THE IRON CURTAIN SPEECH

The Facts:

● On March 5, 1946, Sir Winston Churchill visited Westminster College as the Green Lecturer and delivered "Sinews of Peace," a message heard round the world that went down in history as the "Iron Curtain Speech."

● Speaking to the crowd, Churchill warned: ''From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the continent.''

● His use of the term ''iron curtain'' stuck, and since then has taken on a profound symbolic meaning. We should understand one thing: the term ''iron curtain'' itself had been used throughout history in various contexts. But, it was Winston Churchill who coined the term in reference to the Soviet Union and its allies.

● What does the use of this term connote? Iron suggests brute strength, and in this context, repression. Churchill was expressing that those people living in Soviet-controlled Eastern Europe were subjugated, oppressed, and lacked freedoms. He regarded the ''Iron Curtain'' as horrific and a tragedy because it denied the people of Eastern Europe basic human liberties.

● The portion of Europe behind the iron curtain has typically been referred to as the eastern bloc. Sometimes the term Warsaw Pact is used synonymously.

The Quote of the moment:

“From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest and Sofia, all these famous cities and the populations around them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere, and all are subject in one form or another, not only to Soviet influence but to a very high and, in many cases, increasing measure of control from Moscow.”

Relevant sources:

Source 1

Source 2

Source 3

Source 4- extract from Churchill’s notes for the Iron curtain speech