Khrushchev's secret speech denounces Stalin
February 25, 1956
In a closed session of the Soviet Communist Party Congress, Nikita Khrushchev spent four hours listing Stalin's crimes: the purges, the torture, the cult of personality, the wartime blunders. The text leaked and electrified the world. Communists in Warsaw and Budapest began to imagine reform. Mao, hearing, was disturbed; de-Stalinization would complicate his own cult of personality.
In context
Also in 1956 (5 other events on record)
- Suez Crisis · Middle East · War
- Hungarian Uprising · Europe · Politics
- Elvis meets Sullivan · North America · Culture
- First transatlantic phone cable · Europe · Technology
- Jackson Pollock dies drunk · North America · Culture
Before and after in Europe
Before and after in Politics
Era
Modern Era (1901–2000), one of 590 events from that era on Saeculum.
Sources