The Collapse of Communism

the reason for the collapse of the berlin wall was that people left countrys without exiting visas and caused a migration to east germany. countries formed a union against communism called the warsaw pact. Which denied communism into countries. communist parties still stayed political. traditional communist partys with dictators china cuba north korea and others. also chinese parties crushed their schools. The U.S. was able to profit from its imperialist exploitation of other countries while socialism could only lose economically in that competition.

Mikhail Gorbachev and the Collapse of Communism

Mikhail Gorbachev is the president of Russia. he was 54 and he was the youngest president. Mikhail decided that since russia was a totalitarian state, and nothing was getting done,that he should open up russia more so that free fresh new ideas will come and make Russia more better. This was called the "Glasnost". This was to promote openess in Russia.

In 1985, Gorbachev made something new called "Peristrokia". This was to make economic reforms. Local managers had full rights to their farms and property and people were able to have private small businesses.

Nelson Mandela and Apartheid

The apartheid was a racial segragation policy in South Africa. just like the one in the United States. But they were segragated from 1948-1990. this thing stated that only white people had the right to do things like voting. but all the other peoples, known as the bantu, didnt have those rights.Nelson Mandela was sent to jail because of this.

nelson mandela fought for the independence of South Africa. he was in the ANCs fight to promote non-violence methods to get freedom and justice and to stop the Apartheid. because of this he was a hero. he was in jail for 26 years and he got out,wrote a book and continued to fight for his people. the people liked this about him. so when the election came they voted for him and he was over in 61% votes.

Film Lesson: "The Right Stuff"

Both the US and USSR were competing to see who was the 1st to who gets to space. And at some point, the US was very embarrassed because they 1st sent up a monkey and instead of a man and it made them look bad. A few nights later, Russia sent up their very first man to space. That was why the US was very embarrassed because it made them seem better then the US. The Russians got a head start on going to space 1st. But the ones who won the race was the US because we were the first man to land on the moon. The scenes from the movie that will help me remember about the cold war would be when the scientist was testing out the rockets, and all of them failed. The reason why that would remind me of the cold war is because it shows me how funny it was when the Americans and the Russians were on a race to see who is smarter, stronger and better then each other but they all wound up failing.

African Independence

Africa is a continent and it is filled with over 20 countries. Africa didn't have any independence. The Europeans imperialized the continent and took it for themselves. Until 1955-1970, Africa had been gaining their independence back. The French, Spanish, English etc. took over them for a long time. They used them for their natural resources and cheap labor. Ghana was the first country to gain their independence. Kwame Nkrumah was leading for the people to get their independence. He was a teacher who spent time studying in the united states and came back to get more rights for his country, but ended up becoming the president of Ghana. Another nation was Kenya. In this country, their leader was in prison then he was elected leader. This is only one of the two countries that did this. The leaders name was Jomo Kenyatta. He led the Mau Maus so he can scare the white men away without fighting them. So during this time of fighting for independence, Africa changed a lot, they gained all of their independence from the European countries except for a few and most of them got to destroy their country's names and change them to something more african and create a flag. Like Zimbabwe was Rhodesia, then they changed it to Zimbabwe and created their own national flag to show their independence for that nation.

NATO and the Warsaw Pact

after ww2 the countries in western europe thought they were too weak to fight against the communist. So they made an alliance with 12 nations including UK and US. It was called NATO and it was officially made on April 4,1949 when they signed the North Atlantic Treaty. 6 years after NATO was made the Warsaw Pact was made by a communist military alliance to take power over Eastern Europe. They took over both European nations and let other nations know that they were a military and political force.

Film lesson: "Night and Fog"

I thought the Night and Fog movie was more powerful then Shindlers List because it showed the dead bodies and the real footage of how things happened. The scenes from Shindlers List was just acting and the scenes from Night and Fog were more real. I think that the Night and Fog one was more powerful because it showed more of the real footage and it even showed what they did to all the dead bodies after everything ended.

Film lesson: "Schindler's List"

Schindlers List was a way of showing how all the bad things that happened in the Hollacaust. Like what they did to the sick jews. They poisoned them and shot them. Also the showed where all the Jews hid from the Nazis. They had lil hiding spots in there camping rooms. And what was real messed up is that they chased down all the Jews that tried to run away even if they were kids and shot them. I think that itwas a powerful movie because it showed the horrible things that happened to the Jews like how they got shot and killed. 

The Treaty of Versailles ( end of WW1)

The Treaty of Versailles ended world war 1. Because of the treaty, the war between Germany and the Allied Powers had ended. The treaty also made the German emperor a war criminal and some other german fighters also. Also because of the treaty the Germans lost a lot of land. The Germans had to pay billions of dollars because of the damage they did. They also lost oversea territories. I think that the treaty was unfair because the Germans had to pay billions of dollars. I think they say the treaty led to the power of Hitler because at the time Germany was poor and had no hope in their country so Hitler wanted to give his country hope and wanted to bring Germany back up.

Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk) and the Modernization of Turkey

Mustafa Kemal made Turkey more modernized by giving women more freedom. Women were able to vote and he had government funded industrialize Turkey and for the economic growth. He also had a clothing rule so that Turkey can be more modernized. His rule was to dress civilized, wear boots or shoes,shirts and ties, jackets and waistcoats and a hat. He made government workers dress in western style business suits.He banned people from wearing the fez. The fez was a red hat that was a traditional thing for Turkish people to wear. He did this so that they can be more modern and more American.

Film Lesson "Gandhi"

India got its independence thanks to Gandhi. Gandhi used non violence and told all of his followers to use non violence to. No matter what they did, if the police beat them and hurt them they would not fight back. When the guards beat him for burning the papers he didn't do anything.He just kept burning the papers while they kept beating him.It made the british look bad because the British were beating and hurting defenseless indians. And the more they arrested Gandhi, the more people followed him because he did time in prison for the independence of India. Another thing he did to rebel against the British was that he didn't wear the british clothing. He made his own thread and wore only his own clothes made by the thread he rolled. He inspired other people and his followers to do that also. He also rebelled against the British by not buying their salt. He walked really far with a big group of followers to get their own salt instead of paying for the British salt.