Editing Eastern Bloc (section)

===Tito–Stalin split===
{{further|Tito–Stalin split}}
After disagreements between Yugoslav leader [[Josip Broz Tito]] and the Soviet Union regarding Greece and [[Socialist People's Republic of Albania|Albania]], a [[Tito–Stalin split]] occurred, followed by Yugoslavia being expelled from the [[Cominform]] in June 1948 and a brief failed Soviet putsch in Belgrade.<ref name="wettig156">{{Harvnb|Wettig|2008|p=156}}</ref> The split created two separate communist forces in Europe.<ref name="wettig156"/> A vehement campaign against [[Titoism]] was immediately started in the Eastern Bloc, describing agents of both the West and Tito in all places as engaging in subversive activity.<ref name="wettig156"/>

Stalin ordered the conversion of the [[Cominform]] into an instrument to monitor and control the internal affairs of other Eastern Bloc parties.<ref name="wettig156"/> He also briefly considered converting the Cominform into an instrument for sentencing high-ranking deviators, but dropped the idea as impractical.<ref name="wettig156"/> Instead, a move to weaken communist party leaders through conflict was started.<ref name="wettig156"/> Soviet cadres in communist party and state positions in the Bloc were instructed to foster intra-leadership conflict and to transmit information against each other.<ref name="wettig156"/> This accompanied a continuous stream of accusations of "nationalistic deviations", "insufficient appreciation of the USSR's role", links with Tito and "espionage for Yugoslavia".<ref name="wettig157"/> This resulted in the persecution of many major party cadres, including those in East Germany.<ref name="wettig157">{{Harvnb|Wettig|2008|p=157}}</ref>

The first country to experience this approach was [[Socialist People's Republic of Albania|Albania]], where leader [[Enver Hoxha]] immediately changed course from favoring Yugoslavia to opposing it.<ref name="wettig157"/> In [[People's Republic of Poland|Poland]], leader [[Władysław Gomułka]], who had previously made pro-Yugoslav statements, was deposed as party secretary-general in early September 1948 and subsequently jailed.<ref name="wettig157"/> In [[People's Republic of Bulgaria|Bulgaria]], when it appeared that Traicho Kostov, who was not a Moscow cadre, was next in line for leadership, in June 1949, Stalin ordered Kostov's arrest, followed soon thereafter by a death sentence and execution.<ref name="wettig157"/> A number of other high ranking Bulgarian officials were also jailed.<ref name="wettig157"/> Stalin and Hungarian leader [[Mátyás Rákosi]] met in Moscow to orchestrate a show trial of Rákosi opponent [[László Rajk]], who was thereafter executed.<ref name="wettig158">{{Harvnb|Wettig|2008|p=158}}</ref> The preservation of the Soviet bloc relied on maintaining a sense of ideological unity that would entrench Moscow's influence in Eastern Europe as well as the power of the local Communist elites.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Lewkowicz|first=Nicolas|title=The Role of Ideology in the Origins of the Cold War|publisher=Scholar's Press|year=2020|isbn=978-620-2317269|location=Saarbrucken|page=55}}</ref>

The port city of [[Trieste]] was a particular focus after the Second World War. Until the break between Tito and Stalin, the Western powers and the Eastern bloc faced each other uncompromisingly. The neutral buffer state [[Free Territory of Trieste]], founded in 1947 with the United Nations, was split up and dissolved in 1954 and 1975, also because of the détente between the West and Tito.<ref>Christian Jennings "Flashpoint Trieste: The First Battle of the Cold War", (2017), pp 244.</ref><ref>Karlo Ruzicic-Kessler "Togliatti, Tito and the Shadow of Moscow 1944/45–1948: Post-War Territorial Disputes and the Communist World", In: Journal of European Integration History, (2/2014).</ref>