What made 1989 the Miracle Year in the Cold War?

Answer 1

This truly was a miracle year, it was the year the Cold War ended.

One after another the countries of Eastern Europe held open multi-party elections and borders were opened.
At the start of the year all countries in Eastern Europe (Poland, East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria), plus the USSR were one-party states where you could be put in gaol for disagreeing with the government, by the end they had all had democratic elections and democratic governments. In many cases the new governments were in the hands of the very people who had been in prison at the start of the year.


The main events were:

• 18th January, Poland - The Polish United Workers' Party votes to legalize Solidarity.
• 15th February, Afghanistan - End of the Soviet war in Afghanistan: The Soviet Union announces that all of its troops have left Afghanistan.
• 24th February, USSR (Estonia) - After 44 years, Estonian flag is raised to the Pikk Hermann Castle tower.
• 16th March, USSR - The Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union approves agricultural reforms allowing farmers the right to lease state-owned farms for life.
• 27th March, USSR - The first contested elections for the Soviet parliament result in losses for the Communist Party.
• 5th April, Poland - The Polish Government and the Solidarity trade union sign an agreement restoring Solidarity to legal status, and agreeing to hold democratic elections.
• 17th May, China - More than 1 million Chinese protesters march through Beijing demanding greater democracy.
• 4th June, China - The Tiananmen Square massacre takes place in Beijing on the army's approach to the square, and the final stand-off in the square is covered live on television.
• 4th June, Poland - Solidarity's victory in Polish elections is the first of many anti-communist revolutions in Central and Eastern Europe in 1989.
• 19th August, Poland - President Wojciech Jaruzelski nominates Solidarity activist Tadeusz Mazowiecki to be Prime Minister, the first non-communist in power in 42 years.
• 19th August, Hungary / Austria - The Pan-European Picnic, a peace demonstration held on the Austrian-Hungarian border.
• 23rd August, USSR - Two million indigenous people of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, then still occupied by the Soviet Union, join hands to demand freedom and independence, forming an uninterrupted 600 km human chain called the Baltic Way.
• 23rd August, Hungary - Hungary removes border restrictions with Austria.
• 10th September, Hungary - The government opens the country's western borders to refugees from the German Democratic Republic. GDR government bans all travel to Hungary.
  
• 30th September, Czechoslovakia - Nearly 7,000 East Germans who had come to Prague are allowed to leave on special refugee trains for the West.
• 7th October, Hungary - The communist Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party votes to reorganize itself as a socialist party, to be named the Hungarian Socialist Party.
• 18th October, Hungary - The National Assembly votes to restore multi-party democracy.
• 7th November, DDR (East Germany) - The Communist government of East Germany resigns, although SED leader Egon Krenz remains head of state.
• 9th November Berlin - The end of the Berlin Wall
  Günter Schabowski accidentally states in live broadcast press conference that new rules for travelling from East Germany to West Germany will be put in effect "immediately". East Germany opens checkpoints in the Berlin Wall, allowing its citizens to travel freely to West Germany for the first.
• 10th November, Bulgaria - After 45 years of Communist rule, Bulgarian Communist Party leader Todor Zhivkov is replaced by Foreign Minister Petar Mladenov, who changes the party's name to the Bulgarian Socialist Party.
• 17th November, Czechoslovakia - The Velvet Revolution: A peaceful student demonstration in Prague is severely beaten back by riot police. This sparks a revolution aimed at overthrowing the Communist government (it succeeds on 29th December).
• 20th November, Czechoslovakia - Velvet Revolution: The number of peaceful protesters assembled in Prague swells from 200,000 the day before to an estimated half-million.
• 28th November, Czechoslovakia - Velvet Revolution: The Communist Party of Czechoslovakia announces they will give up their monopoly on political power (elections held in December bring the first non-communist government to Czechoslovakia in more than 40 years).
• 1st December, DDR - East Germany's parliament abolishes the constitutional provision granting the Communist-dominated SED its monopoly on power.
• 7th December, USSR - The Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic becomes the first of the republics of the Soviet Union to abolish the Communist Party's monopoly on power.
• 10th December, Czechoslovakia - President Gustáv Husák swears in a new cabinet with a non-Communist and then immediately resigns as president.
• 10th December, Mongolia - Tsakhiagiyn Elbegdorj announces the establishment of Mongolia's democratic movement, that peacefully changes the second oldest communist country into a democratic society.
• 17th December, Romania - The Romanian Revolution begins in Timişoara when rioters break into the Committee Building and cause extensive vandalism. Their attempts to set the buildings on fire are foiled by military units.
• 21st December, Romania - Nicolae Ceausescu addresses an assembly of some 110,000 people outside the Romanian Communist Party HQ in Bucharest. The crowd begin to protest against Ceausescu and he orders in the army to attack the protesters.
• 22nd December, Romania - After a week of bloody demonstrations the communist dictatorship of Nicolae Ceauşescu ends. He flees his palace in a helicopter to escape inevitable execution after the palace was invaded by rioters. The Romanian troops, who the day before had followed Ceausescu's orders to attack the demonstrators, change sides and join the uprising.
• 25th December, Romania - Nicolae Ceauşescu and his wife Elena are executed by military troops after being found guilty of crimes against humanity.
• 29th December, Czechoslovakia - former 'dissident' Václav Havel is elected president of Czechoslovakia.

Phew, what a year!

This was followed in 1990 by the 'summer of the funny number-plates'. This summer wherever you went in the tourist spots of Western Europe, you would see cars with number plates you had never seen before. Visitors from Eastern Europe getting their first chance to see the sights of the west.