Thread:Vorknkx/@comment-3547390-20150204202730/@comment-1496755-20150318085940

We were an Axis power mostly due to the German lineage of our King (we were a monarchy back then). In the First World War we were (again) allies of Germany, and this cost us dearly. Clearly, we had not learned anything from this mistake when we got involved with the Nazis...

Here is a photo of our King (Boris III) meeting with Hitler himself. Supposedly, they were friends, yet after the King's unexpected death (he suddenly got sick and died after a visit in Germany), there were many rumors that Hitler had poisoned him.

The Soviet invading took place mostly during the war itself. It was done either as an attack against an Axis-aligned country (as in our case, even though we officially switched sides shortly before the invasion), or as a "liberation" of a Nazi-occupied country.

This is what happened to Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia - the Soviets freed them from the Nazis, but then forced them to accept a communist regime and become loyal to the USSR.

This kind of "hostile takeover" was one of the reasons for the Cold War. The West formed NATO, then the East responded by forming the Warsaw Pact. And then the world was polarised between these two major blocs for nearly 50 years... living under the fear of a third world war (which would have probably been a nuclear war).

My aunt once told me how scared everyone was of nuclear weapons during the 1960's and 1970's. Intentionally or not, this fear existed in many people's minds. Everyone lived with the thought that a new war could break out at any moment, with catastrophic consequences. These fears were particularly high during the Cuban missile crisis... or the Vietnam war.