To this day, Russian espionage operations have a free hand in Austria, with Vienna teeming with FSB/GRU agents and electronic intelligence facilities and the Austrian government being able to do little to impede them due to this treaty. Also, Austrian companies like Svarovski Optik supply the Russian armed forces to this day.
When did Austria reunify? Also 1989?
Austria was occupied, but it was never split like Germany. They immediately got a unified government in 1945 and the joint occupation ended in 1955.
Austria, unlike Allied-occupied Germany, had its own government from 1945 onwards. While Germany was divided into East and West Germany in 1949, Austria remained under joint occupation of the Western Allies and the Soviet Union until 1955; its status became a controversial subject in the Cold War until the warming of relations known as the Khrushchev Thaw. After Austrian promises of perpetual neutrality, Austria was accorded full independence on 15 May 1955 and the last occupation troops left on 25 October that year.
how nice of the commies to leave as long as austria promises not to defend itself
russia never changes, fucking cowards
Won’t comment on that last statement, but the deal wasn’t ‘no self defence’, it was ‘no taking sides’. With Finland, with the allied plans to invade Norway and axis invasion of Norway and allied invasion of Iceland, the Soviets struck a deal requiring the Finns to have a good standing army so they couldn’t be invaded and made use of. They went as far as selling Finland their best fighter aircraft to ensure this. The threat was ‘Fight to stay neutral during a war or we’ll have to invade you again’.
That’s a bit sanitised version of history. Russia might have entertained the thought of finishing business with Finland, but it got such a bloody nose the last time and on top of that, Finland was worth way more as capitalist country that was honoring its huge reparation obligations towards Russia than a crippled communist satellite.
The reasons why Austria was left intact was multifold, the main factor was that Russia only controlled the flat parts that were easy to conquer and hard to defend while the Western Allies controlled the mountainous regions that were easy to defend and hard to conquer. Getting the Western Allies out of those mountains was worth way more than retaining military control of Eastern Austria. Hence “Neutrality” which however was never really able to defend itself, unlike Switzerland. It was always a myth, only kept intact by the cold war never turning hot. Russians had plans to march through Austria in case it every had turned hot in Europe.
Even then it took for Stalin to die for Austria to finally manage to end occupation. There was no way Stalin had ever agreed to that. So Austria was occupied for a full decade primarily because of Russia, not because of the western allies. As a nice bonus, Russia dismantled the industrial facilities in the territory it controlled and shipped it all eastwards. Good thing for Austria, that with western support it could exchange that with up to date machinery, while Russia was stuck with the old stuff.
Austria was allowed to defend itself. It was, however mandated to be neutral and not allowed to join any military alliance, western or eastern. The deal was considered a good deal by all sides (except Germany, who was pissed that Austria got such a good deal and Germany was left in a shitty situation.).
They promised neutrality and not joining Germany.
There’s a HUGE Soviet war memorial in Vienna, I wandered into the plaza by accident and was like “wtf is this doing here?”
Thanking the “liberators”, ignoring the welcome that Austria gave to Hitler.
The Ukrainian flag painted behind it is a nice touch, if it’s still there.
“liberators”
Why the quotes? The Soviet military deserves credit where it’s due when it comes to defending Europe against fascism during WW2
Hitler had a positive approval rating in Austria. It’s like liberating Florida from Trump.
Yes, famously 99.3% totally democratic yes votes for the Anschluss, after the fact and without the votes of the key political dissidents, they were already in prison/KZ.
Why is upper Austria chopped into 2 pieces? And another piece added from Styria?
Also why is upper Austria lower down than lower Austria?
I can answer your second question: Upper and Lower have nothing to do with drawing on a northed map, but rather with the geography of the land. The Alps start to fade out and thus get lower the more you go west in Austria so Lower Austria is physically lower than Upper Austria. Same thing in Bavaria: The Southern part is called Oberbayern (Upper Bavaria) whereas the northern part is Niederbayern (Lower Bavaria).
I think it refers to their location in relation to the river Enns. Upper Austira was called “ob der Enns”, Lower Austria was called “nied der Enns” in the middle ages.
Well, rivers usually flow from higher to lower points, so the explanation is still somewhat correct ;) but to be fair, that’s more the reasoning I found for myself, tieing it to rivers makes more sense in a historical context.
The Danube flows from Upper Austria to Lower Austria, so of course Lower Austria is lower than Upper Austria.
Of course! Thanks!
I can’t tell you why they did it that way but Upper Austria was split along the Danube river.
