The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 serves as a bookend for the culmination of the Cold War; however, tensions between the West and the East remain. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has served as the most recent flashpoint between members of the West and East. Since the war in Ukraine began, Western European nations have increased defense spending while successfully adding Sweden and Finland as members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Meanwhile, Russia has established a closer relationship with China and North Korea while imposing the economic sanctions it can on the West. The dynamics in Ukraine today are rooted in the ideological, political, and military battles the Soviet Union and members of NATO had throughout the twentieth century. This unit plan explores the development of Soviet foreign policy during Leonid Brezhnev’s time as the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union to teach students about the histories seen in today’s current events to help them make sense of the world. This curriculum unit contains three sections:

First, students analyze the effects of World War Two—in which Leonid Brezhnev fought, like many other Soviet leaders of his generation—and the ideological underpinnings of the Cold War. Students will explore these topics to understand how political beliefs and life experiences shaped the policies of the major Cold War players while also understanding the Cold War as a global conflict.

Second, the unit will discuss how the Soviet Union implemented foreign policy.  By focusing on the Brezhnev Doctrine (a term used by Western Sovietologists after 1968), students will learn how the Soviet Union’s goal was to transform the world, not just Russia or the European continent. Additionally, students will see how this foreign policy justified the Soviet intervention of Czechoslovakia—one of its own members of the Warsaw Pact—in 1968 within their already established sphere of influence to curb the spread of Western European ideals.

Lastly, students will focus on how the Soviets expanded their foreign policy to launch a global campaign of communism in foreign nations. Students will examine how the Brezhnev Doctrine and the invasion of Czechoslovakia established a precedent for the Soviet Union to intervene in foreign countries where socialism advanced, such as Afghanistan in 1979.

World War Two and the Underpinnings of the Cold War

By the time leaders from the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States met in Tehran at the end of 1943, World War Two was at its height. By this point, the United States had declared war on Japan following the Japanese bombings of Pearl Harbor and other American territories and possessions in the Pacific Theater. Nazi Germany had taken control of much of the European continent, and the Americans, British, and Canadians were planning to launch their D-Day invasions in the New Year.[i]  While Stalin, Churchill, and Roosevelt agreed to meet to create a military strategy, some political discussions were had that would shape the discussion of the postwar era.

Stalin’s primary concern was to defeat Nazi Germany. Together with the British and the Canadians, the Americans were organizing their D-Day invasion of Nazi-occupied France, and they needed the Soviets to coordinate a series of attacks against Nazi Germany when the Allied powers would invade. From Moscow’s perspective, for nearly three years, from June 1941 to the spring of 1944, the Soviets had been fighting the Nazis alone. They were impatient for the US and the UK to get involved (the UK had been fighting Hitler in North Africa but not in Europe). Stalin suspected that the Western powers were content to let Nazi Germany and the USSR bleed each other dry. Additionally, Churchill expressed his concern for Poland, whose government was living in exile in London.[ii]  There was one Polish government in exile in London and another in Moscow. Both Churchill and Roosevelt pushed the Soviets to agree to a referendum after the war’s conclusion.  Still, Stalin wanted the Poles to agree to a geographical boundary, to renounce Nazism, and sever ties with any German agents.  Perhaps most notably, the Americans persuaded the Soviets to agree to hold international peace talks when World War Two concluded.[iii] While the Tehran Conference was initially held to broker a discussion on military strategy, it laid the groundwork for the diplomatic conversation that would follow at the war’s end. These discussions were continued when the leaders met again at Yalta.

As the Allied powers gained momentum during the later stages of World War Two, the heads of state from the Soviet Union, the United States, and the United Kingdom met in Crimea at the Yalta Conference in February 1945. Although the war had not yet been won, Nazi Germany’s military prowess had waned, and the Allied victory in Europe was all but assured. Meanwhile, the Allied nations devised a plan to defeat Japan in the Pacific Theater.[iv]  Many key decisions on partitioning territories from around the world following the conclusion of the Second World War took place at Yalta – both camps aimed to promote their ideologies worldwide. While the division of Germany came later, nobody was thinking of dividing the northern European nation at this point. This meeting foreshadowed the tumultuous relationship the world’s most influential powers would have in the post-war era.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt and Prime Minister Winston Churchill traveled to Crimea to meet with the General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union Josef Stalin in February 1945. The American and British executive leaders pushed for open and free elections throughout much of Europe, including in nations throughout Eastern Europe, such as Poland, which shared a border with the Soviet Union. Remnants of President Woodrow Wilson’s Moral Diplomacy during World War One proved to have been politically popular with time. The American public had warmed to notions of American universalism, the right of nations to exercise self-determination, and the spread of liberal capitalism; however, for these ideologies to become a reality, Stalin and the Soviet Union would need to cooperate with the United States and the United Kingdom.[v]

Meanwhile, Russia demanded a buffer zone of territory, as it had been the subject of yet another foreign invasion from Germany during World War Two. These concerns, combined with the Allies’ belief that they needed Soviet military support to defeat Japan, allowed the Soviet Union to exercise its leverage to expand its sphere of influence across the eastern half of the European continent. The Soviet liberation of much of Eastern Europe from Nazi occupation provided them with this leverage.  Ultimately, no Eastern European states bordering the Soviet Union became democratic or capitalist. The division between the capitalist states in Western Europe and the socialist states in Eastern Europe also manifested in official organizations.  The Soviet Union organized a political apparatus that connected socialist countries militarily through the Warsaw Pact, which served as a counterweight to the Western nations that aligned themselves under NATO.

Despite their temporary military and political partnerships in their opposition to the Axis powers during World War Two, the clash of ideologies at Yalta would only grow after the Second World War’s conclusion. With ideological differences already sown and as tensions during the Cold War increased, nations from the West looked to spread ideas on democracy and capitalism. At the same time, countries in the East aimed to expand their communist bloc and ideas about socialism.

After the death of Roosevelt, Harry Truman replaced him at the Potsdam Conference in 1945 to represent the American government, while Clement Attlee replaced Churchill following his party’s successful elections against Churchill’s Conservative Party. The three leaders together continued their discussions from the Yalta Conference to end the war and discuss how much of the European continent would be divided. The leaders agreed that the Soviet Union would drop its request for Germany to pay Moscow $20 billion in reparations. Over 6.5 million Germans would be expelled from Poland, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia back to Germany.  Nazi leaders would be tried for committing war crimes. The German economy would be reorganized to primarily become agriculturally driven with nonmilitary industrial components.[vi]

The Potsdam Conference was also where Truman shared the news that the United States successfully developed an atomic bomb. After the Yalta Conference, the Soviets agreed that they would declare war on Japan following Nazi Germany’s defeat, which they did thirty days after Victory in Europe Day. Truman was skeptical about this, considering China’s communist revolution and the opportunities it presented the Soviets with. Nonetheless, the United States dropped its first atomic bomb on Japan, and the Soviet Union invaded Japan as it had promised. However, one purpose of the atomic bombs Truman dropped on Japan (one on Hiroshima, the other on Nagasaki) was to hasten the end of the Pacific war before the USSR got involved. The Japanese surrendered to the United States alone, and Truman successfully kept Stalin from getting involved in the postwar occupation of Japan. The Potsdam Conference allowed the United States, United Kingdom, and Soviet Union to partition the world, most notably throughout Europe. This became a hotspot of tension between Western and Eastern powers.

The Warsaw Pact Invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968

Although the United Kingdom and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) were allies during World War Two, the United States and USSR never had a formal alliance. Nonetheless, members who once fought common enemies during World War Two were now adversaries in the decades following the Yalta Conference. Tensions heightened between NATO and the Warsaw Pact globally, but they were localized in Czechoslovakia in 1968 when a series of liberal reforms upset Soviet leaders in Moscow. As a member of the Warsaw Pact, Czechoslovakia fell within the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence while bordering NATO’s West Germany.

Reformist Alexander Dubček was elected First Secretary of Czechoslovakia during the Prague Spring. His platform, called the “Action Programme”, included a series of reforms to remove censorship barriers on the media, introduce multiparty elections, decentralize the economy, provide open travel, and create free speech measures.  Dubček referred to the platform as “socialism with a human face.”[vii]  Troubling for the Soviet Union was that members from within Czechoslovakia’s Communist Party pushed for these reforms. The following months, known as the Prague Spring, showed the popularity of these ideas.  Reformists and ordinary citizens disseminated these ideas in newspapers, samizdat – a way dissidents used to reproduce illegal, underground texts –and by listening to the radio.

In reaction to this, Leonid Brezhnev, the now General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, responded by launching a massive invasion of Czechoslovakia. The purposes of resorting to military intervention were threefold: to prevent a “domino effect” throughout the other member states of the Warsaw Pact, to shut down the liberal reform movement in Czechoslovakia and Eastern Europe, and to demonstrate a show of force to the West.[viii] The timing of the Prague Spring was less than ideal for Brezhnev, who wished to negotiate an arms deal with the United States that would link Western and Eastern powers. After all, Brezhnev’s experience in World War Two contributed to his desire to promote peace and avoid another global military conflict.  Despite this attitude, members of the Politburo – the Soviet Union’s chief political and executive committee – became increasingly worried about the developments in Czechoslovakia, especially proposed reforms that called into question Czechoslovakia’s military policies and its membership inside the Warsaw Pact.[ix]  The increasing momentum of the liberal reforms and the Politburo’s skepticism that Dubček would or could quell the movement led to Brezhnev agreeing to intervene militarily.

Later, the Soviet Union exercised the Sovereignty and the International Obligations of Socialist Countries, labeled the Brezhnev Doctrine by Western powers. While Brezhnev himself did not write the document, it is understood to have received Kremlin’s approval. The document articulated the Soviet Union’s right to intervene militarily in a foreign nation to preserve the socialist progress made within that country.[x] A month after the Soviet Union invaded Czechoslovakia, the Soviet Union used the doctrine to retroactively justify the invasion to quell the liberal reforms and protests.  Moreover, propaganda from the Soviet Union claimed that the liberal reforms in Czechoslovakia were a result of Western intervention and foreign infiltrators. The Soviets viewed the developments in Czechoslovakia as a threat to the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence, which they fought to gain following the World War Two negotiations at Yalta.

Led by the Soviet Union, the Warsaw Pact invaded one of its members by launching a full-scale military invasion of Czechoslovakia with 250,000 troops in 1968.  Soviet soldiers outnumbered other members of the invasion five to one. Despite protests internally and from abroad, the Soviet Union’s forceful military intervention allowed them to retain control of Czechoslovakia within eight months and secure the borders of their sphere of influence. It forcefully quelled the reformist movement inside Czechoslovakia as the country underwent a transition period, and Dubček was ultimately removed. Since Western powers did not intervene, the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia relieved Brezhnev as the borders between the West and the East were finalized. Both had their spheres of influence. This allowed Brezhnev to move forward with his goal of achieving an international security agreement to prevent future conflict between the two regions.[xi] Additionally, it provided a precedent for the Soviet Union to intervene beyond the European continent.

The Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan in 1979

Following the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia, Brezhnev led the Soviet Union into a détente with European powers. The peak of this period of communication and relaxation of tensions between the West and the East culminated in the Helsinki Accords of 1975. This agreement created a security framework between the Soviet Union, Western European powers, and even the United States that would formally set the political borders of continental Europe while laying the groundwork for establishing an economic partnership between both regions. The Helsinki Accords received Brezhnev and the Politburo’s support as it formalized the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence while also ensuring peace between the two adversaries; however, the inclusion of Basket III – a series of human rights stipulations proposed by Western European negotiators – created reluctance on behalf of some members of the Politburo. Nonetheless, the Soviet Union adopted the Helsinki Accords.  Brezhnev successfully formalized the boundaries of the Soviet Union’s sphere of influence, established the USSR as a great European power, and created an arms agreement with the United States.[xii] While tensions between the West and East seemed to have quelled during the 1970s in continental Europe, the involvement of both parties internationally would only heighten.

Later, during Brezhnev’s leadership, the Soviet Union looked to expand the borders of its sphere of influence. This time, Brezhnev invaded Afghanistan in support of the Soviet-friendly government that had been installed there. Unlike in Eastern Europe, the Central Asian country became home to one of the Cold War’s several proxy wars, where support for the Afghani paramilitary forces received covert backing from the United States, the United Kingdom, and other countries from around the globe. The members of the Yalta Conference were now engaged in a military conflict after their ideological disputes in Crimea just three decades prior.

Since the end of World War Two, members of the Grand Alliance were not only facing hostilities against one another but also looked to assert themselves globally by influencing countries of the “Third World”. As a result, they looked to provide economic assistance and sell military weapons to the governments that supported their ideological and structural practices. The case was no different in Afghanistan.  The mountainous country in Central Asia was crucial for the Soviet Union, especially as tensions between China and the United States had soothed.[xiii]

Afghanistan received aid from the Soviet Union and the United States in the 1960s, dating back to the 1940s, as part of the race between the two powers to influence as many countries and governments as possible and governments around the “Third World.” Afghanistan repeatedly requested economic assistance from the United States to improve its roads and infrastructure while it purchased military supplies from the Soviet Union. Neither the Soviet Union nor the United States wanted Afghanistan to be too heavily influenced by the other. Tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union peaked during the 1960s and 1970s when Afghanistan underwent a military coup that led to a civil war.

Previously, in 1965, King Muhammad Zahir Shah of Afghanistan faced few political issues despite the People’s Democratic Party of Afghanistan (PDPA) – the communist party in Afghanistan – being formed in 1965.  However, in 1973, King Zahir Shah was overthrown by Muhammad Daoud Khan, who instituted a republican form of government with himself as the nation’s president. Ultimately, under the leadership of Daoud, the Afghani government formed a one-party government that eliminated all other political parties, including the PDPA. As tensions increased throughout Afghanistan, especially in the country’s more rural areas where local leaders were the beneficiaries of greater degrees of power from King Zahir Shah, Daoud arrested the leaders of two opposing communist factions that had gained favor in these areas. As a result of the arrests, left-leaning leaders of the country’s military force stormed the royal palace where Daoud resided and killed him, his family members, and many of his ministers, resulting in the country’s April Revolutions.  Leaders of the Khalq and Parcham communist parties led the ensuing government that formed. Together, this coalition government instituted a series of communist reforms on land, the economy, and schools, and they sought additional support and closer ties with the Soviet Union, which included a treaty signed between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan in December 1978.

The treaty between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan allowed the Soviet Union to intervene in the Central Asian country upon Afghanistan’s request. In January 1979, the Politburo began to assist Afghanistan in quelling the insurrections they faced among urban and rural populations that rejected the communist reforms. These rebel groups became known as the Mujahideen. Because of the communist leadership’s inability to quell the mujahideen’s guerilla warfare tactics, the Soviet Union’s Politburo ultimately approved the invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan occurred during the negotiations between the United States and the USSR over the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks II (SALT II), which aimed to curtail each nation’s nuclear arms arsenal. Although the Soviet Union knew that their assistance to the Afghani government might jeopardize their negotiations with the Americans, they were equally concerned with the proximity of Afghanistan’s internal troubles. After all, Afghanistan bordered the Soviet Union, and the Politburo’s leadership would not welcome such a proximate American influence.  Additionally, the invasion of Czechoslovakia could be used to intervene in foreign conflicts in which socialism had made progress. And so, just as the Brezhnev Doctrine was used retroactively to justify the invasion in Eastern Europe, it was now used for the same purposes in Central Asia.

Soviet intervention in Afghanistan intensified over the years, resulting in hundreds of thousands of troops pouring into the mountainous terrain. As the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan increased, the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the United States began to assist the rebel forces against the nation’s communist leadership and Soviet troops. With Brezhnev’s health declining, the Politburo was the organization that essentially made the decisions in Afghanistan. As the Soviet Union suffered economic and social stagnation, its foreign policy mirrored the superpower’s internal struggles.  As the Soviet Union intended to project strength globally, it paradoxically took resources away from looking after its population. As a result, domestic affairs in the Soviet Union and its approach to foreign policy would suffer. Ultimately, the reformist Gorbachev became the leader of the Communist Party in the Soviet Union and withdrew its military from Afghanistan.

Verbal and Written Debate

Much of the information will be given to the students through journals, magazines, government documents, and newspaper articles. Students will be reading and watching videos throughout the unit, as this is how many people receive their news today. Students will be exposed to various texts, films, podcasts, and many other forms of media. As students read and enhance their literacy skills, they will then complete writing assignments that they will use to debate and present each other.  This assignment allows students to learn how to articulate their opinions in written and verbal format.

Students will develop critical thinking skills by studying philosophy, politics, geography, and history and learn to construct verbal and written arguments using textual evidence. These skills allow students to improve their reading and writing skills while developing their logical thinking ability and forming persuasive and evidence-based arguments. By learning these skills, students can apply these concepts throughout periods to better understand the past and our political and social climates today.

Voter Registration

To prepare students to become engaged in their local, regional, and global communities, they must be aware of the history of their community and nation. These topics can be used within the classroom to promote active civic participation, encouraging students to study the past to understand the present. This practice will result in students’ ability to apply concepts and practices throughout history to understand the origin and workings of modern-day societies, cultures, and institutions. Understanding the past is crucial to understanding how the history of philosophy, geography, and culture impacts how our government and politics work in today’s economic world, both nationally and globally.

By connecting the history of the Cold War and how tensions between the West and East play out today, students will see their role as global citizens in today’s world.  This unit aims for students to become more politically active in international affairs by registering to vote for the offices and positions that most significantly impact these foreign policy decisions.

Care for the Humanities

After learning about various topics and how they relate to the three branches and levels of government, students will spend time reflecting on each topic.  During these reflections, students will consider how the issue contributes to the political division the United States faces today. Upon doing this, students will evaluate how the problem can be better explored to understand the political division the country faces today. This way, students can explore the multiple perspectives that make up the identity politics of the nation. Students will learn to remain vigilant as citizens and as residents. This will lead to students holding government officials accountable and creating a better understanding of how government works in practice in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and the United States more broadly.

This unit plan aims to address the division that exists between the West and the East today. By learning about the histories of both regions, students will examine the multiple perspectives of the Cold War and the positions of Western and Eastern nations today. This way, students can better understand how the policies global players such as the United States and Russia take today impact the individual lives of human beings in North America, Europe, and elsewhere around the world.

The following lesson plans are listed and described below to ensure students understand the unit’s concepts properly.  This is not an exhaustive list for this curriculum unit.  (Note: SWBAT = Students will be able to; IOT = in order to).

Paper 1 Quiz

Objective:

SWBAT read a collection of primary and secondary sources IOT complete a quiz formatted according to the IB History Paper 1 guidelines.

Materials:

• “The Cold War: An Orthodox View” in The Origins of the Cold War, 1941-1949
• “The Cold War: A Revisionist View” in The Origins of the Cold War, 1941-1949

Procedure:

Students will read a collection of primary and secondary sources related to the origins of the Cold War.  The documents examine the United States’ intentions regarding how the Soviet Union conducted its foreign policy.  After reading the sources, students will respond to open-ended questions that prompt them first to understand each historical source.  Additionally, students must extract the values and limitations of one of the document’s origin, purpose, and content as a historical source.  Then, students must compare and contrast the historical sources as evidence.  Lastly, students must reference the sources by evaluating and synthesizing evidence from both documents in addition to the student’s background knowledge.

Perspectives on the Brezhnev Doctrine

Objective:

SWBAT read a series of primary sources IOT understand the attitudes of politicians and other leaders in the West and East.

Materials:

• The Prague Spring, 1968
• “Afghanistan” in Russia, America and the Cold War, 1949-1991

Procedure:

Students will read a series of excerpts from primary sources.  The compilation of documents includes perspectives from Western and Eastern leaders.  After determining the values and limitations of each document’s origin, purpose, and content, students will be asked to write a free response analyzing individuals involved or subject to the Brezhnev Doctrine and viewing it as aligned with socialist policy.

Current Connections

Objective:

SWBAT read The International Obligations of Socialist Countries IOT compares the views and foreign policies of most Soviet leaders during the Brezhnev era and today’s world.

Materials:

• “Brezhnev Doctrine”
• The Origins of the Cold War, 1941-1949
• Russia, America and the Cold War, 1949-1991
• Current Events Articles

Procedure:

First, students will read an excerpt from the document known as the Brezhnev Doctrine.  Then, students will select a current events article about a conflict between the West and the East from a predetermined list.  For each current events article, students must explain the West and the East perspectives.  After completing this section, students will draft a statement detailing how the two regions’ history has shaped relations between the West and East.  Students will be asked to draw references to World War Two and the Cold War.

Annotated Bibliography

“Brezhnev Doctrine.”  Seventeen Moments in Soviet History: An On-Line Archive of Primary Sources. https://soviethistory.msu.edu/?s=the+brezhnev+doctrine.

• This site provides the text of what became known as the Brezhnev Doctrine and several other primary sources throughout the Soviet Union’s history.

Brune, Lester H., and Richard Dean Burns. Chronology of the Cold War, 1917-1992. New York: Routledge, 2006.

• Brune and Burns’ account of the Cold War provides a detailed timeline of events during the Soviet Union’s existence.

Dijk, Ruud van. Encyclopedia of the Cold War. New York: Routledge, 2008.

• Dijk defines an expansive list of historical players, events, places, and more in this comprehensive document of the Cold War’s history.

Leffler, Melvyn P., and Odd Arne Westad. The Cambridge History of the Cold War. Volume 1, Origins. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.

• In this first volume, Leffler and Westad provide an overview of the Cold War’s history.

Leffler, Melvyn P., and Odd Arne Westad. The Cambridge History of the Cold War. Volume 2, Crises and Détente. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.

• Leffler and Westad continue their history of the Cold War in their second volume.

McCauley, Martin.  Russia, America and the Cold War, 1949-1991.  London: Pearson Education Limited, 2004.

• McCauley provides a detailed account of the tensions between Russia and the United States while pairing primary sources for student use.

McCauley, Martin.  The Origins of the Cold War, 1941-1949.  London: Pearson Education Limited, 2003.

• McCauley provides a detailed account of the origins of the Cold War while pairing primary sources for student use.

McMahon, Robert J. The Cold War: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.  McMahon reviews

Nathens, Benjamin.  “From Circle to Square.” To the Success of Our Hopeless Cause: The Many Lives of the Soviet Dissident Movement. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2024.

• Nathens documents the dissident movement during the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.

Ouimet, Matthew J. The Rise and Fall of the Brezhnev Doctrine in Soviet Foreign Policy. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press, 2003.

• Ouimet offers a brief introductory account of the Cold War.

The Prague Spring, 1968 edited by Jaromír Navrátil.  Budapest: Central European University Press, 1998.

• This book compiles a series of primary sources related to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.

Below is a list of standards from the social studies section of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania’s Department of Education.  These standards will be guidelines for students to think critically about political parties.

History

Standard – 8.1.12.B: Evaluate the interpretation of historical events and sources, considering the use of fact versus opinion, multiple perspectives, and cause and effect relationships.

Standard – 8.4.12.C: Evaluate how continuity and change have impacted today’s world.

• Belief systems and religions
• Commerce and industry
• Technology
• Politics and government
• Physical and human geography
• Social organization