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Czechoslovakia - History

Czechoslovakia - History: Encyclopedia II - Czechoslovakia - History

Main article: History of Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia arose in October 1918 as one of the succession states of Austria-Hungary at the end of World War I. It consisted of the present-day territories of the Czech Republic, Slovakia and (until 1939/29 June 1945) the Carpathian Ruthenia (Carpatho-Ukraine). Its territory included some of the most industrialized regions of the former Austria-Hungary, it was a democratic republic throughout the pre-World War II period, but was characterized by ethnic problems. The ethnic problems wer ...

Czechoslovakia: Encyclopedia II - Czechoslovakia - History

Czechoslovakia - History

Main article: History of Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovakia arose in October 1918 as one of the succession states of Austria-Hungary at the end of World War I. It consisted of the present-day territories of the Czech Republic, Slovakia and (until 1939/29 June 1945) the Carpathian Ruthenia (Carpatho-Ukraine). Its territory included some of the most industrialized regions of the former Austria-Hungary, it was a democratic republic throughout the pre-World War II period, but was characterized by ethnic problems. The ethnic problems were due to the fact that the second and third largest ethnic groups (Germans and Slovaks, respectively) were not satisfied with the political and economic dominance of the Czechs, and that most Germans and Hungarians of Czechoslovakia never really accepted the creation of the new state.

Many Germans, Hungarians and Poles, but also some Slovaks, felt disadvantaged in Czechoslovakia, because the political elite of the country introduced a centralised state and most of the time did not allow political autonomy for the ethnic groups. This policy, combined with increasing Nazi propaganda especially in the industrialised German speaking Sudetenland, led to increasing unrest among the Non-Czech population.

Before WWII, Czechoslovakia became Hitler's target. After the Munich Agreement of 1938, Hitler's troops occupied the ethnic-German border regions of Bohemia and Moravia (the Sudetenland), Hungary received territory in southern Slovakia, and the Slovak and Ruthene regions received an autonomous status for a while. Finally Czechoslovakia ceased to exist in March 1939, when Hitler occupied the remainder of the Bohemian lands and (the remaining) Slovakia was forced to declare independence. During the Second World War the Bohemian lands were designated the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia and were ruled directly by the German state. The newly independent Slovak state became an ally of Nazi Germany. Slovakia's troops fought on the Russian front until the summer of 1944, when the Slovak armed forces staged an uprising against their government. German forces crushed this uprising after several months of fighting.

After World War II, pre-war Czechoslovakia was reestablished, all Germans were expelled from the country and Ruthenia was occupied by (and ultimately ceded to) the Soviet Union. Three years later the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia seized power (1948–1989) following a parliamentary election in which the Communists emerged as the winner and the country came under the influence of the Soviet Union. Except for a short period in the late 1960s (the Prague Spring) the country was characterized by the absence of democracy and relative economic backwardness compared to Western Europe, although its economy remained more advanced than those of its neighbors in Eastern Europe. In the religious sphere, atheism was officially promoted and taught. In 1969, Czechoslovakia was turned into a federation of the Czech Socialist Republic and Slovak Socialist Republic. Under the federation, social and economic inequities between the Czech and Slovak halves of the state were largely eliminated.

In 1989, the country became a democratic country again through the Velvet revolution. In 1992, the federal parliament decided to split the country into the Czech Republic and Slovakia, as of January 1, 1993.