This site is best viewed with
a 4.0 browser and requires javascript
Note: This game, while based in fact, involves a measure of speculation.
The advisers are fictional.
You are Nikita Khrushchev. It is 1956. After only a couple of years in power you have tried to reform the Moscow regime by denouncing the Stalinist past and promoting a more progressive brand of communism. But now your commitment to reform is presenting a dilemma in Poland. After a workers' strikes snowballed into anti-government protests, Polish leaders appear to be making a bid for increased independence from Moscow. They want to restore Wladyslaw Gomulka to the Communist Party leadership. You object to this because Gomulka was expelled from the party in 1951 for supporting Tito's break with Stalin; his reinstatement now would signal unprecedented independence for a Soviet satellite. To maintain control, you have ordered Soviet troops to advance toward Poland's main cities. Gomulka declares that if you use force, the Polish army and people will rise up against the Soviet Union. But if you let him take office, he agrees to remain a loyal member of the Warsaw Pact. You are torn between taking a hard line and sending in the tanks -- as Stalin would have done -- or backing off, allowing greater independence for Poland and other satellites. What do you do?
Politburo
Member
General
Diplomat
Click on an adviser for guidance.
SEND IN THE TANKS
BACK OFF
