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Stalin dies.
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Nikita Krushchev "emerges".
He worked in the Moscow Communist Party. Worked with Lenin briefly. Begins to work on the underground railway in Moscow. -
Krushchev Begins De-Stalinisation.
Releases all political prisoners.
Invited Tito (Communist who hated Stalin, he also set up Yugoslavia) to Moscow.
Dismissed the foregin minister, Molotov. -
Hungarian Uprising
Hungarians that hated the ruler at the time Rakosi, who was a Stalin like leader and lead with an iron fist, rebelled one day at Josef Bem statue of Budapest. They demanded independance and withdrawal of Soviet troops who had been there for nearly 10 years. -
Soviet Demands were:
That the West would recognize the German Democratic Republic.
That the West would withdraw troops from West Berlin.
That the West would hand their access routes over to the East German Goverment. -
207,026 refugees escape from Easy Germany/Berlin to the West.
The East is mad. -
Vienna Summit
Krushchev pressure JFK, who was present by then.
Demanded the withdrawal of Western troops again, Kennedy refused. -
Western Powers reject the Soviets demands.
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Flow of refugees increased to a thousand a day.
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Kennedy repeats support for West Berlin and announces increase in arms spending.
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Krushchev begins to build the Berlin Wall.
All of West Berlin was encircled apart from the access points.
This was against the Four Power agreement reached in Paris on 20 June 1949. -
Krushchev finishes the Berlin Wall
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Kennedy visits West Berlin. Krushchev loses face by failing to remove the West from Berlin.
Ich bin ein Berliner speech.
