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Hungary remembers picnic that changed the course of history.
1989: Gorbachev was leader of the Soviet Union (kids, ask your parents) and was trying to keep his country going while opening things up to the outside. The old guard, Stalinists were planning a coup (which happened on this day as well two years later that marked the end of the Soviet Union) because this was the start of an exodus out of Communist countries into the West. In a few more weeks, the Berlin wall came down.
Strange, when I was in the military back in the 80's, the Soviets were the big threat as the Cold War was reaching its conclusion. No one could have predicted then that there would be no Soviet Union 10 years later. And it wasn't Reagan, it wasn't the huge military budgets, it was a Hungarian border guard who let 150 East Germans enter into Austria that opened the floodgates. Today, you can travel through 25 European countries without showing a passport. Europe shares a common currency for the first time since the Roman Empire and it's economy is one of the strongest in the world.
I think that Europe feels that 2 World Wars fought on it's soil were enough. I would have to agree.
Now to fix the mess left behind from the Bush administration. *sigh*
1989: Gorbachev was leader of the Soviet Union (kids, ask your parents) and was trying to keep his country going while opening things up to the outside. The old guard, Stalinists were planning a coup (which happened on this day as well two years later that marked the end of the Soviet Union) because this was the start of an exodus out of Communist countries into the West. In a few more weeks, the Berlin wall came down.
Strange, when I was in the military back in the 80's, the Soviets were the big threat as the Cold War was reaching its conclusion. No one could have predicted then that there would be no Soviet Union 10 years later. And it wasn't Reagan, it wasn't the huge military budgets, it was a Hungarian border guard who let 150 East Germans enter into Austria that opened the floodgates. Today, you can travel through 25 European countries without showing a passport. Europe shares a common currency for the first time since the Roman Empire and it's economy is one of the strongest in the world.
I think that Europe feels that 2 World Wars fought on it's soil were enough. I would have to agree.
Now to fix the mess left behind from the Bush administration. *sigh*
