The Cold War, Integration, and Globalization (^) ‹ 199
characterized by a number of nuclear test-ban treaties and arms-limitation talks between
the two superpowers.
However, while Soviet–U.S. relations were thawing during this period, the Soviet Union
demonstrated on several occasions that it still intended to rule the Eastern Block with a firm
hand. The most dramatic of these events occurred in 1968 in an episode that has come to
be known as the Prague Spring. Czechoslovakian communists, led by Alexander Dubcek,
embarked on a process of liberalization, stimulated by public demand for greater freedom,
economic progress, and equality. Under Dubcek’s leadership, the reformers declared that
they intended to create “socialism with a human face.” Dubcek tried to proceed by balanc-
ing reforms with reassurances to the Soviet Union. But on August 21, Soviet and Warsaw
Pact troops invaded and occupied the major cities of Czechoslovakia; it was the largest
military operation in Europe since the Second World War.
The Soviet regime also continued to demand conformity from its citizens and to punish
dissent. A good example is the case of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, the acclaimed author who
wrote novels that attempted to tell the truth about life in the Soviet Union. For writing
novels like The Cancer Ward (1966) and The First Circle (1968), Solzhenitsyn was expelled,
in November 1969, from the Russian Writers’ Union. Much to the irritation of the Soviet
government, his work was highly acclaimed in the West, and he was awarded the Nobel
Prize in 1970. Following the 1973 publication of his novel The Gulag Archipelago, he was
arrested. But in a sign that some concessions were being made to Western opinion, he was
deported to West Germany rather than exiled to Siberia.
The totalitarian regimes associated with the Eastern Bloc countries, and earlier with
Nazism, spurred many in the Christian community into action. The Second Vatican
Council of the Catholic Church (1962–1965) took the remarkable step of affirming
Catholicism’s roots in Judaism, Jews’ covenant with God, and the idea that disparate faiths
worshipped the same God. An important corollary in the wake of the Holocaust was the
rejection of civil discrimination based on religion. Like Lutheran pastors Martin Niemöller
and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, both of whom opposed many of Hitler’s actions, Pope John
Paul II spoke out against totalitarianism and in favor of human rights. One of his first acts
as Pope was to travel to his homeland Poland, emphasizing human dignity and urging the
Polish people to maintain their faith. When thousands turned out to see him, it galvanized
the Solidarity movement (discussed later in this chapter in the Poland and Solidarity
section) by demonstrating that they were not alone.
The European Union
The leaders of Western Europe realized almost immediately following World War II they
were going to need to function as a whole in order to rival the economic and military power
of the two superpowers. Throughout the second half of the twentieth century, Europe
embarked on a plan of economic integration that proceeded through several careful stages:
• In 1950, France and West Germany created the French–German Coal and Steel
Authority, removing tariff barriers and jointly managing production in that industry.
• In 1952, the Authority expanded to create the six-country European Coal and Steel
Community, adding Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands.
• In 1957, those six countries signed the Treaty of Rome, establishing the European
Economic Community (EEC), sometimes referred to as the Common Market, to begin
the process of eliminating tariff barriers and cutting restrictions on the flow of capital
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