The Iron Curtain is a political cliche. The term "Iron Curtain"

Real iron curtains appeared in theaters in the late 18th century. The scene was mainly illuminated with candles, so there was always a chance of a fire. In the event of a fire between the stage and the auditorium, a curtain of iron fell, which blocked the fire.

But the term "Iron Curtain" appeared on everyone's lips by no means in connection with security technology in the theaters of the Renaissance. This is a political cliche, which is called a difficult period in world history.

The Iron Curtain in Political Terminology

The "Iron Curtain" is a political metaphor that means the political, economic and cultural isolation of the country, in this case the USSR, from other states.

Who is the author of the expression?

Basically, authorship is attributed to Churchill, but this is not entirely true. If to be extremely accurate, then for the first time this metaphor was used by the Russian philosopher Vasily Rozanov in the book "The Apocalypse of Our Time", written in 1917. He compared the events of the October Revolution with the theatrical action, after which, with a clang, creak, a bulky iron curtain fell over Russian history. It's not good that this performance, according to Rozanov, did not bring, on the contrary, the public, who watched all this, suddenly became naked and homeless.

Two years later, at the Paris Peace Conference, this expression was used by the Prime Minister of France, Georges Clemenceau, in his speech. He declared the readiness of the capitalist countries to build around Bolshevism a huge iron curtain to protect Western civilization from harmful influence. It is not known whether he borrowed this metaphor from Rozanov or invented it himself. Whatever it was, this capacious expression came into widespread use only almost 30 years after Churchill's speech.

But before that (March 1945) was still written an article by Joseph Goebbels entitled "The Year 2000". Realizing the proximity of the defeat of Germany, this minister of Nazi propaganda wanted at least to quarrel with the allies of the time - the US and Britain - and set them against the USSR, describing the gloomy prospects of the future if the Germans surrendered. Expansion of the Russians in the east and south-east Europe, he called the same term "Iron Curtain". This assumption turned out to be prophetic.

A year later, the words of Goebbels began to come true little by little. Then the prime minister of Great Britain, Winston Churchill, wishing to warn the USA of the imminent danger of Bolshevism, delivered his famous speech in Fulton, which is considered the starting point of the Cold War. According to him, the "Iron Curtain" is the isolation of the USSR from other states. He voiced what countries will fall under the socialist influence: Germany, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Austria, Romania, Yugoslavia. So it happened.

How did the "Iron Curtain" in the USSR

Since 1946, Stalin is building around the USSR a "sanitary ring" from "friendly" socialist states to prevent a military invasion. Everything that resembled the West was declared harmful and harmful. The world for Soviet citizens was divided into black and white, that is, to capitalism and socialism. And oil on the fire poured both warring sides.

In addition to the unofficial confrontation, the initiators of the conflict formalized their dislike officially by joining opposing alliances. In 1949, the North Atlantic Alliance (NATO) was created, and in 1955 the Warsaw Pact was signed.

The Berlin Wall erected in 1961 became a visible symbol of such opposition to the two political systems.

The strained relations of the bipolar world influenced both trade and economic ties between the two blocs of states.

In addition, Western media have created a lot of myths and legends about life in the country, where the "Iron Curtain" is omitted. Years of isolation have done their thing.

Life behind the "Iron Curtain"

How did such isolation affect the lives of ordinary citizens?

First of all, they had a very limited opportunity to get abroad the USSR (trips to "friendly" countries do not count, because there everything was very much like the Soviet reality). The units managed to do this, but they were followed closely by agents of special services.

In general, the KGB could learn about everyone's life absolutely everything. Citizens with "unreliable" views were always on the note of the special services. If someone had a wrong opinion from the point of view of the party, he could easily be declared an enemy of the people, and in different years this meant either a reference or a shooting.

Residents of the Land of Soviets were extremely limited in the choice of clothes, equipment, transport. Then the notion of "deficiency" appeared. Get something worthwhile (real jeans, cigarettes, "Marlboro" or even the plate "The Beatles") could only be for a large bluff. The "Iron Curtain" in the USSR influenced the sphere of culture: many European and American films, books, songs were simply banned.

How was destroyed

The Cold War lasted more than 40 years. During this time, both superpowers were tired of the arms race. In 1987, an agreement was signed on the destruction by both states of certain types of missiles. Further, the USSR withdrew troops from Afghanistan. The new General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev radically changed the foreign policy of the state. In 1989 the Berlin Wall fell. In 1991, the Soviet Union ceased to exist. Thus, the notorious "Iron Curtain" over the post-Soviet space was finally raised.

"Iron Curtain" is a history lesson, for which many had to pay a very expensive price.