Blog #16

Chapter 21(pp.1018-1033) +documents

What appears to have started off as combination of imperial and social revolution lead directly into what later became communism.Communism made all kinds of promises that sounded so good to people, thinking they would be reaping some of the benefits themselves; more equality for everyone, freedom from oppression and exploitation and things would move forward into the future. It was later they were to find out that only the elite got any benefits from communism and the common people were worse off than before communism was a way of life. Russia was the first country to experience a communist revolution. It was definitely shocking tome that by the 1970's approximately one-third of the world lived in communist government-run countries. In order of size China, with the largest population took second place in communism, running a few years behind the Soviet Union.  The ‘70’s were pretty much in the middle of the cold war, with World War II, the Korean War and the Vietnam War all have taken place prior. During the cold war the big rivalry was between the United States and the Soviet Union. This rivalry had hundreds of thousands of people worried about nuclear weapons in what was referred to as the arms races while scientists talked about the possibility of human life becoming extinct if there was ever a major war between the USA and the USSR. The Soviet Union and China more or less banded together gathering other countries to join forces with them, while others wanted no part of it. The two main countries China and Russia had very different outcomes from their communistic governmental control of their countries. When World War II ended, the Soviet military forces occupied much of Eastern Europe and Stalin was sure no more threats of invasion would happen if they surrounded themselves with friendly governments of like thinking. Both of these countries had leaders that thought they could change the way things were being done, only to have things redone by someone at a later time; much of the time going back “to the way things used to be”. Feminism and women’s rights were somethings that communism supposedly supported. It just depended who was in charge at the time.  Under communism China’s population appeared to have made huge progressive steps for the betterment of their country and individuals as well. Russia on the other hand did not.  They struggled and their economy got worse. America and Britain wanted a democratic society while the USSR still wanted communism. However there was still a big nuclear weapons problem between Russia and Cuba.The President at the time, John F. Kennedy and Stalin’s successor Khrushchev compromised that the Soviets would remove their missiles from Cuba and the USA would not invade the island. Russia and China became involved in their own disagreements with regards to territories and communist leaders  Once China and the Soviet Union had decided to “back off” a lot of communistic ways it became apparent that China would rejoin the international world of economy with great prosperity for future generations to build on. The Soviet Union on the other hand collapsed and that was basically the end of communism.One of the main reasons China and Russia differed so much with regards to how they treated protesters and others was the fact that Gorbachev would not crush his protesters unlike the disaster which occurred  by China’s protesters where thousands were killed. In 1991 a breath of relief was sighed when the Soviet Union was no longer a force to be reckoned with as their communistic ways no longer existed. I will take the democratic way of living in my country and try not to take for granted some of the simple things we are allowed to do while having the freedom of living here in the United States. State by State have their own rules, and I don’t necessarily agree with all of them, but at least I do not have the government breathing down my neck, telling me what I can and cannot do every single day.  I also thank God for our military forces that are working to keep out country as safe as possible.