Warsaw Pact

The Warsaw Pact (Officially the Treaty of Friendship, Co-operation and Mutual Assistance, Russian Договор о дружбе, сотрудничестве и взаимной помощи) was a political and military organization made up of the communist states of Eastern Europe. The Warsaw Pact was officially formed on May 14, 1955, in response to the integration of West Germany in to NATO. The Warsaw Pact effectively lasted until November 9, 1989, when the Berlin Wall fell and officially ceased to exist on July 1st, 1991.

Background and founding

Immediately after the World War II, Soviet General Secretary of the Communist Party Josef Stalin, sent Konstantin Rokossovsky to Warsaw and gave him the title of Marshal of Poland to add to his existing rank as Marshal of the Soviet Union. In Warsaw Rokossovsky held the posts of Minister of Defence, Deputy President of the Council of Ministers and Member of the Politburo of the Polish Communist Party. Thus a Marshal of the Soviet Union served as deputy to the head of the Polish government. Rokossovsky, nor any other General in the Polish army, spoke Polish, relying constantly on interpreters. The relationship between Generalissimo of the Soviet Union, J. V. Stalin and Rokossovsky was based upon the fact that Stalin gave the orders, and that Rokossovsky carried them out.

All decisions were taken in the Kremlin and monitored by the Kremlin. The Defence Ministers of the East European countries were regarded as equal in status to the Commanders of Soviet Military Districts and they came under the direct command of the Soviet Minister of Defence. All appointments and postings were decided upon by the Kremlin. The Defence Ministers of the `sovereign' states of Eastern Europe were either appointed from the ranks of Soviet generals or were `assisted' by Soviet military advisers. In Romania and Bulgaria, for instance, one such `adviser' was Marshal of the Soviet Union Tolbukhin. In East Germany there was Marshal Zhukov himself, in Hungary Marshal of the Soviet Union Konev. Each adviser had at his disposal at least one tank army, several all-arms armies and special SMERSH, or Red Army Counterintelligence punitive detachments.

In Czechoslovakia there was Ludwig Svoboda, who neutralised the Czech army in 1948 and again in 1968. He carried out the orders of the USSR promptly so it was not necessary to keep a Soviet Marshal in Prague holding a ministerial post in the Czech government. During the World War II all of the East European countries had been enemies of the Soviet Union and it was therefore possible to execute any political figure, general, officer or private soldier, at any given time and replace them with someone more cooperative with the socialist system.

After the death of Stalin, the Soviet government, headed by Marshal of the Soviet Union Nikolai Bulganin, decided to conclude an official military agreement with the countries it was occupying. The signatory for the Soviet Union was Marshal of the Soviet Union Georgi Zhukov, and for the Polish socialist regime Marshal of the Soviet Union Rokossovsky, assisted by Colonel-General S. G. Poplavsky—Rokossovsky's deputy. Marshal of the Soviet Union Bulganin, who was present at the ceremony, took the opportunity to award Colonel-General Poplavsky the rank of General of the Army. Poplavsky, who signed for Poland, was also a Soviet general and the subordinate of Marshals Bulganin, Zhukov and Rokossovsky. Within two years Poplavskiy had returned to the USSR and become deputy to the Inspector General of the Soviet Army. Rokossovsky, Poplavsky, Fyodor Petrovich Polynin and the others were compelled by Soviet legislation to carry out the orders which reached them from Moscow. The Warsaw Treaty did not fundementally change Poland's dependence upon the USSR.