Tom Global Blog

Mikhail Gorbachev and the Collapse of Communism

2010-05-07T09:58:00.000-07:00

Mikhail Gorbachev was the president of Russia. He was age 54 when he was elected the president of Russia. He was very young when he got elected, therefore giving him a lot of knowledge on the politics and economy. He was a communist leader, but unlike the other communist leader. He wasn't as strict as the others. He was actually one of the reason why the collapse of communist happen. He also opened up communist letting everyone know that communist was bringing down the economy. He knew that the idea of communist was coming to an end and he didn't want it to be kept a secret. So he opened up the economy, this was called Glasnost. The Glasnost was suppose to help lessen the corruption in the Soviet Union. Basically the Glasnost was to open up the government secret, to let everyone know what was going on and etc. He also created the Peristrokia which was the resurrecting of the Soviet political and economic system. Both these ideas terribly failed and eventually resulted in the collapse of communism of the USSR. Once this happened communism around the world ended. Russia is still adjusting to its change of Capitalism.

The Collapse of Communism

2010-05-07T09:29:00.000-07:00

Communism collapse all over the world once communist ended in Russia. This was a shock to everyone because people thought communist was building up. The people of Russia acutally didnt like the idea of communist and acutally overthrew their communist leaders, this started in a lot of communist countries. The Eastern Bloc formed by the Warsaw Pact began to reject communist and this was a huge impact on the communist countries. Once the Eastern Bloc overthrew the communist leaders, other countries began follow the lead and communist began falling from that point.
On New Year's Eve 1991 USSR finally collaspes and at the same time the Berlin Wall fell. People teared down the Berlin Wall because communist no longer needed to be separeted into two different system. Many countries became capitalism and democratic. The only countries that remained communist is North Korea and Cuba. Communist isnt as threatening as it use to be.

Nelson Mandela and Apartheid

2010-04-29T09:29:00.000-07:00

The Apartheid was a policy of segaration among the black and white. This government was established by the British that was controlling South Africa during the times of 1948-1994. This policy was about the whites being superior than everyone else. This serparted the whites and the Bantu. The Bantu was any race that was black, colored or Indian. These people had no rights meaning they didnt have citizenship and the right to vote. This was all taken away by the British. This policy made the white better then everyone else. Many people went against this policy and because of this the ANC formed. Nelson Mandela was one the ANC member that stood out and went against this policy and fought against the British. He was then arrested and put into jail for 26 years.

After the release of Nelson Mandela on Feb 11, 1990 he continued his fighting for the independence of South Africa. All the Bantu supported Nelson and was right behind him after he got out of jail. Nelson used non-violence to fight for the independence of South Africa, just like Ghandhi. He then wrote a book called the Long Walk to Freedom. This inspired many people and eventually helped him get elected in 1991. After the election he continued to fight for the independence of South Africa. By 1994 South Africa got its independence from the British. Everyone admired Nelson because of what he accomplished with South Africa.

African Independence

2010-04-28T09:30:00.000-07:00

During the times between 1955 and 1975, Africa countries has progressed greatly. The Europeans mainly controlled Africa for their natural resources. During the 20 years many countries in Africa started a revolution against the Europeans. The Europeans were also very racist back then they thought they were better then the Africans. The Africans then grew tired of being under the country of the Europeans and started fighting back to the Europeans. The Europeans thought that they were actually helping the Africans by civilizing them. The Europeans also named a country of Africa after Cecil Rhodes called Rhodesia. This was before the African fought against the Europeans for their freedom. Eventually the African won their freedom from the Europeans and that country is now called Zimbabwe.
There was many Africans leads that brought the countries of Africa freedom. Jomo Kenyatta was one of them. Jomo Kenyatta was an African from Kenya, he was a very educated kid. He lived in Europe for his school years. During his years in Europe he fought for the freedom of Africans. He then returned to Kenya and was arrested shortly. He spent 7 years in prison and right when he got out, he was elected president of Kenya. Shortly after Kenyatta was elected president, he led his country to a revolution and eventually won the revolution and Kenya gained their independence from the Europeans. By the year of 1994 many countries of Africa won their independence from Africa.

Film Lesson: "The Right Stuff"

2010-04-14T09:29:00.000-07:00

The movie The Right Stuff talks about the Cold War. This was when the Russian and Americans were competing over the bragging rights of space. At first the Russians were in the lead and the Americans was embarrassed that the Russians were in the league, so the Americans put a lot of money into the space program. This space program was called NASA. In the movie The Right Stuff it showed the Americans searching for 7 people that they would send to space. These 7 people had to be very fit and educated. Eventually the 7 people also got mad because the Russians sent their 1st man into space. The Americans felt like they were behind. The scenes that would help me remember about the cold war would have to be the newspaper because in the movie the newspaper would keep everyone updated on whats happening. Another scene would have to be the different rockets the Americans test out because it showed how the Americans were falling behind the Russians.
Although in the movie The Right Stuff showed the Russians winning the competition of space. The Americans eventually won the competition by going to the moon. Americans were the first country to ever go to the moon.

NATO and The Warsaw Pact

2010-04-12T09:14:00.000-07:00

The NATO was formed during the Cold War. The NATO was an organization between Europe and North America. They were against the communist. The NATO were formed by The Americans, Canada and some countries from Europe. This alliance system was formed because Americans was afraid that the spread of communist would spread. Another reason why alliance system was formed to protect each other if one of the countries were attacked by communist. Their objective was to prevent the spread of communist. This NATO organization led to the war of the Vietnam which the Americans lost and it later became a communist countries. There was also another war called the Korean War, the objective of this war was to keep the communist away from South Korea. Eventually America won this war.
The Warsaw Pact later formed. This was also an alliance system. This organization was formed by the communist countries with the exception of China, Russia, Poland and Chezkalyva.. The Warsaw Pact objective was to spread communist. They formed the Warsaw Pact because they took the NATO as a threat to their objective.

Film Lesson: "Schindler's List"

2010-03-25T09:28:00.000-07:00

The movie Schindler's list was the Hollywood version of the holocaust. The movie was about a guy called Schindler who was in the Nazi party and he was a good guy. The Jewish people that worked for Schindler was basically safe from being killed. The movie showed the steps of what they did to the Jewish until Hilter final solution. The Nazi first started moving the Jews to the Ghetto which was a small town with about 10 Jews living in a small space. It was very brutal because they would make the Jews work and if the Nazi soldiers saw lack in the Jews, they would kill them. They later found out that they didn't like the Ghetto idea, so they move them to labor camp where the Jews would work all day and those who showed weakness was killed. Hilter then came up with the idea The Final Solution, it was basically the end of the war and Hilter just wanted to kill all the Jews and those who was on Schindler's list was safe. That was just a brief summary of what the movie was about.
The most brutal part of the money was probably the labor camp because they would killed the unhealthy Jews and also separate the kids from the parents. In the labor camp the Nazi would make them burn the dead body of the Jews to leave no evidence of what happen to the dead bodies. The image that would probably never leave my head is probably the places the Jews hid at. I think Night and Fog had more of a powerful movie because it showed real footages from the death camps.

Film Lesson: "Night and Fog"

2010-03-24T09:33:00.000-07:00

The movie Night and Fog was made 10 years after WWII ended and the camp of Auschwitz was closed . This movie was about a guy that did a documentation of the death camp in Auschwitz. The movie was about footages that the Nazi took and the footages showed the stuff the nazi would do to the Jewish. When I saw this movie, my reaction was just speechless because if you saw what they did to the Jews was just total annihilation of a race. They killed the Jews with almost everything you can think of like gas chambers, guns, and etc. The Nazi would also put the Jews on work and sometimes make the Jews dig their own graves.
Night and Fog and Schindlers list shared same scenes like what they did to the Jews and how it all started. The difference between these two movies was that Night and Fog was a documentation of what happen in the holocaust and Schindler's list was a Hollywood version of the holocaust. I think the movie Night and Fog explains the holocaust better because the movie had real footages from the deathcamps. They also show all the details of what they did to the Jews

The Treaty of Versailles (ended WW I)

2010-02-25T09:45:00.000-08:00

The Treaty of Versailles was a treaty made up by the French and the English. This treaty ended WWI, Germany went to Versailles, France and had to sign it as a loss of defeat. This treaty was totally unfair, it basically blamed Germans for everything. The treaty said the Germans caused WWI, the Germans was responsible for all the lives lost and the German was responsible for the expenses of the war. The Treaty of Versailles as you can see was a totally unfair treaty, but the Germans couldn't do anything about it because they lost the war. After WWI the Germans went through a depression and many people didn't have or lost their jobs. WWI also impacted the Americans because the Germans borrowed some money from the Americans and that led to a American depression.
In 1923 a guy called Adolf Hitler tried to overthrow the government and was sent to prison. During prison he wrote a book and that book was basically about the Germans losing the war because of the weak government Germany had. Hitler then promised he was get the people out of the depression and people believed him. They wanted a strong leader. In January 1933 Hitler and his party the Nazi took over Germany. Hitler blamed the Jews for everything, he then became a dictator. Eventually this led to WWII and historians say that it was the Treaty of Versailles that led to WWII, i agree with this because the treaty took an huge impact on Germany and that's when they needed a leader to guide them through it. That's when Hitler came in and it led to WWII

Mustafa Kemal (Ataturk) and the Modernization of Turkey

2010-02-24T09:36:00.000-08:00

Before Mustafa Kenmal became the president, he was a military leader. He fought for the independence of Turkey which was known as the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Empire was a country full of muslims before Turkey got its independence. Mustafa then became the 1st president of Turkey for 15 years. During the time he was a president of Turkey he tried to modernize the people of Turkey. He wanted the people to dress more like the Europeans and American. He wanted the people to be more secular meaning he wanted the people of Turkey to be less religious. One thing he did was he banned fez, a fez was a brimless hat that the people of Turkey wore. He also didn't want the people to wear the long dresses. He stated that he wanted the state of Turkey to have free privileges of certain stuff. He created a Secular government before he passed away.

Film Lesson: "Gandhi"

2010-02-11T09:29:00.000-08:00

Gandhi was born on Oct 2,1869. Mohandos Karamchand Gandhi an Indian philosopher who fought for the independence of India which was under the control of the British. Gandhi fought against the British using non-violence, he believed that violence will only lead to more violence and that wasn't what he wanted. He led his people to boycott the British, in other words Gandhi told his people to not buy anything from the British. He told his people to stop buying British goods and to make their own cloths. The salt march was one of the things that Gandhi did, the salt march was when Gandhi and his people would walk 10 miles a day to the sea ocean and make their own salt. This was totally illegal, the British didn't let people make their own salt without their permission. In the end India got their Independence and Gandhi was the savior of India, but Gandhi didn't complete everything he did. He also wanted the Muslim and Hindu to get along and live together, but this never happened and now the two religions are separated. Most muslim now live in Pakistan.

Extra Credit: I think India wouldn't have won their independence from British without Gandhi because no one would have the guts to lead India and if India was to use violence against the British, the British would have won because of their technology. World War II happened when India won its Independence from the British. Another reason why the Indians won their independence from British was because British couldn't be worrying about India while fighting Hilter in WWII

The Russian Revolution

2010-01-13T06:06:00.000-08:00

The Russian Revolution started because the Russian people were tired of Czar. They didn't like the way Czar was running Russia. Especially the army, Czar put them into war with basically no food and the Germans was killing them because of the low technology the Russians had. This all started the Russian revolution. The Russian wanted a new government and decided they wanted communism. This revolution was led by the Bolshevik and Lenin was their leader. Once the Russian army quit the war against Germany because of lack in supplies and to many Russian was dying. The revolution began. On the March Walk Czar was forced to step down and quickly the Bolshevik took this as an advantage and took over Russia. Lenin promised them peace, land and bread. The communist party was more about sharing and having the government control everything. Russia then become a communist country

Cause of WWI

2010-01-11T06:33:00.000-08:00

World War I was the the first big war. This war started with Imperialism, when countries were fighting over territory in Europe. This than cause the triple alliance and the triple Entente. The triple alliance included the Germany, Italy and Austria-Hungary. The triple entente included the France, Russia and England. They competed over territory. Militarism was the power each these nations had in military. Francis Ferdinand and his wife visited Sarajevo on June 28, 1914, it was their last visit to anywhere as they were shot by Serbians. Australia then made this assassination an excuse to start WWI. Nationalism then showed in the triple alliance and triple entente as they go on to war. Once Australia attack Serbia, Russia attacked Australia because Russia was in alliance with the Serbian. This then led other nations into this war causing it to be the 1st great war.

Opium Wars-Imperialism in China

2009-12-18T06:04:00.000-08:00

The Opium Wars started when the British wanted to trade tea with the chinese people. The main reason why the Opium War started was because the British wanted the tea and the chinese people refused to trade with them because they were very isolated. The Chinese people thought they were better then everyone else, so there was no need for the Chinese people to trade with the British. The British then started giving out free opium, opium was a drug that was given to the chinese people for free. Very soon the chinese people became very addicted to it.

The British then stop giving out free opium to chinese people and said, we wont give you anymore opium until you guys trade us tea. The chinese government then said to the British, you guys cant come into china and give our people free opium. This led to the Opium war. The chinese fought over for the Opium and the British fought over the tea. Eventually the British won because of their more superior weapons. The chinese technology and weapons were not as good as British because China was a very isolated country, they kept everything to themselves and thought they were more superior than the others. This isolation caused China in a lack of technology and weapons.

Mountains Of The Moon

2009-12-10T06:06:00.000-08:00

In the movie Mountains of the Moon the people faced many problems as the European went deeper into central Africa to find the source of the nile. Problems they faced while on their exploration were running into tribes, mosquito which carried malleria( there was no cure at that time), wild animals, and some of the Africians the European took with for their expidetion ran off with supplies for the exploration, so the people was short on supplies. Once they found the source of the Nile they name it Lake Victoria which is now the 3rd largest lake in the world. Why would they name a river that is in Africa after a Bristish Queen. The reason why was because the Africians didnt all come together and decided the name of the lake. The Bristish thought they discovered it which wasnt really true because their were tribes living by the Nile already. They Bristish councsil decided that the name of the nile should be named Lake Victoria. After the 2nd exploriation the European went back to Europe because they were running low on supplies and people were dying. After 2 yrs the European had more advanced weapons and they went back to Africa to conqueror central Africa. They easily conqueror central Africa because the Euorpean had machine guns and the Africians were still using spears and shield. Another reason why the Euorpean were successful in their defeat over the Africians was that they finally had a cure for malleria so no one was scared of gettin malleria

Imperialism Project

2009-12-07T08:38:00.000-08:00

We did the Imperialism Project to get a better understanding of where imperialism was around the world and which countries were imperialism and which ones were not. What I learned from the project was that British controlled many countries for their goods. From what I remember British controlled India, Canada, Eastern side of America and mostly all Africa. So British was pretty rich from all these resources they got from other countries. One outside information I wanted to share was that China wasn't controlled by British until British started giving them free drugs.

Karl Marx and Communism

2009-11-19T06:05:00.000-08:00

Karl Marx was an German philosopher that created the idea of Communism. He didn't agree with the conditions of the workers in Europe. He thought that the workers had more powers over the landlords and they should unite in a world revolution for Communism. Communism is when the goverment controls everything and the people have no control over the government, those who went against communism were treated harshly. He wanted communism to take over the world because he wanted everyone to be controlled by the government and everyone to have equal amount of money paid and equal work hours. Marx saw the workers as the good guys and he saw the owners as the bad guys because he thinks that the workers have more power over the owners, number wise.

Karl Marx and The Industrial Revolution

2009-11-18T13:01:00.000-08:00

Karl Marx born on May 5th, 1818 as a Jewish, German. Karl Marx created communism. He didn't like the idea of Industrial Revolution because he thought it wasn't fair for everyone. He didn't like the idea that one person would work less than some one else and they would be payed the same amount of money, sometimes the person that works less gets payed more. This led him to create communism which is still around in today's world. Karl Marx created communism because he thought everything should be equal. Communism is controlled by the government and everyone gets the same payment, same work hours and you are limited to what you buy. Although communism is not fair for the people, it is still around, but hopefully it will end soon.

Nationalism and The Creation of Italy

2009-10-27T06:01:00.000-07:00

Nationalism is when people take pride in their country or nationality. Nationalism is everywhere and are expressed in different ways. What makes a nationalism is the people all speak a common language, similar culture, food, same currency and etc. I am nationalistic by speaking the common language which is English. You can also tell when someone is supporting their nation by how they dress. The food I eat can show my nationalistic.

Italy was created when nationalism destroyed the empires. Italy was then ruled by Austria. In 1832 a 26 yr kid called Guiesseppe Mazzini made a group called the young Italy. The group didnt allow people older than 40. Guisseppe tought that it was best for Italy to have a democracy and peace. The attack failed and Austria was still under control of Italy. In 1858 Napoleon decided to help drive Austria back and that was very successful. Italy then became a democracy nation.

Simon Bolivar and Latin American Revoultions

2009-10-22T06:38:00.000-07:00

Simon Bolivar was an miltary leader and political leader. Born on july 24,1783 in Caracas, Venezuela. His parents died before he turned teen and his guardian knew he was a smart kid, so they put him in school. At the age of 19 he married a woman and a few years she died from yellow fever. During his depression of his wife deaf, he traveled to France and United States, which won their independence. Simon then returned to his country and decided that it was time for him to fight for his country and free them from Spain. He was not successful in the beginning of the fight for independence.

After he was captured, Simon escaped and fled to New Granada in Colombia where he regrouped and continue to fight for independence. In summer 1813 Simon led an force into Venezuela and was successful. Years later Simon escaped captured again and fled to New Granada, Colombia. Then Simon traveled to Haiti and made friends with them. Years later June 24,1821 Simon defeated the Spanish and declared the independence in Venezuela.

Simon started this revolution from all the ideas he got from France and American revolution. Even today we talked about him, the reason why he was so famous was because he fought for the independence of South America and freed the countries from Spain. He also help Ecuador, Colombia and Panama with their independence. Simon then became the dictator of Peru and after the victory against the Spaniards at Auacucho in 1824 upper Peru became its own state. They called the upper part of Peru Bolivia to honor Simon Bolivar.

The Enlightenment and John Locke

2009-10-01T06:20:00.000-07:00

The Enlightenment was a new way people came up with ideas. People like John Locke an english philosopher and an enlightenment thinker. His idea influenced people like Thomas Jefferson and Thomas Jefferson to write the declaration of independence. The declaration of independence is an example of an enlightenment, it's written by a group of enlightenment thinkers from America. It's about civil rights in America. This change the way people think in America, it also gave people the right to vote and every man was created equal.

Copernicus and the trial of Galileo

2009-09-18T06:10:00.001-07:00

The Scientific Revolution it was a theory and it separated into 2, Geocentric and the Heliocentric. The heliocentric theory was that the sun was the center of the universe and that it was stationary. Geocentric theory was that instead of the sun being the center, they thought the world was the center of the universe. Geocentric was the first theory to come out, but was it the right one? (will be answered in the end).

Now the Scientific Revolution was a study of geocentric and heliocentric. It was to prove which one is right. So the people decided to test it out. They found that heliocentric was just one of the planets orbiting the sun. Heliocentric was the right theory because the earth does not revolve around the sun. Geocentric was wrong because the sun does not revolve around earth.

Galileo challenged the theory of heliocentric, saying that the earth did not center the universe. The catholic church believed in heliocentric, Therefore Galileo was put in arrest because of what he believed in.

Scientific Revolution: The Scientific Method

2009-09-17T06:12:00.000-07:00

The scientific method was just a new way of thinking. This challenged all the the other theory's such as creation and evolution. An example for this method was the Aristotle theory of falling object that everyone for 1500 yrs has believed that heavier object falls faster than lighter objects. Basically the method was just to challenge other theory's by experimenting over and over again until they can prove the theory is right or wrong.

My personal thought of this method is more detailed than the other theory's and stuff. This method actually challenges and experiments the theory. This is also more believeable because its supports its answer with detailed information.

Evolution vs. Creation

2009-09-15T06:33:00.000-07:00

the theory of evolution was that everyone was related like birds and fishes. i personally think that evolution happened overtime, people, animals and another other living things evolved overtime.

creation has many theory's behind it, but the most importent one is for its religious belief. i think that this theory is true, but it has some twist behind it that doesnt really support this theory. when it comes to creation i think of a adam and eve, the first 2 living things.

my opinion on this is that evolution makes more sense,but then there isnt enough information to support this theory and there's also false information. creation can be true, but it also doesnt have enough information to support its theory, so its hard to say