A popular uprising against Soviet control then broke out in Hungary, where the local communist leaders, headed by Imre Nagy, called for a multiparty political system and withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact see Glossary , the defensive alliance founded by the Soviet Union and its East European satellites in The Soviet army crushed the revolt early in November , causing numerous casualties.
Although the Hungarian Revolution hurt Soviet standing in world opinion, it demonstrated that the Soviet Union would use force if necessary to maintain control over its satellite states in Eastern Europe. Chinese discontent with the new Soviet leadership stemmed from low levels of Soviet aid, feeble Soviet support for China in its disputes with Taiwan and India, and the new Soviet doctrine of peaceful coexistence with the West, which Mao viewed as a betrayal of Marxism-Leninism.
Against Khrushchev's wishes, China embarked on a nuclear arms program, declaring in that communism could defeat "imperialism" in a nuclear war. The dispute between militant China and the more moderate Soviet Union escalated into a schism in the world communist movement after Albania left the Soviet camp and became an ally of China, Romania distanced itself from the Soviet Union in international affairs, and communist parties around the world split over whether they should be oriented toward Moscow or Beijing.
The monolithic bloc of world communism had shattered. Soviet relations with the West, especially the United States, seesawed between moments of relative relaxation and periods of tension and crisis.
For his part, Khrushchev wanted peaceful coexistence with the West, not only to avoid nuclear war but also to permit the Soviet Union to develop its economy. Kennedy in and his tour of the United States in demonstrated the Soviet leader's desire for fundamentally smooth relations between the West and the Soviet Union and its allies. Yet Khrushchev also needed to demonstrate to Soviet conservatives and the militant Chinese that the Soviet Union was a firm defender of the socialist camp.
Thus, in Khrushchev challenged the status of Berlin; when the West would not yield to his demands that the western sectors be incorporated into East Germany, he approved the erection of the Berlin Wall between the eastern and western sectors of the city in To maintain national prestige, Khrushchev canceled a summit meeting with Eisenhower in after Soviet air defense troops shot down a United States reconnaissance aircraft over Soviet territory.
Finally, mistrust over military intentions clouded East-West relations during this time. The West feared the implications of Soviet innovations in space technology and saw in the buildup of the Soviet military an emerging "missile gap" in the Soviet Union's favor. By contrast, the Soviet Union felt threatened by a rearmed Federal Republic of Germany West Germany , by a United States alliance system that seemed to be encircling the Soviet Union, and by the West's superior strategic and economic strength.
To offset the United States military advantage and thereby improve the Soviet negotiating position, Khrushchev in tried to install nuclear missiles in Cuba, but he agreed to withdraw them after Kennedy ordered a blockade around the island nation. After coming close to war during the Cuban missile crisis, the Soviet Union and the United States took steps to reduce the nuclear threat. In the two countries established a "hot line" between Washington and Moscow to provide instant communication that would reduce the likelihood of accidental nuclear war.
Throughout his years of leadership, Khrushchev attempted to carry out reform in a range of fields. The problems of Soviet agriculture, a major concern of Khrushchev's, had earlier attracted the attention of the collective leadership, which introduced important innovations in this area of the Soviet economy. The state encouraged peasants to grow more on their private plots, increased payments for crops grown on collective farms, and invested more heavily in agriculture.
In his dramatic Virgin Lands campaign in the mids, Khrushchev opened vast tracts of land to farming in the northern part of the Kazak Republic and neighboring areas of the Russian Republic.
These new farmlands turned out to be susceptible to droughts, but in some years they produced excellent harvests. Later innovations by Khrushchev, however, proved counterproductive. His plans for growing corn and increasing meat and dairy production failed miserably, and his reorganization of collective farms into larger units produced confusion in the countryside.
Khrushchev's attempts at reform in industry and administrative organization created even greater problems. In a politically motivated move to weaken the central state bureaucracy, in Khrushchev did away with the industrial ministries in Moscow and replaced them with regional economic councils. Although he intended these economic councils to be more responsive to local needs, the decentralization of industry led to disruption and inefficiency.
By the time Stalin died in March , Khrushchev had positioned himself as a possible successor. At first, Khrushchev and other high-ranking officials ruled through a form of collective leadership.
But in he organized the ouster of Premier Georgi Malenkov and replaced him with an ally, Nikolai Bulganin. Khrushchev foiled a Malenkov-led coup attempt in June and took over the premiership the following March. Once a loyal Stalinist, Khrushchev gave a long speech in February that criticized Stalin for arresting and deporting opponents, for elevating himself above the party and for incompetent wartime leadership, among other things.
This withering, albeit incomplete, indictment of Stalin was supposed to remain secret. By that June, however, the U. State Department had published the complete text. The Polish revolt was resolved fairly peacefully, but the Hungarian revolt was violently suppressed with troops and tanks.
In all, at least 2, Hungarians were killed in late , and about 13, were wounded. Many more fled to the West, and others were arrested or deported. On the domestic front, Khrushchev worked—not always successfully—to increase agricultural production and raise living standards. Two years later, a Soviet rocket hit the moon, and in Soviet astronaut Yuri A. Gagarin became the first man in space. Khrushchev had a complicated relationship with the West. A fervent believer in communism, he nonetheless preferred peaceful coexistence with capitalist countries.
Unlike Stalin, he even visited the United States. Relations between the two superpowers deteriorated somewhat in when the Soviets shot down an American U-2 spy plane deep inside their territory. The following year, Khrushchev approved the construction of the Berlin Wall in order to stop East Germans from fleeing to capitalist West Germany.
Cold War tensions reached a high point in October when the United States discovered Soviet nuclear missiles stationed in Cuba.
The world appeared to be on the brink of nuclear conflict, but, after a day standoff, Khrushchev agreed to remove the weapons. After the start of the Russian Civil War, Khrushchev joined the Bolsheviks and served in the Red Army as a commissar in charge of political indoctrination. During World War II, a failed offensive at Kharkov proposed by Khrushchev nearly cost him his life, but he was instead sent to Stalingrad, where the historic Russian victory helped redeem his reputation.
After the war, Khrushchev managed the Soviet reconstruction of war-torn Ukraine. When Stalin died suddenly in , Khrushchev was among the few high ranking officials in a position to seize power.
He did so in September, and quickly organized the execution of his political rivals. Eisenhower in The Eisenhower administration was staunchly anti-communist, however it was unwilling to intervene militarily when the Kremlin crushed a popular uprising in Hungary in After this exchange, it was decided on by both the Eisenhower administration and the Kremlin that Nikita Khrushchev would visit the United States.
0コメント