CHAPTER 25

THE EUROPE OF

ECONOMIC DEPRESSION

AND DICTATORSHIP

In 1922, Benito Mussolini became the first dictator to take
power in Europe. By the end of 1925, fascist parties demanding the impo­
sition of dictatorships had sprung up in many other nations. Other more
traditional right-wing authoritarian movements, too, were on the rise. In
Portugal, where junior army officers had overthrown the monarchy in 1910
and declared a republic, right-wing military officers staged a coup d etat in

1926. General Jozef Pilsudski overthrew the Polish Republic the same
      year. All of the Eastern European and Balkan states became dictatorships
      in the 1920s and 1930s, with the exception of Czechoslovakia. In the
      meantime, Joseph Stalin transformed the Soviet Union into a totalitarian
      state. Amid the ravages of the Great Depression that began in 1929, Europe
      entered an even more dangerous period of instability. In 1933, a right-wing
      government came to power in Austria, and Adolf Hitler, leader of the
      National Socialist (Nazi) Party, became chancellor of Germany. The right­
      wing nationalist revolt against the republic of Spain began in 1936, start­
      ing a civil war that ended in 1939 with the victory of General Francisco
      Franco’s right-wing nationalist forces. Britain and France were the only
      major powers in which parliamentary government was strong enough to
      resist the authoritarian tide. Democracy also survived in the smaller states
      of Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway,
      despite the existence of small fascist movements in each.

Economies in Crisis

The global economic Depression that began in October 1929 had dramatic
political consequences in Europe. Economic insecurity and accompanying

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