The Warsaw Pact Established on May 14 1955

The Warsaw Pact

Established on May 14, 1955, the Warsaw Pact (technically named the Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance) was in large part a Soviet response to West Germany’s entry into NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) in December 1954. Founding Signatories: USSR People’s Republic of Albania People’s Republic of Bulgaria Czechoslovak Republic German Democratic Republic (“East Germany”) People’s Republic of Hungary People’s Republic of Poland People’s Republic of Romania

Warsaw Pact members pledged to come to the mutual defense of any member being attacked by hostile forces. Although policies of respect for sovereignty and non-intervention were included in the pact’s language, all of the member nations within the Warsaw Pact were in fact dominated by the Soviet Union. In fact, the Warsaw Pact’s primary strategy was to provide a series of buffer states that would help protect the USSR from invasion from the West.

● The Warsaw Pact and NATO avoided direct conflict, instead implementing containment strategies against each other in Europe. Each side sought to limit the other’s influence within Europe as well as on a global scale. ● From 1989 to 1991, popular discontent within the pact’s member states led to the dissolution of Communist control of those governments. As this process occurred, member states began to drop out of the treaty. ● The Warsaw Pact was officially disbanded in 1991, the same year in which the Soviet Union was dissolved.