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The article discusses the important changes in the Russian foreign policy doctrines that occurred in the beginnings of the 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Author argues that the officially claimed devotion to peacemaking and peacekeeping are in fact manifestations of the Russian imperial outreach. The model of international relations promoted by Moscow in fact resembles the American 19th century Monroe Doctrine. Thus, the foreign policy doctrine and the potential national conflicts in the post-Soviet territory may become triggers for Russian actions aiming at restoring the Russian Empire.
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After analyzing the problems in the study of social history in general, the article mentions the scientific centers of Ukrainian Bulgarian studies and the stages in which they progress. The author outlines the thematic areas of Bulgarian studies, analyzes the factors that influence the conceptual conclusions. The Ukrainian authors are presented with their scientific works on the subject.
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This article proposes an analysis of Romanian dissent from its springing moments in 1977 to the end of the Communist regime in 1989. The study follows the context in which dissent emerged and developed, such as the changes in the economic and political situation that drove Romania into a deep economic crisis and revealed the Stalinist nature of Ceauşescu’s regime. Furthermore, it investigates upon the sources of inspiration of Romanian dissent such as Charter 77 or, later in the 1980s, Soviet perestroika. The core of the article tackles the main forms of Romanian dissent from its founding moments to 1989.
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Many serious international crises happen during the Cold war in the core of confrontation between East and West Europe – Berlin. The article deals with the main problems related to the Soviet Union’s and western policies in regard to Western Berlin during the crisis of 1958–1963. The causes and motives of N. Khrushchev’s actions, which lead to the beginning of the Berlin crisis in 1958, are explained and also the positions of the four great powers (USSR, USA, United Kingdom and France), GDR and FRG during the meeting in Geneva between the six ministers of foreign affairs in 1959, the reinforcement of the border between East and West Berlin, the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961, the course and the ending of the Berlin crisis are analyzed. The article is based on a wide range of sources, including documents from the Russian Federation Foreign Policy Archive, some of which have been never used in research publications before.
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Aim of this article is close reading of the Michał Siermiński’s book on so-called left-wing opposition during real socialism period in the years 1968–1980, and its „Afterword” by Zbigniew Marcin Kowalewski). Author claims, that value of the book is very dubious – as in research aspect as in academic ethics aspect, and scientific technique. Author is focused on ideological dimension of Siermiński’s and Kowalewski’s work, their neo-Trotskyist skew, lack of understanding of the geopolitical reality of the Cold War and international competition between communism and capitalism. Other weakness of the book is not recognizing historical existentional circumstances of communist/socialist countries.
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The official relations between Poland and Japan started in 1919. Throughout the entire interwar era, till December 1945, when Poland declared war on Japan, they were friendly, although due to geopolitical conditions not especially intense. After the war, the Iron Curtain fell deeper between East and West, and the division between the two camps became sharper. Post-war Poland became totally dependent on the USSR, which impacted the Polish foreign policy towards Japan. This paper examines the negotiations between Poland and Japan which proceeded in the years 1947–1957, and the problem of reestablishing official relations between the two countries after the war.
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This paper will look at the East-West military balance in 1956 and at each side’s (i.e., Moscow’s and Washington’s) understanding of the balance. It will look also at the way in which each side regarded the danger of nuclear war, and at how each side regarded the other’s approach to nuclear war. Finally, the paper will address Moscow and Washington’s views of the danger that the Hungarian revolution might escalate to general war, and at the communication between the two sides on that score during the revolution.
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This paper will analyze Eisenhower’s policy towards Eastern Europe in general and towards Hungary in particular from the perspective of the gaping gulf between high-minded rhetoric and the political realities of the Cold War and the nuclear arms race. While the Eisenhower Administration sounded the high-faluting rhetoric of “liberation of captive peoples” from communism and engaged in the short-lived effort to launch a “Volunteer Freedom Corps” to undermine communism in Eastern Europe, the political reality was that uprisings against communism were not supported in East Germany in 1953, neither in Poland and Hungary in 1956. The Cold War regimes in Central Europe, along with the establishment of deterrence strategy, made the cautious Eisenhower administration not dare actively support rebellions in Eastern Europe. The price of an escalation of conflict towards nuclear war was deemed too dangerous; no direct interventions were launched in the Soviet sphere of influence. The price the Eisenhower administration also had to pay was a loss of trust among the “captive peoples”. Eisenhower’s rhetoric was revealed to be only propaganda.
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Armed teenagers who fought in the 1956 revolution are preserved in the nation’s memory as “the kids from Pest”, among them, there were several girls who did not get a separate designation, however several photographs of them survived and some appeared widely in the world press. My fellow researcher, a French journalist Phil Casoar, and I selected a captivating photograph of an armed young man and a young woman wearing a red-cross armband that might be described as the extraordinary starting point of our research. In November 1956, numerous prominent western weekly magazines published the photo; subsequently books, documentary films and exhibitions made it widely known. It first appeared as the opening image in a series of articles about the Hungarian revolution, entitled “Budapest Heroes”, appearing in the magazine Paris Match. During the Cold War, the image became well-known in the west as well as the east, but it was placed on opposite poles. In the west, the characters were portrayed as heroes who defied the Soviet tanks; in socialist Hungary and in the east, they were officially considered to be criminals along with other armed rebels. Subsequently, the Hungarian political police used the photos as conclusive evidence during trials. In my presentation I use approximately 35 photographs and documents related to the Paris Match picture to discuss our investigation since 1999, the fate of the young woman appearing in that picture, and the different usages of the Paris Match picture.
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This paper analyzes Romania's involvement in the settlement of the 1973 Arab-Israeli crisis. The Yom Kippur war, as this conflict is also known, gave the Bucharest government the opportunity to undertake a series of steps aimed at demonstrating to the Arab states that Romania could be an extremely valuable partner in starting the Arab-Israeli peace process. With the outbreak of hostilities, Romanian diplomats made considerable efforts to mediate negotiations between combatants as well as to ensure the two belligerent camps of the Romanian Government's entire willingness to support a viable solution that would meet the demands of all parties. Romania's interests in resolving this new crisis were dictated by several aspects: on the one hand, Bucharest officials were motivated to empathize with the Arab cause because of the oil embargo imposed by the Arab states. This situation was very important, given that at that time the Romanian state was dependent on oil imports from the Near East. On the other hand, Nicolae Ceausescu's desire to obtain „the most favored nation clause” from the United States began to take shape in light of a balanced approach of the Romanian government towards both sides involved in the conflict. At the same time, both the Arab states and the Soviet Union - who criticized Romania's decision not to break relations with Israel as a result of the Israelian aggression in 1967 - now saw the Bucharest government as the only one capable of creating a bridge between the two camps in order to put them at the negotiation table and to find a solution to ground a lasting peace in the Near East.
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The history of all nations, from the earliest times until now, shows a very characteristic disposition of all state organisms, situated far from the sea, to control the sea coast and to strengthen it. The task of naval forces in peacetime is to safeguard national interests in the seas and oceans, as well as to defend and protect the maritime border. Benedykt Krzywiec has once aptly commented on the significance of a war fleet, namely “A war fleet is a powerful political factor in peacetime, as well as a weapon necessary during the war” . The history of the navy and coastal nations, including those of medium size, confirms the thesis that the governments would try to ensure that their war fleets had the appropriate force of impact. They have been, and will continue to be, the guarantor of maritime border security and effective foreign policy. The time and manner of its engagement are matters for politicians governing a given country. It is the government that shapes the foreign policy of its country. However, these forces should be maintained in proper combat readiness, which in particular demands an adequate number of ships of different classes, as well as highly qualified personnel – and undeniably that is costly. Therefore, not every coastal nation is interested in bearing such costs. Thus, the question arises: What maritime forces should a state have at its disposal? The answer to this question comes down to the statement that, in principle, these should be forces that ensure effective defense of the nation’s vital interests in sea basins. They should be proportionate to the needs arising from the risks, aspirations, and financial capacity of the nation. It is a little-known fact that during the so-called Cold War period, the Polish Navy was actively involved in the foreign policy, on consent of our main ally, the Soviet Union. The author’s aim is to shed light on this issue.
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Sport is oftentimes used as an unofficial instrument of diplomacy and/or civic activism – especially in usually tense relations between democracies and authoritarian regimes – as was the case concerning the USA and the Islamic Republic of Iran. The main focus of this article is to analyze the way in which wrestling and football – sport disciplines that are popular in both these countries – made it possible to get out of mutual isolation lasting uninterruptedly since 1979.
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Reviving the Romanian foreign policy underwent an unprecedented increase after the declaration of the Romanian Workers' Party's position on issues of international communist movement and workers in April 1964. The document says the Romanian political elite’s autonomy from the Soviet era and marked the distancing of Romania from the Soviet foreign policy, helping to legitimize nationalist leaders in Bucharest. This autonomy was limited; however, it is not any major ideological difference with Moscow. Strengthening political autonomy towards Moscow required achievement of economic autonomy. This purpose could be achieved only under conditions of normalization of relations with the West, which would provide new markets for raw materials and the Romanian products and, especially, access to modern industrial technologies. The timing for launching this policy benefited a favorable international context. In the early '60s, the U.S. launched a new strategy of relations with communist countries, the so-called "building bridges policy”. U.S. policy was designed to give new impetus to the opening with the East, to settle communication channels with the Soviet Union's satellite countries in Eastern Europe and to accelerate the process of European detente. The relevance of the new American political strategy against the East and its long-term impact did not seize as opportunity for politicians in Bucharest. This led to the normalization of relations with Western countries through an unprecedented series of diplomatic actions in the short history of the Romanian communist state until then; Bucharest initiated a comprehensive program of agreements with Western countries.
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In the late 1940s and early 1950’s, several lawsuits were held in Bulgaria against highly qualified specialists from important sectors of the Bulgarian economy. Following the trial against Traicho Kostov, the State Security authorities continue to untie the threads of the “conspiracy” in various sectors of the economy. The article for the first time explains in detail the cases brought against civil engineers and electrical engineers, as well as those aspects of the policy of the ruling party that led to the destruction of a large part of the engineering community in Bulgaria. Seeds of mistrust towards engineers and technicians who received their education in European countries, sown after September 9, 1944, gave fruit – seeking an “enemy engineer” became a political practice. A number of lawsuits against civil engineers, mining engineers, and electrical engineers removed people from the past who had been inconvenient for the new political situation and were blamed for the failure of the new government’s economic policy.
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The Revolution in Military Affairs is a US and USSR - invented concept which describes operational and organizational changes plus the transformation of military technology, all those being factors which allow a state to get predominance as a military power vis a vis its rivals. One of the central problems in understanding the current debate over RMA is due to many theorists’ use of the term as referring to the revolutionary technology itself, which is the driving force of change. Concurrently, other theorists tend to use the term as referring to revolutionary adaptations by military organisations that may be necessary to deal with the changes in technology. Other theorists place RMA more closely inside the specific political and economic context of globalization at the end of the Cold War.
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In the author’s opinion, current globalization trends after the Cold War resulted in a redefinition of the territorial concepts from a geopolitical points of view. This is reflected in the security studies which embraced the post-positivist paradigm emphasizing threats to identity and values rather than military classical threats. States are confronted with terrorism and asymmetrical threats, thus they have shifted their security priorities from external enemies, especially foreign states, to domestic and transnational terrorism, and their reaction meant the increase of the mechanisms of watching and control on the population, with a special regard on immigrants.
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Nemačka je iskovala „evropsko čudo“: poražena, razrušena, okupirana i podeljena na dve neprijateljske države, danas je prva sila i vodeća nacija u stroju evropskih država. Istočni deo je bio ideološki proizvod SSSR-a, sa njim roden, sa njim umro; zapadni deo je u cigle tri godine skinuo nacističku uniformu i obukao uniformu NATO-a. Nacistički rajh, uzročnik tragedije evropskih naroda, obima koji istorija nikada nije zapisala, od poraženog krvoločnog neprijatelja, voljom snažne Amerike, svrstan je medu pobednike zapadnih sila. Istovremeno je SSSR, odlučujući pobednik u Velikom ratu, preko nod prestao biti saveznik, a postao preteća neprijateljska sila, u senci hladnog rata, fenomena epohe, koji je objavio Truman. [...]
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Prikaz/The review of: László Borhi, Hungary in the Cold War 1945-1956. Between the United States and the Soviet Union, Budapest (Central European University), 2004, 352 стр.
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