's Over!
Poster circulated by the anticommunist organization, Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF) in the summer 1989 marking the anticipated departure-eviction of the Soviet Red Army troops who had kept Hungary in the Soviet bloc since the end of World War II.
[description as stated in the guide for Goodbye, Comrade: An Exhibition of Images from the Revolutions of ’89 and the Collapse of….
Remarks on East-West Relations at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin
On June 12, 1987, President Ronald Reagan delivered a major speech on the Cold War with the Brandenburg Gate and the Berlin Wall as a back drop. In staging this speech, President Reagan hoped to draw a parallel with the historic speech delivered in Berlin by President John F. Kennedy in July 1963. It was in this speech that President Kennedy spoke the famous phrase: "All free men, wherever they….
Verbal Message from Mikhail Gorbachev to Helmut Kohl
With the opening of the border between East and West Germany on November 9, 1989, jubilant crowds took to the streets in Berlin to celebrate this historic event. West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl was traveling in Poland when word reached him about the events in East Germany and he quickly rearranged his schedule so that he could make a public appearance the following day, on November 10.….
Sofia Embassy Cable, Bulgarian Reportage of Krenz-Gorbachev Summit Stresses Unanimity, Stability, and Party Supremacy
On November 1, 1989, the new East German leader Egon Krenz traveled to Moscow for a summit meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev to discuss the mounting crisis in the GDR and seek a greater level of cooperation between the two states. The following excerpt is taken from a diplomatic cable sent from the U.S. Embassy in Sophia, Bulgaria and reports on how the summit was depicted in the Bulgarian press.….
Soviet Record of Conversation between Mikhail Gorbachev and Egon Krenz
The new Secretary General of East Germany, Egon Krenz, traveled to Moscow on November 1, 1989 to meet in person with Gorbachev and assess the situation in East Germany and discuss possible paths forward. Throughout the lengthy meeting, Krenz and Gorbachev spoke openly about the challenges that now faced the GDR. Gorbachev, for the most part, remained hopeful that the new GDR leadership could….
Memorandum of Conversation Between Egon Krenz, Secretary General of the Socialist Unity Party and Mikhail S. Gorbachev
The new Secretary General of East Germany, Egon Krenz, traveled to Moscow on November 1, 1989 to meet in person with Gorbachev and assess the situation in East Germany and discuss possible paths forward. Throughout the lengthy meeting, Krenz and Gorbachev spoke openly about the challenges that now faced the GDR. Gorbachev, for the most part, remained hopeful that the new GDR leadership could….
Bonn Embassy cable, The German Question and Reunification
As events in Eastern Europe and especially in East Germany continued to pick up the pace, speculation began to grow, both within the two Germanies and internationally, that German reunification was once again a topic for debate. The West European had already speculated that West Germany might abandon its commitment to NATO and the European Community in favor of reunification. West German….
Telephone Call from Chancellor Helmut Kohl of the Federal Republic of Germany
In this telephone conversation between West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and U.S. President George H. W. Bush on October 23, 1989, the two leaders discuss the revolutionary events in Hungary, Poland, and East Germany. It is clear from Kohl's summary of West Germany's approach toward Eastern Europe that he preferred a slow course of reform, based primarily on economic reforms supported by new….
Berlin Embassy Cable, GDR Crisis: The Honecker Era Fades Quickly
In this excerpt of a diplomatic cable from the U.S. Embassy in Berlin, we see the first official analysis of East Germany's new leader Egon Krenz, who replaced Erich Honecker on October 18, 1989. In the summary remarks, the embassy officials make clear that Krenz is attempting immediate reform, but not yet on a scale that could be compared to Gorbachev's perestroika.
The U.S.….
Czechoslovak Ministry of Interior Memorandum, Information on the Security Situation in the CSSR
In October 1989, the situation was growing dire for the Czechoslovak communists. Increasing unrest and change in other Eastern Bloc countries was quickly isolating conservatives and emboldening the domestic opposition. In the analysis presented here, Federal Minister of the Interior Frantisek Kincl details a number of domestic security threats. The first was the opposition's increased level of….
Excerpts from Chernyaev's Theses Prepared for Gorbachev's Report to the Defense Council
In this excerpt from the Mikhail Gorbachev's remarks to the Soviet Union's Defense Council, his chief foreign policy advisor Anatoly Chernyaev lays out the argument by Gorbachev that the Soviet Union can no longer sustain the arms race with the west that had raged as a part of the Cold War since the 1940s. Despite this rational observation that the Soviet Union can no longer compete with the….
US Mission cable, Summary of Berlin Press End of the Cold War
The press excerpts gathered here by the U.S. Embassy in East Berlin and transmitted to offices in Washington, Bonn, Brussels, and Tokyo reflect the growing urgency of the situation in East Berlin. This press report comes just days after two of the largest days of demonstrations in Berlin, Leipzig, and elsewhere on October 7 and 9, 1989.
West Berlin's governing mayor, Walter Momper….