1. Includes Russia and the 14 other countries that were part of the Soviet Union

2.  Russia  Ukraine  Belarus  Moldova  Latvia --------  Lithuania ----  “The Baltic States”  Estonia -------  Georgia =====  Armenia =====  “The Caucasus Region”  Azerbaijan ===  Kazakhstan  Kyrgyzstan  Tajikistan  Turkmenistan  Uzbekistan

3.  1917: Vladimir Lenin leads the Bolshevik Revolution that overthrows Czar Nicholas II. The czar and his family are killed, even though he had offered to step down.

8.  He was poisoned, stabbed, clubbed, shot, and drowned before he finally died.  As he was being cremated, he sat up (most likely because his tendons were not severed first).

10.  Stalin instituted the policy of forced collectivization, meaning the government seized all property.  Stalin engineered a famine that cost the lives of 4 million Ukrainians in 2 years.  He also conducted executions of anyone who disagreed with his policies.  In addition, “undesirables” were either exterminated or deported under his rule.

11.  The U.S. and Russia both fought the Nazis.  It wasn’t until after World War II that the Cold War began.  The Cold War was a technology and arms race between the U.S. and the Soviet Union.  Much of the technology we use today is a result of the Cold War.

18.  This means they left their country (which was not allowed except under certain conditions, such as performing with the Olympics or Russian ballet) and did not return.

19.  In satellite countries, communist governments were in place, and people in those countries lived under similar conditions to the Soviet Union

20.  East Germany  Czechoslovakia  Yugoslavia  Romania  Bulgaria  Poland  Hungary  Albania

22.  Western items such as blue jeans, Coca Cola, rock music, McDonalds, etc., were banned by the communist government.

25.  What he actually said was that the working class in capitalist countries would bury their leaders eventually, as had occurred in Russia during the Bolshevik Revolution. His words were interpreted as a threat that he would initiate nuclear war with free western nations. Of course, that never happened.

33.  Under the Soviet system, government allowed abuse of the environment with little or no interference from the people.  The Aral Sea diminished greatly during the Soviet era, due to pollution and overuse.  In 1986, a nuclear power plant (Chernobyl, located near Kiev) had a meltdown which resulted in severe environmental problems that persist to this day.

36.  Gorbachev contributed to the end of the communist era by instituting policies of glasnost (“openness”) and perestroika (“restructuring”).

41.  Yeltsin continued Gorbachev’s policies of glasnost and perestroika, but thought the changes should happen sooner.  When he resigned from the Communist Party, he became the first non-Communist leader of Russia in over 70 years.  In 1994, Yeltsin and U.S. president Bill Clinton signed history’s first detargeting agreement. Since then, no Russian missiles have been aimed at America, and ours are not aimed at them.