1945 in Central Europe: Hopes and Uncertainties on the Brink of the Cold War

Session Submission Type: Panel

Brief Description

This panel will commemorate the landmark events that are 80 years away this year. It will focus on the situation in three countries whose peoples had lived in a common state until three decades earlier - Austria, Hungary and Czechoslovakia. The aim of the panel is to highlight the similarities as well as the important differences that fundamentally influenced the different directions of these three countries in the first post-war years and in the longer perspective. The focus will be on the geopolitical situation, foreign policy as well as the internal political development of the three countries.

Sub Unit

• History: 1945-1990

Chair

• Norman M. Naimark, Stanford U

Papers

• Estimating Changes and Consistencies: Austria in 1945 and its Post-War Perspective with Special Focus on the View of US and British Intelligence - Dieter Bacher, Inst for Research on War Consequences (Austria)

• Hungary between the Soviet Union and the West - Laszlo Borhi, Indiana U Bloomington / Hungarian Academy of Sciences (Hungary)

• A Bridge Between East and West?: Czechoslovakia in 1945 and its Post-War Perspectives - Vít Smetana, Inst of Contemporary History CAS (Czech Republic)

Discussant

• Norman M. Naimark, Stanford U