Centropa's Cold War Quiz Welcome to Centropa's first online Cold War quiz! Test your knowledge of Cold War facts by choosing the correct multiple choice option. Be sure to click "done" at the end (bottom of the page), so you can see which of your answers were correct, and learn some background information, as well. Enjoy! The Centropa Team OK Question Title * 1. What is your name? (We need this information only for announcing the results) OK Question Title * 2. What is your email address? (Make sure to give us the correct address which you use regularly, as we are going to inform you about the results through this email). OK Question Title * 3. “If Stalin was alive there wouldn’t be anything left of us but a wet spot.” Who reportedly said that and at what occasion? Nikita Khrushchev when he was deposed in 1964. Leonid Brezhnev when he sent Warsaw Pact troops into Czechoslovakia in 1968. Yuri Gagarin when he didn’t salute Khrushchev Andrei Gromyko when he returned from Budapest in 1956 after the Soviets had been chased out. OK Question Title * 4. George H W Bush wrote a letter to Polish strongman Marshall Wojciech Jaruzelski just before the Polish elections of 1989. What did President Bush encourage Jaruzelski to do? Turn Poland over to Solidarity Leave the country Resign immediately Run for president OK Question Title * 5. “It still stinks!” Graffito written on the side of Georgi Dimitrov’s mausoleum in Sofia. What was it referring to? A sewage back-up in 1949 when it was first opened. Someone threw garbage in it after November 1989. Dimitrov had been taken away and cremated in November 1989. Someone had forgotten to take away Dimitrov’s corpse in November 1989, and the air conditioning broke. OK Question Title * 6. Dean Reed, an American, was a household name in East Germany. Who was he? The fifth Beatle The sixth Beach Boy A “rock” singer no one in America had heard of A famous American actor OK Question Title * 7. “Political reform will come to our country when pears grow on apple trees.” Who said that, and what happened to him? Janos Kadar, who was pushed out of the Central Committee of Hungary in 1988. Tudor Zhivkov, pushed out of his job in Bulgaria in 1989. Erich Honecker, pushed out of his job in the DDR in 1989. Nicolae Ceausescu, who was pushed against a wall and shot in December 1989. OK Question Title * 8. Which came first in 1989: Poland voting in the first non-Communist prime minister, or the fall of the Berlin Wall? Poland’s non-Communist PM came first. The Berlin Wall fell first. This is a trick question. They happened at the same time. OK Question Title * 9. “Ab sofort” (immediately) were the two most fateful words in postwar German history. WTF? Please explain. Helmut Kohl’s answer when asked when Ronald Reagan should visit Bitburg in 1985. US General Clay’s response when asked when the Berlin Airlift should begin in 1948. Walter Ulbrecht’s response in 1961 when asked when the Berlin Wall should be built. Günter Schabowski’s answer at a press conference in November 1989 when asked when East Germans would be free to travel. OK Question Title * 10. “But they keep dying on me!” What was Ronald Reagan referring to when he said that? That Leonid Brezhnev died before the two could have substantial talks. That Yuri Andropov died before they had substantial talks. That Konstantin Chernenko died before they had substantial talks. All of the above. OK Question Title * 11. Who was Che Guevara’s East German Jewish girlfriend and what happened to her? Lotte Lenye, who fled to America. Patty Hearst, who was kidnapped by Che when he took over the Symbionese Liberation Army in California. Tamara Bunke, who was shot while crossing a river in Bolivia in 1967. Ulrike Meinhof, who caused the West German authorities a lot of trouble. OK Question Title * 12. Gennadi Gerasiimov, Mikhail Gorbachev’s spokesman, spoke of “the Sinatra doctrine” at a news conference in October 1989. What was he referring to? That the Communist leaders of the Warsaw Pact should act more like Sinatra’s ‘rat pack.’ His response when a reporter asked if, as Bill Clinton quoted Lindsey Buckingham’s Fleetwood Mac song, the Warsaw Pact countries could “Go Your Own Way.” His response when asked if Moscow would soon employ the Brezhnev doctrine the day after Hungary declared itself a multiparty democracy. OK DONE
