Mikhail Gorbachev and the Collapse of Communism

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

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

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

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"

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

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"

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.