Tell me about the fall of the GDR /his/
What happened? Collapse of the regime due to people's uprising?
Also can anyone tell me what it was like growing up in eastern Europe from the sixties or seventies onwards? I like reading people's experience of that
A fall due to even losing russian support
>>348002
Generally any state that literally has to build a wall to keep its citizens in is going to have stability problems. The only thing that kept them afloat was the fact that they were a Russian puppet and they saw what happened to Hungary and Czechoslovakia.
>>348002
>Also can anyone tell me what it was like growing up in eastern Europe from the sixties or seventies onwards? I like reading people's experience of that
Read "Stasiland" it's chock full of interviews from GDR citizens, both in favor and against the former state.
>>348981
Yeah, their students were chanting for Gorby to save them during the 40th anniversary ceremony. That's pretty bad.
>>348987
They had a relatively high standard of living overall. The wall was seen by some as a means to prevent Westerners from taking cheaper, subsidized basic goods and preventing mingling and thus WWIII.
>>348995
>They had a relatively high standard of living overall
And yet they still lagged behind West Germany.
Stasi was worse than Stalin
>>349063
Well, yes, I didn't say that, did I? It's understandable that they lagged behind given the dismantling of whatever industry remained after the bombing and taken off to the USSR, not to mention the lack of Marshall Plan bucks. The USSR was in no position to support their client states like the West was.
>>348995
>The wall was seen by some as a means to prevent Westerners from taking cheaper, subsidized basic goods and preventing mingling and thus WWIII.
And yet all of the defenses were on the "East" side of the wall. They weren't concerned with keeping West Germans out so much as they were with keeping East Germans in.
1. GDR
2. Czechoslovakia
3. Hungary
4. Poland
MASSIVE POWER GAP
5. Bulgaria
6. USSR
7. Romania
>>349109
USSR was kind of tolerable in the Baltics, everywhere else it was pure hell.
>>349129
Kind of tolerable? Every Baltic dude who ever had an opinion on it all hate the Russians...
>>349132
I mean relative to the rest of the SU.
>hating the Russians
Probably for a good reason too.