Mikhail Gorbachev and the collapse of Communism

Mikhail was arguing with another man about who would take over after the death of two successors died after a year in office. People praised Mikhail's youth, and he became the youngest Soviet leader at age 54. In choosing Mikhail people supported the mild reform of the Soviet Union. Mikhail also made up his new own new ideas instead of following other leaders like Stalin. Past leaders had encouraged totalitarianism, and rewarded silence and discouraged people from acting on their own. However, Mikhail did not want this. So he announced a policy called glasnost, which was an openness that allowed citizens to discuss ways to improve their country and society. He also introduced perestroika, which was economic restructuring. Both these policies made a pave to the collapse of communism. Because it gave the citizens a voice in opinions and more power to make decisions for themselves. Which could have then led to the overthrow and defeating of the Soviet Union. Plus no supporting them.

The Collapse of Communism

Communism in Eastern Europe collapsed because there was no support, economical issues and political downfall. The USSR collapsed because Stalin put all his money into defensive arms and none into the country itself. The Soviet Union collapsed because they had no money, they had a lot of competition, and socialism failed. It did change the world because it was a huge relief, and almost every country under communism turned into capitalism.

Nelson Mandela and Aparthied

The apartheid was a racial segregation policy in South Africa. It was very similar to the one in USA. They were segregated from 1948-1990. The policy stated that white people were above everyone else and can vote, while the "Bantu" ,which is everyone else that is black mixed or Indian, is not able to do these things. And so Nelson Mandela was put into jail because of this. Nelson Mandela fought for the independence of South Africa. Mandela was in the ANC's fight to promote non-violence methods to gain freedom and justice. He also tried to stop the Apartheid. He was considered a hero for these things. Mandela was in jail for 26 years but then got out and wrote a book called "Long Walk To Freedom". The book was about his struggle to overcome segregation and gain freedom. He still continued to fight for his country and his people admired him for that. When the elections came in 1991, he was elected over the other candidate with 61% of the votes.

African Independence

After WWII, the Europeans wanted to bring government to the African people. However, they weren't very fair with the Africans. They took advantage of them and treated them unequally. The Europeans were also very racist towards the Africans, they thought they were better than them. The Africans grew tired of being under the rule of the Europeans and started fighting back to the Europeans. The Europeans thought that they were helping the Africans by civilizing them, and thought what they did was not wrong. So the Africans went against the Europeans. And they won their freedom against the Europeans. They tried to become civilized themselves but really couldn't get it together after they were no longer under the rule of the Europeans. They're still trying till this day. But they got a new president, and tried turning things around. To this day all of Africa's countries have won independence by the year 1994.

Film Lesson: "The Right Stuff"

In the film "The Right Stuff", both USSR and US were competing against each other in many different things. One of the competitions were trying to be faster than the speed of sound/light. In which they put a pilot in a plane and try to go faster than the speed of sound/light. They also competed in the first man to go into space. The US were getting ready to put a group of men into space however scared that something might go wrong, they sent a monkey up there first. Doing this gave the USSR the advantage to go into space first. Making the US look stupid for sending a monkey up there. A few weeks later the US went to space also. The scenes that they put of Russia, where it was pretty dark and mysterious will always remind me of the Cold War. This is because they made Russia seem so bad and such enemies.

NATO and The Warsaw Pact

NATO was an alliance made against the Soviet Union. It stands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization. It includes North America and Europe. So if one of their countries was attacked then all of NATO would come and defend that one country. Since the Americas made the NATO alliance, the Soviet Union decided to make the Warsaw Pact. Which included Russia. They were both a mutual defense. These alliances were made so that if one country decided to attack with the nuclear defenses they claimed to have had, they would have backup with other countries who would also jump into the war.

Film Lesson: "Schindler's List"

Schindler's List demonstrates the Holocaust by showing how families would/could have been affected by the Holocaust. Also certain scenes where taken from real images and footage from the Holocaust. The most powerful scene in the film was the scene with Auschwitz. Where the women thought they were going to work for Schindler's and instead they ended up in Auschwitz. While being taken over there in the train, the woman looked out the window to see a little boy motioning that the women were going to be killed. This image will definitely stay with me for a long time. However, as a viewer I think that the documentary "Night and Fog" was much powerful than the film "Schindler's list". I think this because the images from "Night and Fog" were realistic and actually real footage. Which made it more real to believe and not just to think "Oh it was just a movie".