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Beginning of Warsaw pact
Formally known as the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation, and Mutual Assistance, the Warsaw Pact was created on 14 May 1955, immediately after the accession of West Germany to the Alliance. West Germany joined NATO, which prompted the Soviet Union to form the Warsaw Pact alliance in central and eastern Europe the same year. -
1968
The Soviet Union invoked the treaty when it decided to move Warsaw Pact troops into Czechoslovakia in August 1968 to bring the Czechoslovak regime back into the fold after it had begun lifting restraints on freedom of expression and had sought closer relations with the West. (Only Albania and Romania refused to join in the Czechoslovak repression.) -
Brezhnev doctrine
The Brezhnev Doctrine was more formally presented in an official document—known as “Sovereignty and the International Obligations of Socialist Countries”—that was published in September 1968 in Pravda, the newspaper of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. It stated that while socialist countries should be free to determine their path, “none of their decisions should damage either socialism in their country or the fundamental interests of other socialist countries. -
Treaty of Warsaw
The Treaty of Warsaw was a treaty between the Federal Republic of Germany and the People's Republic of Poland. It was signed by Chancellor Willy Brandt and Prime Minister Józef Cyrankiewicz at the Presidential Palace on 7 December 1970, and it was ratified by the West German Bundestag on 17 May 1972. -
End of Warsaw
In 1990, East Germany left the Warsaw Pact in preparation for its reunification with West Germany. Poland and Czechoslovakia also indicated their strong desire to withdraw. Faced with these protests—and suffering from a faltering economy and unstable political situation—the Soviet Union bowed to the inevitable.