| • Science | • People | • Locations | • Timeline |
During this period, Eastern Europe was under the political influence of the Soviet Union, and the direct political control of either the Soviet Union or national communist régimes. Western Europe was under the political influence of the United States, and the direct control of national democratic régimes, enjoying sufficient freedom to allow them to oppose United States policies.
Some suggest that the term may have been first coined by Queen Elisabeth of the Belgians 1 to describe the situation between Belgium and her country of birth, Germany, in 1914 after World War I. An Iron Curtain, or eisener Vorhang, was an obligatory precaution for all German theaters to prevent a possible fire from spreading from the stage to the rest of the theater. These fires were rather common since the decor was often very flammable. In case of fires, a metal wall would separate the stage and theater, secluding the area ablaze to be extinguished by firefighters.
Joseph Goebbels coined the phrase in anti-Soviet propaganda, and it was picked up by German politician Count Lutz Schwerin von Krosigk who referred to the 'Iron Curtain' coming down. This phrase was later popularized by Winston Churchill and used in a long speech on March 5, 1946Events January January 4 Theodore Schurch becomes the last person to be executed for offences committed under the Treachery Act of 1940 January 7 Allied recognize Austrian republic with 1937 borders the country is divided into four occupation zones Januar at Westminster College in Fulton, MissouriFulton is a city located in Callaway County, Missouri. As of the 2000 census, the city had a total population of 12,128. It is the county seat of Callaway County 6. 1936 Olympic Champion Helen Stephens (the Fulton Flash was born in Fulton. Winston Churchi: After the fall of the Berlin Wall a section of it was transported to and erected at Westminster College."From StettinSzczecin (pronounce: Media:Szczecin. ogg|['tin]]], German Stettin is the 7th largest city in Poland and the second largest Polish seaport on the Baltic. It is also the capital of the West Pomeranian Voivodship. There are 419,000 inhabitants in Szczecin (a in the BalticThe Baltic Sea is in northeastern Europe, bounded by the Scandinavian Peninsula, the mainland of east and central Europe, and the Danish islands. It drains into the Kattegat and the North Sea by way of the Oresund, the Great Belt and the Small Belt. It is to TriesteFor Auguste Piccard's deep-sea submersible Trieste see Bathyscaphe Trieste. Trieste ( Latin Tergeste Slovenian and Croatian Trst German Triest is a city in northeastern Italy, capital of Friuli-Venezia Giulia region and Trieste province, population 211,18 in the AdriaticThe Adriatic Sea is an arm of the Mediterranean Sea separating the Apennine peninsula ( Italy) from the Balkan peninsula, and the system of the Apennine mountains from that of the Dinaric Alps and adjacent ranges. The western coast is Italian, while the e an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. WarsawWarsaw ( Polish: see also other names in full The Capital City of Warsaw Polish: Miasto Stoleczne Warszawa is the capital of Poland and its largest city. It is located on the Vistula river roughly 350 km from both the Baltic Sea coast and the Carpathian M, BerlinBerlin [ bɛrˈliːn ] is the national capital of Germany and its largest city, with 3,387,404 inhabitants (as of September 2004); down from 4. 5 million before World War II. Berlin is located on the rivers Spree and Havel in the northea, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia; all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject, in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and in some cases increasing measure of control from Moscow."
The phrase had been used a year earlier, in an article on "The Year 2000" by the Nazi leader Joseph Goebbels:
"If the German people lay down their weapons, the Soviets, according to the agreement between Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin, would occupy all of East and Southeast Europe along with the greater part of the Reich. An iron curtain would fall over this enormous territory controlled by the Soviet Union, behind which nations would be slaughtered. The Jewish press in London and New York would probably still be applauding."
In the summer of 1989, the foreign ministers of Austria and Hungary,
Alois Mock and Gyula Horn, ceremoniously cut through
the border defences separating their countries.
It is difficult to say what is going on, but in general the Russians are acting little better than thugs. They have wiped out all the liquid assets. No food cards are issued to Germans, who are forced to travel on foot into the Russian zone, often more dead than alive. An iron curtain has descended over the fate of these people and very likely conditions are truly terrible. The promises at Yalta to the contrary, probably 8 to 10 million people are being enslaved.
While the exact origins of the phrase are not known for certain, it was Churchill's speech that popularized the phrase and made it known to much of the public.
Although the phrase was not well received at the time, as the Cold War strengthened it gained popularity as a short-hand reference to the division of Europe. The Iron Curtain served to keep people in and information out, and the metaphor eventually enjoyed wide acceptance in the West. A variant, the Bamboo Curtain, was coined in reference to the People's Republic of China.
As the standoff between the West and the countries of the Iron and Bamboo curtains eased with the end of the Cold War, the term fell out of any but historical usage.
|